Energy-based Analysis of Material Dissolution Behavior for Laser-Chemical and Electrochemical Machining

Laser-chemical and electrochemical machining (ECM) have the common feature that material removal is based on the chemical dissolution on atomic scale. Although, the mechanisms of dissolution and surface modification are quite similar, physical main active principle and corresponding material loadings differ. During laser-chemical machining the material is heated locally and chemical reactions are enabled by heat going into the reaction. On the other hand in ECM the material is dissolved by an electric field support. For this reason, this paper presents the energy-based analysis and comparison of these two material loadings to process performance and material modifications. The results imply that the stability of an electrochemically evolved oxide layer is strongly depending on the local temperature. Furthermore, the results appear that the chemical reaction and thus the dissolution speed depends on the microstructural composition of the workpiece material.