A simulation investigation on elliptical vibration cutting of single-crystal silicon

In recent years, elliptical vibration cutting (EVC) has been proven as a promising technique to improve the cutting performance of brittle materials like silicon. However, the influence of vibration parameters on the machined surface quality has not been explored clearly. In this paper, molecular dynamics simulation was carried out to explore the machinable mechanism of silicon by EVC. Firstly, the difference in material removal performance between ordinary cutting (OC) and EVC was discussed. Then, the influence of two critical parameters in EVC, i.e., the vibration amplitude in the depth of cut (DOC) direction and the nominal DOC, on the machined surface quality was explored in detail. The simulation results demonstrate that the vibration amplitude in the DOC direction has a significant influence on the compressive stress and tensile stress distribution, which affects the phase transition and chip pulling-up motion in the EVC process. Based on the simulation results and previous experimental achievements, the high-quality surface can be obtained when the amplitude ratio in the nominal cutting/DOC direction is about 3.5. Furthermore, when the nominal DOC is increased, although the variation of tensile stress is quite small, the increased chip pulling-up distance is responsible for brittle fracture on the machined surface.