Precision Engineering 33 (2009) 425–429

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Precision Engineering
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/precision

Development of a cutting tool with a nano/micro-textured

surface—Improvement of anti-adhesive effect by considering
the texture patterns
Tatsuya Sugihara ∗ , Toshiyuki Enomoto
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka University, 2-1 Yamada-oka, Suita,
Osaka 565-0871, Japan

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Demand for lightweight aluminum-based composites is rapidly increasing in the transport industry. Gen-
Received 14 August 2008 erally it is considered that aluminum alloys are easy-to-cut materials due to their low hardness. However,
Received in revised form 4 November 2008 it is noted that some serious problems exist. Because of low lubricity against the cutting tool surface dur-
Accepted 17 November 2008
ing deep-hole drilling, milling, and tapping, aluminum chips may adhere strongly to the cutting edge of
Available online 20 January 2009
the tool, leading to tool breakage. To solve this problem, a cutting tool with a nano/micro-textured surface
utilizing femto-second laser technology was proposed in our previous research. A series of face-milling
Keywords:
experiments for aluminum alloy showed that a nano/micro-textured surface promoted anti-adhesive
Cutting
Cutting tool
effects at the tool–chip interface, although adhesion remained a problem. In this study, the ways to
Friction improve the anti-adhesive effect with nano/micro-textures were studied. Based on this, a cutting tool
Tribology with a banded nano/micro-textured surface was newly developed and it was revealed that the surface
Adhesion significantly improved the anti-adhesiveness and lubricity.
Texture © 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Diamond-like carbon film
Aluminum alloy

1. Introduction To solve this problem, we proposed a micro-textured cutting

Such advantages as a high ratio of strength to mass and good
corrosion resistance have rapidly raised demand for lightweight
aluminum alloy composites, especially in the transport industry.
Their low hardness compared to steel makes aluminum alloys easy-
to-cut, but this can be outweighed in certain applications by their
low melting point and high ductility, which make aluminum chips
adhere strongly to the cutting edges of tools, leading to tool break-
age [1]. Then many cutting technologies such as cutting fluid, fluid
supply, and cutting tool surface coating and finishing have been
developed. In particular, diamond-like carbon (DLC)-coated tools
having extremely low friction are being applied in the dry cutting
of aluminum alloys [2], but aluminum chips adhering to DLC-coated
tools [3] require a cutting fluid in practical use. Furthermore, tool
breakage occurs frequently in cutting processes such as deep-hole
drilling, milling, and tapping, in which it is difficult to directly apply
cutting fluid to the cutting point.
∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +81 6 6879 7341; fax: +81 6 6879 7341.
E-mail address: sugihara@cape.mech.eng.osaka-u.ac.jp (T. Sugihara).
tool to determine the role of textured surfaces in: (i) retaining cut-
ting fluid and (ii) reducing actual contact between the tool and chips
[4,5]. Effective application is expected to increase lubricity and pro-
mote anti-adhesive effects at the tool–chip interface. As shown in
Fig. 1(a), a cutting tool with segmented DLC coating was developed
in our previous research [4,5], and it was revealed that the cut-
ting tool maintained good lubricity under wet cutting conditions
as indicated by the evaluation of the shear angle, the cutting force,
and the friction coefficient of the rake face. However, the cutting
tool failed to solve the problem of adhesion, apparently because
segments were large enough – 150 ␮m × 150 ␮m – at tool–chip
contact to make lubricity on the tool face insufficient. Then a
DLC-coated cutting tool with a nano/micro-textured surface using
femto-second laser technology was developed, as shown in Fig. 1(b)
[6]. A series of aluminum alloy face-milling experiments showed
that the nano/micro-textured surface promoted anti-adhesiveness
at the tool–chip interface [7] and, however, the adhesion problem
still remained.
In this paper, the ways to improve the anti-adhesive effect using
nano/micro-textures were studied in order to overcome the above-
mentioned problem. Based on this, a cutting tool with a banded
nano/micro-textured surface was newly proposed to ensure an

0141-6359/$ – see front matter © 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.precisioneng.2008.11.004
426 T. Sugihara, T. Enomoto / Precision Engineering 33 (2009) 425–429
Fig. 1. Previous developed cutting tools with textured surface.
excellent anti-adhesive effect. The cutting performance was also
evaluated.
2. Problems associated with nano/micro-textured cutting
tool surfaces
2.1. Cutting tool with nano/micro-textured surface
Femto-second laser technology was adopted to generate
nano/micro-grooves [8,9] on the rake face of a cemented carbide
cutting tool. Precise regular grooves are produced using linear
polarized femto-second laser energy near the ablation threshold,
and spacing of regular structures about the same as the laser
wavelength [8]. Applying this technology, the regular nano/micro-
grooves 100–150 nm deep and spaced at 700 nm were produced
on the rake face of the cemented carbide cutting tool using a laser
(Canon Machinery Inc., Model Surfbeat R; peak wavelength 800 nm,
pulse width 150 fs, cyclic frequency 1 kHz, pulse energy 300 ␮J).
Grooves were sine-wave-shaped (Fig. 1(b)), which is thought to
make the contact between the tool surface and chip small. Before
Fig. 2. Experimental setup of face-milling tests.
Fig. 3. Geometry of cutting tool.
laser irradiation, the tool surface was polished with diamond slurry
to a surface roughness of P-V 40 nm. After grooving, the plasma-CVD
DLC film was coated on the textured surface to improve anti-
adhesiveness. The coating decreased groove depth 10–20 nm.
2.2. Cutting experiment procedures and performance
Cutting experiments were conducted using a vertical machining
center (Yamazaki Mazak Corp., AJV-18), as illustrated in Figs. 2 and 3
show the geometry of the cutting tool, in which had a single insert.
The center of the cutter was set on the center line of the work-
piece. Table 1 lists the cutting conditions. Dynamometer (Kistler
Co., Ltd., 9257B) was set under the workpiece for measuring three
components of cutting forces.
In cutting performance, the rake face of the cutting tool was
observed after cutting for 1800 m to evaluate tool surface adhesion.
Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) (Hitachi High-Technologies
Corp., S-3400NX) and energy dispersive X-ray spectrometry (EDX)
analysis of the rake face aluminum (Fig. 4) confirmed large adhe-
sion to the rake face of a conventional DLC-coated, namely polished
tool. In contrast, it was found that the nano/micro-texture, par-
ticularly nano/micro-grooves parallel to the main cutting edge,
improved anti-adhesion, but not sufficiently on the cutting tool
surface (Fig. 4(b)).
Then the enlarged SEM observation was done to determine
adhesion to the tool surface in detail (Fig. 5). Although it was
confirmed that nano/micro-grooves were not buried by adhesion
after cutting for 1800 m, as SEM image showed, aluminum adhered
slightly, as EDX-Al imaging showed. Concern arose that adhesion
 T. Sugihara, T. Enomoto / Precision Engineering 33 (2009) 425–429 427

Table 1
Cutting conditions.

Workpiece A5052 W 75 (mm) – L 210 (mm)

Furukawa-Sky Aluminum Corp.
Tool Cemented carbide K10 SEKN42M,
Sumitomo Electric Hardmetal Corp.
Tool geometry Axial rake angle,  A 20◦
Radial rake angle,  R −3◦
True rake angle, ˛ 12.4◦
Corner angle,  45◦
Cutter diameter, D 80 (mm)

Cutting speed 380 (m/min); 1500 (rpm)

Depth of cut 3 (mm)
Feed rate 0.12 (mm/rev.)
Cutting length 180 (m) × 5 passes
Cutting fluid Dry; wet: emulsion type (JIS A1)
Finecut CFS-100, NEOS CO., LTD
Supply rate 12.6 (L/min)

Fig. 6. Rake face of cutting tool after dry cutting (left: SEM image; right: EDX-Al
image).

could become worse with increasing cutting distance, eventually

leading to tool breakage, making it vital to increase anti-adhesive
effects.

3. Anti-adhesive effect with nano/micro-textures

As stated, the nano/micro-textured surface plays two roles,

Fig. 4. Rake face of cutting tool after wet cutting (left: SEM image; right: EDX-Al
image).
Fig. 5. Enlarged rake face of cutting tool with grooves parallel to edge (left: SEM
image; right: EDX-Al image).
namely: (i) retaining cutting fluid and (ii) reducing actual contact
between the tool and chip. To evaluate these two roles individually,
dry cutting experiments were conducted using basically the same
cutting conditions as in Table 1.
In addition to SEM and EDX analysis of the aluminum rake face
after dry cutting for 1800 m (Fig. 6), the aluminum atom concen-
tration on the tool rake face in EDX-Al imaging was measured to
quantitatively evaluate aluminum adhesion (Fig. 7). Compared to
wet cutting, aluminum adhesion in dry cutting increased in the tool
with a nano/micro-texture and, in contrast, aluminum adhesion
decreased in the tool with a polished surface (Figs. 4, 6 and 7).
This is thought to be due to the tool surface making strongly solid
contact with chips in dry cutting. The tool with a polished surface
had such a large contact area between the tool and chips that high
cutting heat was generated, decreasing adhesion and suppressing
the built-up edge. On the other hand, in the tool with a nano/micro-
texture, cutting temperature did not become high due to the small
contact area, making adhesion greater than that in the tool with a
polished surface. Chip material also entered easily into nano/micro-
grooves under solid contact, i.e., nonlubrication.
It was found that wet cutting with the tool having a nano/micro-
texture was superior – the aluminum atom concentration was 3.9%
428 T. Sugihara, T. Enomoto / Precision Engineering 33 (2009) 425–429

Fig. 9. Rake face of the developed cutting tool after wet cutting (left: SEM image;
right: EDX-Al image).

Fig. 7. Concentration of aluminum atom on the rake face of cutting tool.

– in decreasing tool surface adhesion in all types of cutting tool and

cutting conditions.
From the above-mentioned consideration, it was found that
the retention of cutting fluid on the tool surface was essential for
achieving good anti-adhesion. Nano/micro-grooves ensured that
cutting fluid was well retained and that, as a result, anti-adhesion
was high under wet cutting conditions.

4. Proposed cutting tool with banded nano/micro-texture

4.1. Cutting tool development

Two types of textured pattern on the cutting tool surface thought
to be effective in retaining cutting fluid are patterns that (1) pre-
vent retained fluid from leaking from grooves and (2) increase the
amount of retained cutting fluid. Then the DLC-coated cutting tool
with a banded nano/micro-textured surface was newly developed,
as shown in Fig. 8. Nano/micro-grooves in a direction parallel to
the main cutting edge were generated in bands 50 ␮m wide on the
polished tool surface.
The nano/micro-texture is sandwiched between polished sur-
faces, preventing fluid retained in the textured area from leaking.
The banded nano/micro-textured surface is 100–200 nm deep,
increasing the amount of fluid retained. If the banded nano/micro-
textured area acts as a micro-groove, i.e., a slot on the tool surface
(Fig. 1(a)), the concern arises that adhesion will be severe. The
newly developed cutting tool’s nano/micro-grooves are, however,
Fig. 10. Concentration of aluminum atom on the rake face of cutting tool after wet
cutting.
expected to induce very high anti-adhesion, unlike for the cutting
tool with a micro-textured surface.
4.2. Evaluation of anti-adhesion
The results of cutting experiments with the newly developed
tool (Table 1) were analyzed using SEM and EDX analysis of the alu-
minum rake face after wet cutting for 1800 m (Fig. 9) and measuring
the aluminum atom concentration on rake faces of several tools,
including the newly developed one (Fig. 10). From these results,
it was found that the banded nano/micro-textured surface pro-
vided excellent anti-adhesion, reducing adhesion to less than half
compared to the tool having nano/micro-grooves overall.
The observation of the tool surface with an optical scope
(Keyence Corp., VF-7500) was carried out each 180 m in cutting
distance to evaluate changes in adhesion as cutting progressed.

Fig. 8. Newly developed cutting tool with banded nano/micro-textured surface. Fig. 11. Changes in adhesion area on rake face with cutting distance.
 T. Sugihara, T. Enomoto / Precision Engineering 33 (2009) 425–429
Fig. 12. Shear angle in cutting.
Fig. 13. Coefficient of friction on rake face.
Fig. 11 shows the changes of the aluminum adhesion area, which
was calculated with the image analysis from the microphotograph.
Increased adhesion areas were very few in the newly developed
tool—1/15 compared to that of the polished tool and 1/2 compared
to that of the tool with grooves overall.
4.3. Evaluation of tool surface lubricity
As the cutting performance, the cutting shear angle, and cut-
ting force were evaluated. Improving lubricity between the tool –
particularly the rake face – and chips is essential for achieving good
cutting performance. Shear angle increases with decreasing friction
on the rake face, so the shear angle was evaluated.
Shear angle  was calculated by approximation from three-
dimensional cutting to two-dimensional cutting and the following
equation in two-dimensional cutting:
 r cos ˛  t1
c
 = tan−1 , rc =
1 − rc sin ˛ t2
where rc : cutting ratio, t1 : underformed-chip thickness, t2 : chip
thickness, ˛: true rake angle.
429
Underformed-chip thickness t1 was calculated geometrically
and chip thickness t2 was measured using a micrometer (Mitutoyo
Corp., CPM30-25MJ; resolution 1 ␮m) at 2 mm intervals.
In the change in the cutting shear angle with the rotational angle
of insert in wet cutting, the shear angle obtained by the tool with
a banded nano/micro-texture was larger than that of other tools,
achieving the best tool surface lubricity, as shown in Fig. 12.
Results for the coefficient of friction on the cutting tool rake
face calculated by measured cutting forces indicated that banded
nano/micro-textures significantly improved tool surface lubricity
(Fig. 13). We further confirmed that the low friction coefficient
remained constant in cutting experiments.
5. Conclusions
A cutting tool with a nano/micro-textured surface was devel-
oped to improve anti-adhesive effects in aluminum alloy cutting,
with the following findings:
(1) Nano/micro-texture on the cutting tool surface increased adhe-
sion of aluminum chips to the surface in dry cutting, but
decreased adhesion in wet cutting.
(2) Improved cutting fluid retention on the tool surface is essen-
tial for achieving a good anti-adhesive effect in aluminum alloy
cutting.
(3) The banded nano/micro-textured cutting tool surface con-
sisting of nano/micro-textured and mirror-polished areas
significantly improved anti-adhesive effects and lubricity of the
cutting tool surface.
Acknowledgments
We thank everyone at Canon Machinery Inc., Nippon ITF Inc.,
and Neos Co., Ltd., for their invaluable assistance and advice. This
research was supported in part by the Machine Tool Engineering
Foundation.
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