Multi-objective optimization of EDM process for titanium alloy Manisha Priyadarshini a , Ajit Behera b , Biswajit Swain b , Swadhin Patel b a Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Institute of Technology, Rourkela 769008, India b Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering, National Institute of Technology, Rourkela 769008, India article info Article history: Received 26 December 2019 Received in revised form 15 March 2020 Accepted 17 March 2020 Available online xxxx Keywords: Material removal Machining Tool wear TOPSIS Surface finish abstract Electro-discharge machining (EDM) is a widely used process for manufacturing industries. It is a non- conventional machining process, where material is removed by the thermal energy of the generated elec- trical sparks between the electrode and workpiece. It is generally used to machine high strength temperature-resistance alloys which are difficult-to-machine. Titanium alloys being a difficult-to- machine alloy, is generally used for parts in aero-space industries, thus its machining should have a higher material removal rate, lower tool wear rate with better surface finish. To achieve these suitable machining responses the process is successfully optimized using Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS). Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Selection and Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 2nd International Conference on Processing and Characterization of Materials. 1. Introduction To sustain in this competitive market, product has to be modi- fied and new product has to be developed. There are many external things which impose for development or modification. Among these materials, technologies, services and the attention paid to the end user requirements are significant. Though technological barriers exist, as in most technology areas, it is important to over- come them by developing proper understanding of process with related attributes. In this direction, next chapter explains the var- ious efforts directed for improving the industrial feasibility of EDM process. Exhaustive literature review reveals that, there are many work carried out in EDM, but less work carried out using copper as tool material with titanium alloy as workpiece. The work represents choosing the best set of parameters among all and a suitable condition for improving EDM performance. In this direc- tion, present work emphasize on the EDM process functionality to understand the multiple interacting phenomena involved with this process and make it more reliable and predictable than other non-traditional manufacturing processes. Now-a-days, advance materials are mostly used due to its remarkable properties. Ti-6Al-4V with its exceptional qualities is widely used in many engineering fields, such as, manufacturing of turbines, inkjets of printers as well as in the case of biomedical, automobile and aerospace industries [1,2]. It has a high strength- to-weight ratio, good temperature stability and noticeable corro- sion resistance. It cannot be machined traditionally with its prop- erties of high melting and low thermal conductivity. Therefore, EDM as a non-traditional machining process, is most effectively used to machine this hard-to-machine alloy. The vanadium free titanium materials has greater mechanical and bio-compatible properties owing to their use in artificial hip joints [3]. The dam- ages occurred by EDM can be reduced by the AECG and to achieve good surface finish. The material is eroded using EDM and then the surface is grounded to achieve a high polished surface. Whereas, including both the processes to manufacture a better element is much expensive. Talon et al. suggested a technique for machining a spur-tooth gear through Ti-6Al-4V alloy utilizing a Wire Electro Discharge Machining [4]. Chattopadhyay et al. have used Taguchi’s design of experiment (DOE) way to deal with direct trial on turning EDM utilizing EN8 steel and copper as work piece-apparatus mix and created exact relations between execution attributes, such as, material removal rate (MRR) and electrode wear rate (EWR) and procedure parameters, for example, peak current, pulse-on- time and rotational speed of tool electrode. It is discovered that peak current and rotational speed of tool electrode influence signif- icantly on both the responses [5]. DOE approaches have been widely used to decide best machining parameters in EDM. The DOE approaches are appropriate to find optimal parametric combi- nation for a single response problem. The method breaks down when numerous outputs are simultaneously optimized due to few specialized and commonsense reasons [6]. The impact of flush- https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2020.03.492 2214-7853/Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Selection and Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 2nd International Conference on Processing and Characterization of Materials. Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Materials Today: Proceedings journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/matpr Please cite this article as: M. Priyadarshini, A. Behera, B. Swain et al., Multi-objective optimization of EDM process for titanium alloy, Materials Today: Proceedings, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2020.03.492