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Procedia Manufacturing 15 (2018) 1678–1686
Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2017) 000–000
www.elsevier.com/locate/procedia
17th International Conference on Metal Forming, Metal Forming 2018, 16-19 September 2018,
17th International Conference on MetalToyohashi,
Forming, Metal
Japan Forming 2018, 16-19 September 2018,
Toyohashi, Japan
Micro-beam plasma polishing of ground alloy steel surfaces
Micro-beam
Manufacturing plasma
Engineering polishing
Society ofConference
International ground alloy steel2017,
2017, MESIC surfaces
28-30 June
2017, Vigo (Pontevedra), Spain
Tian-tian Deng, Jian-jun Li, Zhi-zhen Zheng *
Tian-tian Deng, Jian-jun Li, Zhi-zhen Zheng*
Costing modelsof Materialfor capacity optimization in Industry
of Science and4.0: Trade-off
State Key Laboratory of Material Processing and Die&Mould Technology ,Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan430074,
State Key Laboratory Processing and Die&Mould Technology
China ,Huazhong University Technology, Wuhan430074,

between used capacity and operational efficiency

China

Abstract
Abstract
A. Santanaa, P. Afonsoa,*, A. Zaninb, R. Wernkeb
Polishing provides a commendable approach to gain high quality surfaces after machining or forming processes. A micro-beam
Polishing provideswas
plasma polishing a commendable
presented in approach to gain
thisa paper. highmetal
Several
University of Minho,quality surfaces
materials
4800-058 aftertested
were
Guimarães, machining or forming
and SUS304
Portugal wasprocesses. A micro-beam
used to find optimized
plasma polishing
parameters. was presented
A numerical in this
simulation modelpaper.
b
wasSeveral metalonmaterials
established
Unochapecó, 89809-000 COMSOL were
Chapecó, tested to
software
SC, Brazil andhelp
SUS304
digestwas
meltused
pooltodynamics
find optimized
which
parameters. A numerical
influences roughness a lot.simulation model was
The experiment showedestablished on COMSOL
a reduction software
of roughness to help digest
from Ra=4.07μm melt pool dynamics
to Ra=0.46μm which
with optimized
influences
parameters.roughness a lot.proved
The simulation The experiment showed
that the increase a reduction
in electric of can
current roughness
increasefrom
meltRa=4.07μm towhich
pool velocity, Ra=0.46μm withofoptimized
is in favor obtaining
parameters. The surface.
a smooth finish simulation proved that the increase in electric current can increase melt pool velocity, which is in favor of obtaining
Abstract
a smooth finish surface.
© 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.
© 2018
2018 the
Under The Authors.
concept Published by
of "Industry Elsevier B.V.
© The
Peer-review Authors.
Peer-review under
Published
responsibility
under responsibility
by
of the4.0",
of Elsevier
the
production
B.V.
scientific
scientific committeeprocesses
committee ofthe
of 17thwill
the17th be pushed
International
International
to be on
Conference
Conference
increasingly
MetalForming.
on Metal
interconnected,
Forming.
information basedresponsibility
Peer-review under on a real timeof thebasis and, committee
scientific necessarily, much
of the 17thmore efficient.
International In this context,
Conference on Metalcapacity
Forming.optimization
goes beyond
Keywords: the traditional
Melting; aim of capacity
Polishing; Micro-beam maximization,
plasma; Model; Simulation contributing also for organization’s profitability and value.
Indeed, Melting;
Keywords:lean Polishing; Micro-beam
management plasma; Model;
and continuous Simulation
improvement approaches suggest capacity optimization instead of
maximization. The study of capacity optimization and costing models is an important research topic that deserves
1. Introduction
contributions from both the practical and theoretical perspectives. This paper presents and discusses a mathematical
1. Introduction
model for capacity management based on different costing models (ABC and TDABC). A generic model has been
High surface
developed and it roughness
was used tocan lead to
analyze unacceptable
idle capacity andtolerances, increasedtowards
to design strategies friction the
andmaximization
potentially becoming a source
of organization’s
HighThe
of fatigue
value. surface
crack roughness
initiation
trade-off canmaximization
[1].
capacity leadprocess
The to unacceptable tolerances,
ofvspolishing,
operationalwhich increased
could
efficiency friction
reduce androughness
surface
is highlighted potentially
and ofbecoming a source
the workpieces
it is shown to
that capacity
of fatigue crack
obtain the bright
optimization initiation
mightand [1].
hidesmoothed The process
operationalsurface, of polishing, which could reduce surface roughness of the
is an important step in industrial production. Conventional polishing
inefficiency. workpieces to
obtain the
operations
© bright and smoothed
include Published
2017 The Authors. manual polishing, surface, is
by Elsevier mechanical
B.V. an important step in industrial production. Conventional
polishing, electro polishing and electrochemical polishing, etc. polishing
operationsconventional
However,
Peer-review include
under manual polishing,
polishing
responsibility of the mechanical
operations,
scientific such aspolishing,
committee manual electro polishing
polishing,
of the Manufacturing which and Society
electrochemical
is time-consuming
Engineering polishing, etc.
and labor-intensive,
International Conference
However, conventional polishing operations, such as manual polishing, which is time-consuming
mostly depends on the operator’s abilities. What’s more, abrasive blasting and mechanical polishing do not offer an
2017. and labor-intensive,
mostly depends
acceptable on the
solution for operator’s abilities. What’s
precision components, more,
which abrasive
require blasting
selective and mechanical
processing polishing do notpolishing
[2, 3]. Electrochemical offer an
acceptable
Keywords: solution
Cost for precision
Models; ABC; components,
TDABC; Capacity which
Management; Idlerequire
Capacity;selective processing
Operational Efficiency [2, 3]. Electrochemical polishing

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 361 866 0011; fax: 86-27-87554405.

*1.E-mail
Introduction
Corresponding author.
address: Tel.: +1 361 866 0011; fax: 86-27-87554405.
zzz@mail.hust.edu.cn
E-mail address: zzz@mail.hust.edu.cn
The cost of idle capacity is a fundamental information for companies and their management of extreme importance
in modern©production
2351-9789 systems.
2018 The Authors. In general,
Published it isB.V.
by Elsevier defined as unused capacity or production potential and can be measured
in several©ways:
Peer-review
2351-9789 tons
underThe
2018 of production,
responsibility
Authors. of theby
Published available
scientific
Elsevier B.V.hours of the
committee manufacturing, etc.Conference
17th International The management of the idle capacity
on Metal Forming.
Peer-review under
* Paulo Afonso. responsibility
Tel.: +351 253 510of thefax:
761; scientific committee
+351 253 604 741 of the 17th International Conference on Metal Forming.
E-mail address: psafonso@dps.uminho.pt

2351-9789 © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the Manufacturing Engineering Society International Conference 2017.
2351-9789 © 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 17th International Conference on Metal Forming.
10.1016/j.promfg.2018.07.268
 Tian-tian Deng et al. / Procedia Manufacturing 15 (2018) 1678–1686 1679
2 Author name / Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2018) 000–000

and electro polishing will lead to an environmental problem. In order to solve these problems, high-energy beam
polishing, which provides a contact free, automatable and selective area polishing process, had shown promising
potential. When high-energy beam irradiates substrate surface, the input energy of the high-energy beam could melt
the peaks of initial topography with surface tension. Due to surface tension, liquid material is able to flow from peaks
to cavities. In other words, high-energy beam polishing is capable of smoothing the initial substrate by reallocating
the molten components rather than getting rid of excess components.
High-energy beam polishing has been investigated by a plenty of researches owing to its capacity of providing a
contact free and selective area process to reduce surface roughness. Chen and Qiu [4] conducted an experiment to
optimize parameters of laser beam polishing mould steel, and the sample's roughness made from 2316 tool steel is
reduced from about Ra=1.0μm to 0.2μm under the best parameters. Laser polishing of Inconel-718 parts built by laser
metal deposition has been investigated by Dadbakhsh [5], who focused on identifying the optimum process parameters
to achieve an 80% reduction in surface roughness. Pulsed electron beam was used to polish by a committee of Okayama
university professors [6] at first time. In their study, the surface of the huge mould got smooth (minimum Ry=0.7μm)
after being treated by an electron beam of diameter of 60 mm in a short time. In general, high-energy beam is able to
get the reduction of the roughness of the initial surface, when the surface hardness and corrosion resistance of materials
had been improved. Laser polishing and electron polishing have been successfully applied to a variety of metals, such
as tool steel, stainless steel, nickel alloy and titanium alloy [7].
As compare to laser beam and electron beam, plasma beam has no need for vacuum environment but lower
equipment costs. There’s very little study on polishing by plasma beam, so a micro-beam plasma polishing was
proposed in the paper. At first, several metal materials were tested to find the most suitable material. Then the
experimental investigation was undertaken to affirm micro-beam plasma could achieve a decent reduction of surface
roughness by optimizing parameters. Melt pool dynamics significantly influence the surface profile [8], therefore, a
numerical simulation model of micro-beam plasma polishing of ground alloy steel surfaces was established on
COMSOL software. Heat transfer, phase transition, Marangoni force, buoyancy force and latent heat were included in
this two-dimensional model, which is on behalf of topography profile of the experimental sample. The calculated fused
profile conditions were compared with experimental results to verify the availability of micro-beam plasma polishing.

2. Experiments and setups

The equipment for investigations is one modified micro-plasma welding machine PLASMAFIX51. The plasma is
operated in a continuous wave mode. The maximum electric current of 11A could be used. The micro-plasma torch
was made up of a tungsten electrode bur (d=1.0mm), a nozzle (d=1.2mm), a plasma protective cap (d=7mm) and a
pipe liner for centring. During the experiment, argon gas was used to both ionization and protection of alloy steel
from oxidization, and then gas flow rate was set with a constant of 6 L/min for protection and a maximum of 0.5
L/min for ionization. The micro-plasma torch was controlled by a robot hand at a distance of 1mm from alloy steel
surface, meanwhile, samples were irradiated in a horizontal position with the vertical micro-plasma beam interaction
at room temperature. For each parameter, three sets of samples were made to eliminate the effect of systematic errors.
Fig. 1 shows the constitutions of the micro-plasma torch and the procedure of micro-beam plasma polishing.

Fig. 1. (a) Constitutions of micro-plasma torch and (b) procedure of micro-beam plasma polishing.
1680 Tian-tian Deng et al. / Procedia Manufacturing 15 (2018) 1678–1686
Author name / Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2018) 000–000 3

In this investigation, SKD61, FCD500-7, SUS420J2 and SUS304 were used in trial test to probe that if micro-beam
plasma polishing could achieve a decent reduction of surface roughness of most metals and alloys, then the most
suitable material and key variables would be picked out for experiment to find the availability of micro-beam plasma
polishing. The chemical composition of the samples used in the study is given in Table 1. The average surface
roughness of the base material is around 4.00μm.

Table1. Chemical compositions for alloy steel used in study (wt %).

Species Mn C Cr Si S P Mo Ni Mg RE
SKD61 0.50 0.32- 4.50- 0.80-1.20 0.003 0.003 1.00-
0.42 5.50 1.50
FCD500-7 0.60 3.55- 2.34-2.86 0.025 0.08 0.02- 0.03-
3.85 0.04 0.05
SUS420J2 0.50 0.26- 12.00- 0.90 0.03 0.04 0.20 0.60
0.40 14.00
SUS304 2.00 0.08 18.00- 1.00 0.030 0.045 8.00-
20.00 11.00

The samples were measured by a laser scanning confocal microscope VK-X200K. This equipment is equipped to
obtain a three dimensional (3D) topography of polished surfaces. The roughness parameters could be obtained after a
3D-reconstruction, established with the matched software. Then, more detailed measurements of samples were taken
by a digital Microscope VHX-1000. This equipment is able to get the polished surface micro-feature and size of the
molten pool etched with ferric chloride mixture (m(FeCl3) =10g, V(HCl) =30mL, V(H2O) =120mL). A digital
micro-hardness tester was used to measure the hardness with a load of 0.025kg applied for 15s.

3. Modeling processes and governing equations

A two dimensional (2D) model was established to observe dynamic procedure of polishing. Heat transfer, phase
transition, Marangoni force, buoyancy force and latent heat were included in this model. However, MPP is a complex
process that influenced by multiple factors. To dig out accurate key factors in procedure, the secondary factors were
ignored in this model. In order to simplify the model, the following assumptions were made: (1) The metal liquid is
considered as incompressible Newtonian fluid, and the laminar model (spf module) is judged according to the
magnitude of velocity of the molten pool; (2) The input micro-plasma heat source is regarded as a Gaussian heat
flux[7]; (3) The energy and quality loss of the material vaporization are ignored, because of the influence of the metal
vapor is not critical for modeling[9]; (4) The micro-plasma arc is protected by a pure argon environment, and there is
no oxidation[9]. (5) The initial topography of sample is replaced by one sinusoid, and the size of the sinusoid is
determined by the real size of initial topography observed by VK-X200K; (6) The material is homogeneous and
isotropic. The density and viscosity of the material in the liquid phase region are constant [10].
Based on the above assumptions, conservation of mass, conservation of momentum and conservation of energy
were used [9, 10, 11]. The equation of conservation of mass is given by Eq. (1):

𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌
+ 𝛻𝛻𝛻𝛻 ∙ (𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝑣𝑣𝑣𝑣⃗) = 0 , (1)
𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜕

where ρ is the density , t is the time and 𝑣𝑣𝑣𝑣⃗ is the melting metal velocity in respective directions. Generally, the
change in mass density ρ is not considered, Eq. (1) can be simplified as,
∇∙v=0, (2)

The conservation of momentum is given by Eq. (3):

∂
(𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝑣𝑣𝑣𝑣) + ∇ ∙ (𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝑣𝑣𝑣𝑣⃗𝑣𝑣𝑣𝑣⃗) = −∇𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝 + 𝜇𝜇𝜇𝜇∇2 𝑣𝑣𝑣𝑣 + 𝐹𝐹𝐹𝐹 , (3)
∂t

where 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝 is the pressure force and 𝜇𝜇𝜇𝜇 is the viscosity. To solve phase transition issue, F which is consisted of the
 Tian-tian Deng et al. / Procedia Manufacturing 15 (2018) 1678–1686 1681
4 Author name / Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2018) 000–000

following equations Eq. (4) is added,

(1−𝛽𝛽𝛽𝛽)2
F = (𝛽𝛽𝛽𝛽3 𝐴𝐴𝐴𝐴𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 (𝑤𝑤𝑤𝑤) , (4)
+𝛿𝛿𝛿𝛿)
where 𝐴𝐴𝐴𝐴𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 is the mushy zone constant, δ is a small number(0.001) to avoid division by zero, β is the volume fraction
of liquid, and the expression is as follows
0 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇 < 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑠𝑠𝑠𝑠
𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇−𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑠𝑠𝑠𝑠
β = �𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇 −𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑠𝑠𝑠𝑠 ≪ 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇 ≪ 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇 , (5)
𝑠𝑠𝑠𝑠 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙
1 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 < 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇
where 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑠𝑠𝑠𝑠 is the initial temperature of the phase transition, 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 is the final temperature of the phase transition, and 𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇,
which is on behalf of a moiety of phase transition temperature, can be defined as 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 − 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑠𝑠𝑠𝑠 = 2𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇.
The conservation of energy is given by Eq. (6):
∂
(𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌) + ∇ ∙ (𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌𝑣𝑣𝑣𝑣⃗𝜌𝜌𝜌𝜌) = ∇(𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘∇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇) + 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆 , (6)
∂t
where H is enthalpy, k is the thermal conductivity, T is the temperature and S is the volumetric heat source. Due to
assumption (3) that the input micro-plasma heat source is regarded as a Gaussian heat flux, heat flux convection can
be given by Eq. (7):
𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃 2𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅
k∇T = 2 exp �− 2 � − ℎ𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐 (𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇 − 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑎 ) . (7)
𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 𝜋𝜋𝜋𝜋 𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟
where P is the total input power, r is the beam diameter, R is radial position within the beam, ℎ𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐 is the heat transfer
coefficient and 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑎 is the ambient temperature.

4. Results and discussion

The final surface topography depends on not only polishing parameters, strategy, but also material. To find out
suitable materials, SKD61, FCD500-7, JIS SUS420J2 and SUS304, with same surface roughness of around 4.00 μm,
were used in trial experiment under the same parameters. Typical optical micrographs are shown in Fig. 2. The
micrographs of four samples have distinct features via observing figures. As we can see in Fig. 2, for FCD500-7,
there is no clear-cut distinction between initial area and polished area. When it comes to SKD61 and JIS SUS420J2,
obvious ripples can be seen, and it will increase the surface roughness and result in a failure for polishing. Finally,
the best suitable material is SUS304. As can be seen from the figures, SUS304 had a stable melt pool width and a
relatively smooth surface morphology. Mai et al. [12] presented the results of an investigation on laser polishing of
304 stainless steel surfaces, without harmful effects after laser rapid melting and solidification. Hence, SUS304 was
chosen for formal experiment to find optimized parameters for SUS304. Table 2 shows the experimental parameters
used for samples of SUS304.

Fig. 2. Typical optical micrographs of trial test (Electric current=10A, scanning speed=10cm/min, plasma gas flux=0.2L/min, shield gas
flux=6L/min, the nozzle height=1mm).
1682 Tian-tian Deng et al. / Procedia Manufacturing 15 (2018) 1678–1686
Author name / Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2018) 000–000 5

Table 2. Experimental parameters used for samples of SUS304.

Electric current(A) 7;8;9;10;11

Plasma gas flux （L/min） 0.2;0.3;0.4;0.5
The nozzle height=1mm ，scanning speed=10cm/min ，shield gas flux=6L/min.

Fig. 3 shows the effect of electric current on polished surface morphology. As seen, a small electric current resulted
in insufficient melting of the polished area (Fig. 3(b)), and a large electric current can produce surface ripples (Fig.
3(f)). A small electric current was unable to provide sufficient thermal for melting and flowing, and then many cavities
were reserved due to a lack of reallocating. At the same time, excessive thermal resulted in excessive energy on
movement of molten pool. In opinion of Ramos and Bourell [13], before the input energy irradiated on the surface of
the metal material comes to a limit on polishing effects, surface roughness decreases with the increase of the input
energy. This phenomenon exists in two different processes: shallow surface melting and excessive surface melting. In
the shallow surface melting, the melting layer thickness is below the peak valley value of the surface. In the excessive
surface melting, the thickness of the melting layer is higher than the peak valley value of the surface. The procedure
of excessive surface melting, which determines the final morphology of the polished surface, is sensitive to input
energy. To achieve a smoother surface morphology, the input energy must be controlled within a reasonable range
which is not exceeding that limit. The detailed relationship between electric current, plasma gas flux and surface
morphology, which is represented by surface roughness (Ra), is shown in Fig. 4. As seen, Ra decreased gradually with
increasing in electric current at the very start, however, Ra increased with continuously increasing the electric current.
Ignorance of electric current, Ra decreased with the increase in plasma gas flux. Nonetheless, Ra is increasing rapidly
when flow rate comes to 0.5 L/min. Both increase in electric current and plasma gas flux can aggrandize the energy
density of plasma beam. The processes of plasma polishing depend on input energy for rapid melting and reallocating.
Increasing input energy is in favour of repeated melting and reallocating, which can remove peaks and cavities on
surface to decrease Ra. Nevertheless, excessive thermal would do harm to polishing effects. Detailed mechanism will
be demonstrated in simulation. In this test, the best minimum Ra = 0.46 μm was achieved when electric current =9 A,
plasmagas flux = 0.3 L/min.

Fig. 3. Effect of electric current on polished surface morphology (Plasma gas flux =0.3L/min).
 Tian-tian Deng et al. / Procedia Manufacturing 15 (2018) 1678–1686 1683
6 Author name / Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2018) 000–000

Fig. 4. Impact of electric current on surface roughness Ra. Fig. 5. Surface characteristics at the border of polished area
(Current=9A, plasma gas flux =0.3 L/min).

After polishing with best parameters, the surface is not inhomogeneous and the topography becomes smooth, as
shown in Fig. 5. Before the polishing, the surface of SUS304, whose Ra is around 4.00 μm after rough handling of
sand blasting, is full of scallops. Not only surface roughness, but surface flatness, dimensional accuracy and position
precision should be considered in a polishing procedure. Therefore, the material removal rate is momentous. As the
topography profile is shown in Fig. 5, the average height is 53.582 μm and the altitude difference is 15.390 μm for
initial profile. As for polished profile, the altitude difference is 1.314 μm, representing an approximate decrease of 91
percent. The average height is 53. 376μm after polishing. The surface topography can get smooth by plasma
affects without distinct material removal rate, which can be caused by metal vapours due to excessive thermal.
Fig. 6 shows the effect of electric current and plasma gas flux on width and depth of molten pool. As mentioned
above, micro-beam plasma polishing could achieve a large decrease in Ra without distinct material removal rate.
What's more, it is important not only to have polishing effects, but also polishing efficiency. In opinion of S.
Marimuthu [14], Higher molten pool width and lower molten pool depth are needed in polishing procedures. As seen
in Fig. 6(a), molten pool width increased gradually with the increase in electric current and plasma gas flux. In Fig.
6(b), molten pool depth increased slowly with electric current and increased rapidly with the increase in plasma gas
flux. To achieve a high polishing efficiency, a bigger current and a smaller gas flow rate can be used in a reasonable
range.

Fig. 6. Impact of electric current and plasma gas flux on width and depth of molten pool.

The 2D model established with COMSOL is consisted of Heat Transfer in Solids (ht), Laminar Flow (spf) and
Deformed Geometry (dg). In addition, Non-Isothermal Flow (nitf) and Marangoni Effect (me) are considered in
multiphysics to simulate authentically. The forces that influence the molten pool dynamics and convection fluid flow
are primarily the surface tension, viscous stress and buoyancy forces [15]. Electric current, which is one of the
important experiment parameters, is substituted by input power in this simulation. Real-time power can be gained
from PLASMAFIX51, and the relationship between electric current and real-time power can be seen in Fig. 7. The
1684 Tian-tian Deng et al. / Procedia Manufacturing 15 (2018) 1678–1686
Author name / Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2018) 000–000 7

diameter of plasma beam is set as 1mm and the input energy is set as a Gaussian distribution. Fig. 8 shows finite
element meshing of the 2D model. Moreover, the basic material properties can be taken from literatures [15, 16].
A typical sequence of polishing process can be seen in Fig. 9. The red line is on behalf of real-time profile, and the
black one presents as initial profile. The maximum temperature (K) is labelled by red figure. When the Gaussian heat
source move from right to left, the location of maximum temperature move from right to left at the same time, which
provides favourable heat transfer from material surface to interior. The velocity inside the melt pool is strongly
influenced by the surface tension gradient of the material (due to Marangoni convection), which depends upon the
surface temperature gradient and the maximum temperature [14]. The surface tension of liquid phase decreases with
the increase of temperature. The temperature at the center of the molten pool is the highest, and the temperature
decreases gradually near the boundaries. The surface tension, whose distribution is opposite to the temperature, drives
the liquid phase to flow from the center of the molten pool to the boundaries. As shown, the velocity in the molten
pool is inconsistent, and the velocity in the middle of molten pool is minimum due to the minimal temperature gradient
in the center of heat source. The velocity near the surface solid-liquid junction increases rapidly, because the
temperature gradient increases quickly away from the center of heat source. The final result of flowing is that the
peaks and cavities on the initial surface are wiped out. The red line (real-time profile) is much smoother than the black
one (initial profile). The real-time profile gets slippery in this 2D model. Fig. 10 shows the development of the
reduction in measured and simulated roughness as a function of electric current. Owing to the actual measurement
errors and the assumptions of the simulation process conditions, the simulation results and the test results have a
certain degree of error. After the maximum point, the maximum error is no more than 10%. The numerical simulation
is of reference significance.

Fig. 7. The relationship between electric current and real-time Fig. 8. Finite element meshing of the simulation model.
power (Plasma gas flux =0.3 L/min).

Fig. 9. Typical sequence exhibiting the polishing process, melt pool dynamics and velocity field (Speed =10 cm/min, current=9A).
 Tian-tian Deng et al. / Procedia Manufacturing 15 (2018) 1678–1686 1685
8 Author name / Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2018) 000–000

Fig. 10. Development of the reduction in measured and Fig. 11. Micro-hardness distribution of polished sample (Current=9A,
simulated roughness as a function of electric current. plasma gas flux =0.3 L/min).

After the polishing treatment, there can be some variations of the mechanical properties. Fig. 11 shows the micro-
hardness profiles. As seen, the hardness of molten pool has a significant increase due to grain refinement. Then in the
heat affect zone, the hardness decreased owning to the enlarged crystal size. The tests were operated in a non-pure
argon environment, and there was very little inevitable oxidation in the surface. For this reason, the maximum hardness
was obtained in the sub-surface. There were no significant variations or abnormal points in hardness from the surface
to the substrate, which confirmed the absence of impurity defects.

4. Conclusion

The following important conclusions can be made from the study.

 Plasma beam can be used to polishing some metals and alloys. Specifically, there was a conspicuous decrease in
surface roughness Ra from Ra=4.07μm to Ra=0.46μm with optimized parameters for SUS304.
 Increasing in electric current and plasma gas flux is beneficial to surface finish, however, excessive thermal can
lead to the increase in surface roughness.
 Micro-beam plasma polishing can achieve a decrease of 91 percent in the altitude difference of surface and a
decrease of 88 percent in the surface roughness. At the same time, the average height on the boundary of polishing
area has indistinctive variation, and it is needed for large area polishing.
 By comparison, plasma gas flux is more important on molten pool depth than electric current. A bigger current
and a smaller gas flow rate are worthy of micro-beam plasma polishing.
 Increase in input energy can increase melt pool velocity, which will result in an uneven surface and the increase
in surface roughness Ra. The error of the latter half simulation is no more than 10%. The numerical simulation
is of reference significance.
 Micro-beam plasma polishing can achieve an improvement in hardness without impurity defects.

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (51435007).
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Author name / Procedia Manufacturing 00 (2018) 000–000 9

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