Experimental study on optimization of WC-Co surface quality by <i>in-situ</i> laser ultrasonic assisted turning

Abstract Tungsten carbide (WC-Co) materials have high strength and hardness, as well as excellent wear resistance, and these properties make the effective machining of WC-Co a technically demanding task. In the conventional machining process, the surface of hard-to-machine materials, such as WC-Co, is prone to severe brittle fracture, and the machining quality is difficult to ensure. In contrast, the in situ laser ultrasonic assisted turning ( in situ LUAT) process has demonstrated efficacy in the machining of such materials. In this study, a systematic optimization analysis of the main influencing parameters in WC-Co in situ LUAT was carried out by response surface design of experiments, and the surface roughness value of the material after machining with the optimal parameter combination was reduced by 47.9%. The surface formation and damage characteristics of WC-Co under different processing modes were analyzed by one-factor comparative experiments, and the main forms of physical and thermal damage on the material surface were systematically analyzed. This study provides a promising machining method for ultra-precision turning of WC-Co materials.