Materials and Design 30 (2009) 160–165

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Materials and Design

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/matdes

A study of plastic strain and plastic strain rate in machining

of steel AISI 1045 using FEM analysis
J.P. Davim *, C. Maranhão
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Aveiro, Campus Santiago, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal

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

Article history: The present paper employs the finite element method to determine the plastic strain and plastic strain
Received 18 January 2008 rate when machining an AISI 1045 steel. A validation of the process using literature experimental values
Accepted 15 April 2008 was also conducted in order to verify if the obtained results with the commercial finite element software
Available online 22 April 2008
were close to those found within the literary research. The comparison shows that finite element mod-
ulation can be used to determine either plastic strain or plastic strain rate if special attention is taken into
Keywords: consideration when using the analytical models. The effect of high speed machining (HSM) in the plastic
FEM analysis machining
strain and plastic strain rate when cutting steel AISI 1045 was observed.
Plastic strain
Plastic strain rate
From the simulations, it can be concluded that both the plastic strain and plastic strain rate can be pre-
AISI 1045 dicted with good precision when machining with the FEM model.
High speed machining (HSM) Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
AISI 1045 steel is widely applied nowadays because of its
mechanical properties and is commonly used in mechanical con-
structions and also as part design. It’s a material with good
machinability and has proven to be capable of providing engineers
a good and reliable solution when submitted to effort, corrosion,
etc. Due to its characteristics, it’s the steel with more applicability
among them all.
High speed machining (HSM) process is being used for manu-
facturing complex machine parts, mould and die, aerospace and
automotive components where maintaining structural integrity
of materials (while removing high volumes of material) is of ex-
treme importance [1–3]. It presents several advantages besides
high removal rates such as reduction in dead times and lower cut-
ting forces, leading to excellent dimensional accuracy and surface
quality as well [4]. Having this said, HSM processes are growing
industrial interest not only because they allow larger material re-
moval rates but also because of the positive influence on the fin-
ished workpiece properties. An interesting feature of HSM
processes is that specific cutting force for a great amount of mate-
rials decreases with the increase in cutting speeds and then reach-
ing a plateau. However, the reason for the cutting forces reduction
is still somewhat unclear. Thermal softening, a decrease in friction
or segmental chip formation (assuming that heat evacuation
through the chip is energetically favourable) at high cutting speeds
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +351 234 370830; fax: +351 234 370953.
E-mail address: pdavim@ua.pt (J.P. Davim).
are possible causes [5]. Unlike conventional machining, where chip
formation is followed by plastic deformation, at HSM serrated chip
or segmentation processes occur [6].
2. Plastic strain and plastic strain rate effects during HSM
Machining of metals is a non-linear process and the complex
coupling between deformation and temperature is not completely
understood nowadays. The deformation process is concentrated
in a small zone and the temperatures that are generated in this zone
greatly affect both the tool and the workpiece. High cutting temper-
atures strongly influence tool wear, tool life, workpiece surface
integrity, chip formation mechanism and also contribute to thermal
deformation of the cutting tool. An increase in temperature in the
primary deformation zone softens the material, allowing for lower
cutting forces and less energy in the shear process [2]. It is com-
monly known that during metal cutting, a great amount of defor-
mation energy is transformed into heat near the tool cutting edge.
A small percentage of this heat is transferred through conduction
to the uncut material ahead of the cutting tool, having an effect in
the integrity of the machined workpiece. The bigger percentage of
heat remains in the removed chip and this produces a local increase
of temperature in a narrow zone where high strain occurs and adi-
abatic shear bands are formed [4] (shear bands can be observed in a
metal if the plastic strain rate is higher than 102 s1).
The nature of the plastic strain and related phenomenon of
materials still remain considerably unclear nowadays. It has been
realized that strain rate and temperature affect material properties,
although strain rate has a greater effect on flow stress in hot-work-

0261-3069/$ - see front matter Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.matdes.2008.04.029
 J.P. Davim, C. Maranhão / Materials and Design 30 (2009) 160–165 161

ing range and a smaller effect in the cold-working range, especially Table 1
when large strains are present [7,8]. Plastic deformation of steel is Literature values (presented in Denkena et al. [13])

temperature sensitive, the rate at which the deformation takes Experimental values
place also has influence on the plastic strain. This sensitivity is di- Cutting speed (Vc) (m/min) 300 (conventional machining) 3000 (HSM)
rectly related with time and temperature dependency of the mech- Elemental chip thickness (Dx) (lm) 21 10
anisms that govern the deformation and the evolution of the Chip compression ratio (k) 2.1 1.5
deformation in the material. The main mechanism by which plastic Feed (f) (mm/rev) 0.3
Depth of cut (ap) (mm) 3
strain takes place is thermally activated motion of dislocations past Rake angle (c) (°) 6
obstacles that exist within the lattice over a wide range of strain Relief angle (a) (°) 6
rates and cutting temperatures. The material response is signifi- Workpiece material AISI 1045
cantly affected by the nature and density of the obstacles (which Tool material HC P30-P40
Tool coating Ti(CN)/Al2O3
may change as the deformation takes place). When dealing with
metals, experimental results show that the stress required for plas-
tic strain often reduces with the increase of temperature and with
the decrease of plastic strain rate. It can then be said that temper- rate with the finite element analysis when compared to the litera-
ature and plastic strain rate greatly influence the material re- ture data supplied by Denkena et al. [13].
sponse. In general, the stress decreases with the increasing of
temperature and decreasing the plastic strain rate [9]. Actually, 3. Analytic model
temperature and strain rate effects are coupled, since one influ-
ences the other. Temperature affects the rate of deformation, Merchant theory [14] was followed to make all the calculations
which is controlled mainly by a thermally activated mechanism. (all the presented results in the analytic model are based on liter-
On the other hand, plastic strain at high rate generates significant ature values [13]).
heating and cause an increase in temperature which leads to The chip compression ratio is obtained with the following
mechanical instability and the localization of deformation into nar- formula:
row sheets of material (the adiabatic shear bands), which act as
t0
precursor for eventual material failure [7]. k¼ ð1Þ
t
Deformation at low strain rates or under quasi-static loading, is
relatively homogeneous because is governed by slip and twinning where t0 is the measured chip thickness within the experimental
mechanisms. On the contrary, deformation at high strain rates is a process and t is the theoretical chip thickness that can be obtained
much complex phenomenon that is characterized by extreme by
strain localization along the adiabatic shear bands. Each material t ¼ f  sin v ð2Þ
has a different susceptibility to adiabatic shear because it depends
on properties like heat capacity, heat conductivity, strength level, where f is the feed rate and v is the tool position angle.
microstructure, geometry, defects and strain rates. It is also known The shear angle can be obtained by
that adiabatic shear banding precedes material failures at high  
cos c
strain rates. Adiabatic shear banding is usually accompanied by a / ¼ arctg ð3Þ
k  sin c
loss in stress capacity owing to intense thermal softening in the
shear bands and, in many cases, shear bands serve as sites for crack where c is the tool rake angle. The plastic strain was calculated
initiation and growth during subsequent dynamic fracture [10]. using the following method:
Localized adiabatic shearing can be considered a unique conse- 1 þ k2  2k  sin c
quence of severe plastic deformation at high strain rates. As both e¼ ð4Þ
k  cos c
thermal and strain softening lead to rapid deformation localization,
a shear band forms via a nearly adiabatic process. Also of note is Finally, the plastic strain rate can be found with the following
that grain refinement can occur within shear bands and severe formula:
plastic strain (which can reach 5–20) can also appear within these V c  cos c 1
shear bands [11]. e_ ¼  ð5Þ
cosð/  cÞ Dx
Plastic strain rate can be divided in three zones: the low strain
rate region (<1 s1), the medium rate region (comprehended be- where k is the chip compression ratio, Vc is the cutting speed, / is
tween the low and high strain rate region values) and the high the cutting shear angle and Dx is the elemental chip thickness.
strain rate region (above 103 or 104 s1). The influence of these For a cutting speed of 300 m/min:
zones on the flow stress is, respectively, weak, sensitive and great  
cosð6Þ
[7]. / ¼ arctg ¼ 33
2:1  sinð6Þ
Duan et al. [12] showed that the plastic strain rate increases
with the increase of the cutting speed. These authors also con- 1 þ 2:12  2  2:1  sinð6Þ
e ¼¼ ¼ 2:8
cluded that the hardness of the workpiece is able to influence 2:1  cosð6Þ
300
the chip formation and the deformation mechanism.  cosð6Þ 1
e_ ¼ 60  ¼ 30:1  104 s1
The objective was to study the behavior of AISI 1045 steel when cosð33 þ 6Þ 21  106
machined with HSM (in this case, 3000 m/min). Also of note is that
For a cutting speed of 3000 m/min:
a conventional machining (of 300 m/min) was also applied to the
 
workpiece keeping the remaining machining parameters the same. cosð6Þ
/ ¼ arctg ¼ 43
This allowed for a better comparison between both conventional 1:5  sinð6Þ
and high speed cutting regimes. The experimental values worth 1 þ 1:52  2  1:5  sinð6Þ
noting for the calculation of the plastic strain and plastic strain rate e ¼¼ ¼ 2:39
1:5  cosð6Þ
are presented in Table 1 (taken from Denkena et al. [13]). 3000
 cosð6Þ 1
From the developed work within this paper, it was possible to e_ ¼ 60  ¼ 67  105 s1
predict with good precision both plastic strain and plastic strain cosð43 þ 6Þ 10  106
162 J.P. Davim, C. Maranhão / Materials and Design 30 (2009) 160–165

Table 2 4. Finite element analysis

Software input parameters

Workpiece Predicted results may vary with software and with the input
Workpiece length 4.0 mm data so the choice of the software is of extreme importance. A finite
Workpiece height 3.0 mm
element software, specific for machining operations, was chosen to
Workpiece material AISI 1045
Tool simulate the metal cutting process (in this case, a turning opera-
Rake angle 6° tion). Therefore, AdvantedgeTM, supplied by Third Wave Systems,
Rake face length 2.0 mm was used in this study. This commercial software package was
Relief angle 6° built from the start with metal cutting operations in mind, allow-
Relief face length 2.0 mm
Cutting edge radius 0.02 mm
ing to simulate turning, drilling, milling, micro machining, etc in
Material Cemented carbide (P) both two or three dimensions. It uses adaptive meshing to help
Coating (3 layers) Al2O3:0.03 mm improving the quality and the accuracy of the predicted results
TiC:0.015 mm and it also supports several workpiece material library. Unfortu-
TiN:0.015 mm
nately, the solver cannot be controlled by the user (is controlled
Process
Depth of cut 3 mm by the software itself which sometimes can be problematic) but
Length of cut 4.0 mm fast setups for several simulations can be done easily because of
Feed 0.3 mm/rev the easy to use software interface.
Cutting speed 300 and 3000 m/min The input parameters (for the simulation) of the machining
Friction coefficient* 0.69 for 300 m/min and 0.31 for 3000 m/min
Coolant Not used
operation can be found in Table 2.
Simulation Third Wave AdvantedgeTM allows improvement and optimiza-
Maximum number of nodes 12,000 tion of machining processes and with it, is possible to determine
Maximum element size 0.1 mm optimum machining parameters and tool configurations allowing
Minimum element size 0.02 mm
lower cutting and feed forces and temperature, without spending
*
Values obtained using the experimental cutting and feed forces [13]. time and money with experimental processes.
To model the thermal–visco plastic behavior of the workpiece
materials, the software uses a constitutive equation, the
Johnson–Cook law, which can be represented by the following
Table 3 formula:
Errors between analytical and simulation values for both conventional machining and     m 
HSM e_ T  T room
req ¼ ðA þ Ben Þ 1 þ C ln 1 ð6Þ
e_0 T m  T room
Plastic strain (%) Plastic strain rate (%)
300 m/min 2.5 1.4 where e is the plastic strain, e_ is the plastic strain rate (s1), e_ 0 is the
3000 m/min 1.6 6.5 reference plastic strain rate (s1), T is the temperature of the work-
piece material (°C), Tm is the melting temperature of the workpiece
material (°C), and Troom is the room temperature (°C). Coefficient A
is the yield strength (MPa), B is the hardening modulus (MPa) and C
Table 4 is the strain rate sensitivity coefficient, n is the hardening coeffi-
Comparison between analytical and simulation values for both plastic strain and cient and m the thermal softening coefficient [15].
plastic strain rate at conventional machining and HSM (the presented values should The friction coefficient was obtained using the Coulomb model
be considered an average)
and was calculated through the following reasoning:
Plastic strain Plastic strain Plastic strain Plastic strain
(analytical) (simulated) rate (analytical) rate (simulated) F f þ F c  tan y
U¼ ð7Þ
(s1) (s1) F c  F f  tan y
300 m/min 2.77 2.84 2:74  105 2:78  105
3000 m/min 2.36 2.40 6:3  106 6:7  106 where Ff represents the feed force, Fc the cutting force and c is the
tool rake angle.

Fig. 1. Plastic strain distribution in the workpiece, chip and burr. (a) 300 m/min, and (b) 3000 m/min.
 J.P. Davim, C. Maranhão / Materials and Design 30 (2009) 160–165 163

Fig. 2. Plastic strain rate distribution in the workpiece, chip and burr. (a) 300 m/min, and (b) 3000 m/min.

Fig. 4. Comparison between experimentation and simulation for the plastic strain
(a) and plastic strain rate (b) for the machining of AISI 1045. The cutting speed was
Fig. 3. Comparison between experimentation and simulation for the plastic strain
3000 m/min with a feed of 0.3 mm/rev and a depth of cut of 3 mm.
(a) and plastic strain rate (b) for the machining of AISI 1045. The cutting speed was
300 m/min with a feed of 0.3 mm/rev and a depth of cut of 3 mm.

It is also important to refer that the workpiece height is more tance to obtain simulations with good precision and the RTS (rela-
than 5 times bigger than the feed. This ratio is of extreme impor- tive tool sharpness) which is, by definition
164 J.P. Davim, C. Maranhão / Materials and Design 30 (2009) 160–165
tr
RTS ¼ ð8Þ
rn
where tr is the uncut chip thickness (mainly affected by the feed)
and rn is the tool edge radius [16,17] is bigger than 10 which is con-
sidered to be the minimum value to have reliable simulations.
5. Results and discussion
In this paper, the validation was made using the experimental
data given in Denkena et al. [13] so it was possible to calculate both
experimental plastic strain and plastic strain rate. Therefore, the
obtained results were compared with the predicted values found
in the simulations. The errors between experimentation and simu-
lation were calculated using the following formula and can be
found in Table 3:
jExperimental value  Simulated valuej
Error ¼  100% ð9Þ
Experimental value
In Table 4, a comparison between the analytical and simulated val-
ues for both the plastic strain and plastic strain rate is presented (all
values should be considered an average in the primary shear zone).
Iqbal et al. [18] stated that a realistic value for the friction coef-
ficient is comprehended between 0.6 and 0.75 when machining
AISI 1045 with a cemented carbide cutting tool (with conventional
cutting speeds). The simulations in the present paper were con-
ducted under a friction value of 0.69 for 300 m/min (conventional
machining) and 0.31 for 3000 m/min (HSM). The friction values
were obtained using Coulomb model and the experimental forces.
A validation of the plastic strain and plastic strain rate was con-
ducted in order to verify the simulated values. However, this anal-
ysis was made using analytic methods (with experimental
measured data as an input for the formulation).
In Fig. 1, a comparison of the distribution of the plastic strain in
the workpiece and chip between both cutting regimes is presented.
Like expected, the plastic strain had felt a slight reduction in the
average value from the higher cutting speed to the lower cutting
speed (from 2.84 at 300 m/min to 2.40 at 3000 m/min in the sim-
ulated process and from 2.77 at 300 m/min to 2.36 at 3000 m/min
in the experimental process). This behavior can be explained by the
fact that the workpiece material suffered both a thermal softening
and a friction reduction due to the increase of the cutting speed
from 300 to 3000 m/min. When machined at 300 m/min, the sim-
ulated average temperature was about 1200 °C and when ma-
chined at 3000 m/min, the simulated average temperature
reached about 1400 °C. The friction coefficient, like already men-
tioned, has seen a decrease with the increase of the cutting speed.
The affected zone by the plastic strain is higher when machining at
high speed (comparing with the conventional speed machining).
The comparison between the plastic strain rates on both cutting
regimes can be observed in Fig. 2. The distribution of the strain rate
can be seen in the workpiece and chip. Once more, the results con-
verged to what was initially expected. As the cutting speed in-
creases, the plastic strain rate increases accordingly, showing a
rise from 2:78  105 at 300 m/min to 6:7  106 at 3000 m/min in
the simulated process and from 2:74  105 at 300 m/min to
6:3  106 at 3000 m/min in the experimental process. The affected
zone by the plastic strain rate is also higher when machining at
high speed (comparing with the conventional speed machining).
Also of note is that the elemental chip thickness is more evident
when machining at high cutting speeds and the chip has more curl-
ing when machined at higher cutting speeds (like can be observed
in both Figs. 1 and 2).
In Figs. 3 and 4, a comparison between the simulated and exper-
imental plastic strain and plastic strain rate (using analytical mod-
els) values are presented.
A reduction in the cutting force can be understood as an effect
of thermal softening (this causes a change in the effective stress–
strain curve of the workpiece material, increasing the shear angle
and lowering this way the amount of plastic deformation required
to deform the chip). Although not observed in the simulated pro-
cess, segmented chips cause an additional decrease in the cutting
force due to being energetically favourable.
6. Conclusions
Friction coefficient is significantly lower in high speed machin-
ing (HSM) when compared to traditional speed machining. This
leads to a reduction in the plastic strain, acting together with a
thermal softening due to an increase in the cutting speed. As defor-
mation proceeds, adiabatic heating occurs along the narrow bands
and thermal softening begins to dominate the deformation process.
This has an impact in the flow stress (starts to decrease with the
increase in strain). If a critical strain is reached, mechanical insta-
bility results in strain localization along narrow bands.
It was possible to determine with great precision both the plas-
tic strain and plastic strain rate. For conventional speed machining,
the plastic strain presented an error of only 2.5% and 1.4% for the
plastic strain rate. In high speed machining, the errors are also very
small presenting 1.6% of error in the plastic strain and 6.5% in the
plastic strain rate. Having that said, it is believed that finite ele-
ment analysis can be considered a good method to predict both
plastic strain and plastic strain rate in conventional and high speed
machining.
To sum it all up, the effect of HSM was felt in multiple ways like:
 a considerable reduction in the friction coefficient from conven-
tional to HSM,
 in the chip morphology (more serrated shape in HSM),
 an increase in the cutting temperature which in turn causes a
reduction of the plastic strain, and
 a significant increase of the plastic strain rate from conventional
to HSM.
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the Foundation for Science and Tech-
nology (FCT), Portugal, Project POCTI/EME/61676/2004, for the use
of the software licence AdvantedgeÒ.
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