ELSEVIER J. Mater. Process. Technol. 42 (1994) 377-390 Journal of Materials Processing Technology Review: Various methods of machining advanced ceramic materials I.P. Tuersley *, A. Jawaid and I.R. Pashby Warwick Manufacturing Group, Department of Engineering, Warwick University, Coventry, CV4 7AL UK (Received February 25, 1993; accepted August 21, 1993) Industrial Summary A collaborative programme has been initiated recently under the title 'Machining of Ad- vanced Engineering Materials Using Traditional and Laser Techniques'. A first step of review- ing the 'state-of-the-art' of the various aspects of this venture has been undertaken, examining aspects of machining Ceramic Matrix Composites (CMCs) by a range of methods, these including grinding, ultrasonics, abrasive water jet, electrical discharge and laser techniques. This paper reports on each and considers the trade-off between the material removal rate and the level of near-surface damage that these processes involve. Key words: Ceramic; Composite; Laser 1. Introduction The last two decades have seen an enormous surge in interest in ceramic materials and, as a result there have been significant advances in their development and usage. Many applications take advantage of some of their inherent properties; as electrical insulators, refractory linings and more recently as thermal barrier coatings. It has been appreciated that there are characteristics of these materials that are particularly useful, including very high hardness and wear resistance and high specific strength, but it is the retention of these properties at elevated temperatures that present ceramic materials as a generic group as potentially unique solutions to a number of engineer- ing application problems. Composite ceramics are being developed to address the well-documented problems of brittle nature and low fracture toughness; reinforcing phases (particulate, whisker or continuous fibre) introduce mechanisms such as crack deflection, crack blunting or load transfer [1]. * Corresponding author. 0924-0136/94/$07.00 © 1994 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved SSDI 0924-0136(93)E0102-M