Machinability Study of Al and Mg-based Alloys Using PCM for Selective Material Removal

One of the advanced manufacturing techniques is photochemical machining (PCM) which is a process of selectively removing material using masking and etchant. Aluminum (AI) and Magnesium (Mg) alloys are nowadays useful in a variety of components in the automobile and aeronautical sector due to their specific strength-to-weight ratio. PCM process is used in the current work to machine the Al and Mg-based alloys. In this work, three PCM process parameters such as etching concentration, etching temperature, and etching time are taken into account. In the PCM process, as an etchant, ferric chloride is used. Taguchi
$\mathbf{L}_{9}$
orthogonal array design is employed for experimentation. Response measures such as material removal rate (MRR) and surface roughness (SR) are investigated to determine how process parameters affect Al and Mg-based alloy specimens. Using PCM, the Al 6063 alloy achieves the maximum MRR of2.010 mg/min and the lowest SR values of 1.39
$\mu\mathbf{m}$
than the Mg AZ91D alloy.