Development and Application of New Cutting Tool Materials

The development of new cutting tool materials during the last few years is based mainly on submicron hardmetal substrates as well as on new PVD and CVD coatings. The development of submicron and nanopowders with higher strength and higher fracture toughness solves problems in machining high-temp alloys, hard materials, and in dry cutting. Based on physical models used to calculate stress in the substrate and in various coating layers, it is possible to recommend PVD and CVD coatings for interrupted cutting operations such as milling, parting, and drilling or in some cases also for continuous operations like turning and threading. Compression stresses in PVD coating have the advantage in interrupted and impact type of operations, while CVD coating with larger thickness and tensile stress in the coating performs better in continuous operations and higher speeds. The use of TiAlN coating has the advantage in dry and high-speed machining compared to the TiN and TiCN coatings. The use of new coating processes in lower temperatures (MT) improves toughness and tool life in turning. A wide range of ceramic-based tools are developed and used successfully to cover the high-speed machining of materials. Various examples are shown to demonstrate the application range of the various new tool materials. The development of new materials is influenced more and more by the demand for high-speed machining (HSM), dry cutting (DC), and hard cutting (HC).