Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41

Technology and research developments in powder mixed

electric discharge machining (PMEDM)
H.K. Kansal a,∗ , Sehijpal Singh b , Pradeep Kumar c
aDepartment of Mechanical Engineering, SLIET, Longowal 148106, District Sangrur, Punjab, India
b Department of Mechanical & Production Engineering, G.N.D.E.C., Ludhiana, 147001 Punjab, India
c Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, I.I.T. Roorkee, 247667, India

Received 28 July 2005; received in revised form 11 October 2006; accepted 31 October 2006

Abstract
Powder mixed electric discharge machining (PMEDM) is one of the recent innovations for the enhancement of capabilities of EDM process. In
PMEDM, the electrically conductive powder is mixed in the dielectric of EDM, which reduces the insulating strength of the dielectric fluid and
increases the spark gap between the tool and workpiece. As a result, the process becomes more stable, thereby, improving the material removal rate
(MRR) and surface finish. Moreover, the surface develops high resistance to corrosion and abrasion. This paper presents a tutorial introduction,
comprehensive history and review of research work carried out in the area of PMEDM. The machining mechanism, current issues, applications
and observations are also discussed.
© 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Electric discharge machining; Surface roughness; Material removal rate; Tool wear rate

1. Introduction
Among all the non-conventional machining methods, electric
discharge machining (EDM) is one of the most popular machin-
ing methods for the manufacturing of press tools and various
dies. This process enables machining of any material, which
is electrical conductive, irrespective of its hardness, shape and
strength [1]. Even highly delicate sections and weak materials
can be machined without any fear of distortion because there is
no direct contact between the tool and the workpiece.
Since the invention of EDM in the 1940s, many efforts have
been made to improve the machining performance and stability
of EDM process. Process stability is the key factor for turning
a natural material removal process into a controllable machin-
ing process [2]. Due to continuous process improvement, many
EDM machines have become so stable that these can be operated
around the clock if monitored by an adaptive control system. The
demands for high machining precision with low surface rough-
∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +91 1672 284962(O)/280038(R);
fax: +91 1672 284860/280057/280072.
E-mail addresses: shaarut@yahoo.com (H.K. Kansal),
sehijgnec@yahoo.co.in (S. Singh), kumarfme@iitr.ernet.in (P. Kumar).
ness at relatively high machining rates arise in die, mold and tool
manufacturing industries [2]. To fulfill this requirement, a rela-
tively new advancement in the direction of process capabilities is
the addition of powder in the dielectric fluid of EDM [3–5]. This
new hybrid material removal process is called powder mixed
EDM (PMEDM). The results show that the PMEDM can dis-
tinctly improve the surface finish and surface quality to obtain
near mirror like surfaces at relatively high machining rate [5–7].
Moreover, the surface produced by PMEDM has high resistance
to corrosion and abrasion [8,9]. In this process, a suitable mate-
rial in fine powder form is mixed into the dielectric fluid of EDM.
The added powder improves the breakdown characteristics of the
dielectric fluid, i.e. the insulating strength of the dielectric fluid
decreases and consequently, the spark gap distance between the
electrode and workpiece [3,4,7] increases. Enlarged spark gap
distance makes the flushing of debris uniform. As a result, the
process becomes more stable thereby improving machining rate
and surface finish.
PMEDM also termed as ‘Additive EDM’ was originally
invented during late seventies as a revolutionary technique
for achieving mirror like finish relatively at high machining
rates on already machined components (using conventional
methods) [10,11]. Numbers of researchers have conducted the
experiments to investigate the effects of addition of powder

0924-0136/$ – see front matter © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jmatprotec.2006.10.046
 H.K. Kansal et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41
into dielectric fluid on the performance of EDM. While going
through the available literature on this process, a need is felt
to summarize all the results and conclusions made by differ-
ent researchers. Therefore, this paper is an attempt to provide a
review of the various research activities carried out in the past
decade involving the PMEDM process.
In this paper, the fundamental principle and major techno-
logical developments into the PMEDM process are described.
Although the machining mechanism of PMEDM is not still
clearly understood, the widely accepted principle of the pro-
cess is presented here. The historical perspective of PMEDM
process and its applications are discussed in the next section.
The final part of the paper discusses the current problems and
future direction for the PMEDM research.
2. Technology of powder mixed EDM
This section provides the basic machining mechanism of
PMEDM.
PMEDM has a different machining mechanism from the con-
ventional EDM [3]. In this process, a suitable material in the
powder form is mixed into the dielectric fluid either in the same
tank or in a separate tank. For better circulation of the powder
mixed dielectric, a stirring system is employed. For constant
reuse of powder in the dielectric fluid, a modified circulation
system (Fig. 1) is used.
The experimental setup consists of a transparent bath like
container, called machining tank. It is placed in the work tank of
Fig. 1. Schematic of PMEDM experimental setup.
Table 1
Thermo physical properties of various additives [7]
Powder Density (g cm−1 ) Thermal conductivity (W cm−1 ◦ C−1 )
Al 2.70 2.38
Cr 7.16 0.67
Cu 8.96 4.16
SiC 3.21 1.0–5.0
33
EDM and the machining is performed in this container. To hold
the workpiece, a workpiece fixture assembly is placed in it. The
machining tank is filled up with dielectric fluid (kerosene oil).
To avoid particle settling, a stirring system was incorporated. A
small dielectric circulation pump was installed for proper circu-
lation of the powder mixed dielectric fluid into the discharge gap.
The pump and the stirrer assembly are placed in the same tank
in which machining is performed. The distance between powder
mixed dielectric suction point and nozzle outlet is kept as short
as possible (10 in.) in order to ensure the complete suspension
of powder in the discharge gap. Magnetic forces were used to
separate the debris from the dielectric fluid. For this purpose,
two permanent magnets are placed at the bottom of machining
tank.
The various powders that can be added into the dielectric fluid
are aluminum, chromium, graphite, silicon, copper or silicon
carbide, etc. Their thermo physical properties are tabulated in
Table 1 [7].
The spark gap is filled up with powder particles. When a
voltage of 80–320 V is applied between the electrode and the
workpiece facing each other with a gap of 25–50 ␮m [12], an
electric field in the range of 105 –107 V/m is created. The powder
particles get energized and behave in a zigzag fashion (Fig. 2).
These charged particles are accelerated by the electric field and
act as conductors. The conductive particles promote breakdown
in the gap and increase the spark gap between tool and the work-
piece. Under the sparking area, the particles come close to each
other and arrange themselves in the form of chain like struc-
Electrical resistivity (␮ cm) Melting point (◦ C) Specific heat (Cal g−1 ◦ C−1 )
2.45 660 0.215
2.60 1875 0.11
1.59 1083 0.092
1 × 109 2987 0.18
34 H.K. Kansal et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41
Fig. 2. Principle of powder mixed EDM.
tures between both the electrodes. The interlocking between
the different powder particles occurs in the direction of flow
of current. The chain formation helps in bridging the discharge
gap between both the electrodes. Due to bridging effect, the
insulating strength of the dielectric fluid decreases. The easy
short circuit takes place, which causes early explosion in the
gap. As a result, a ‘series discharge’ starts under the electrode
area. The faster sparking within a discharge takes place causing
faster erosion from the workpiece surface and hence the material
removal rate (MRR) increases. At the same time, the added pow-
der modifies the plasma channel. The plasma channel becomes
enlarged and widened [3]. The sparking is uniformly distributed
among the powder particles, hence electric density of the spark
decreases. Due to uniform distribution of sparking among the
powder particles, shallow craters are produced on the workpiece
surface. This results in improvement in surface finish.
3. Evaluation of PMEDM performance
The various machining characteristics used to evaluate the
performance of PMEDM are: MRR, tool wear rate (TWR), rel-
ative wear ratio (WR) and surface roughness (SR). The MRR
is expressed as the weight of material removed from workpiece
over a period of machining time in minutes.
Workpiece weight loss (g)×1000
MRR (mm3 / min) =
density (g/cm3 )×machining time (min)
(1)
The TWR is calculated by using the weight loss from the tool
divided by the time of machining.
Tool weight loss (g)×1000
TWR (mm3 /min) =
density (g/cm3 )×machining time (min)
(2)
The relative wear ratio of the workpiece and tool is expressed
as:
Tool wear rate
%WR = × 100
Material removal rate
The SR of the workpiece can be expressed in different ways
like, arithmetic average (Ra ), average peak to valley height (RZ ),
or peak roughness (RP ), etc. Generally, the SR is measured in
terms of arithmetic mean (Ra ) which according to the ISO 4987:
1999 is defined as the arithmetic average roughness of the devi-
ations of the roughness profile from the central line along the
measurement. It is shown as:

1 L
Ra = |h(x) dx| (4)
L 0
where h(x) is the value of the roughness profile and ‘L’ is the
evaluation length.
4. Historical perspective of PMEDM
4.1. Experimental investigations of PMEDM
The authors have tried to arrange the literature in the area of
PMEDM as it has been reported.
Erden and Bilgin [10] reported the experimental and the-
oretical investigations to determine the effect of impurities in
dielectric fluid of EDM in 1980. Copper, aluminum, iron and car-
bon in powder form were mixed into the commercial kerosene
oil as artificial impurities and machining was performed on
brass–steel and copper–steel pairs. It was found that the added
powder improves the breakdown characteristics of the dielectric
fluid. It was further observed that the machining rate increases
with increase in the concentration of the added powder. The
increase in machining rates was obtained due to the decrease in
time lags at high impurity concentrations. It was further observed
that the machining becomes unstable at excessive powder con-
centration due to occurrence of short circuits. Surface quality and
the gap size were also improved by the impurity concentrations.
Thereafter, Jeswani [11] investigated the effect of the addition
of fine graphite powder into kerosene oil. It was reported that
by addition of 4 g/l of fine graphite powder increased the inter-
space for electric discharge initiation and lowered the breakdown
voltage. The machining process stability was improved that
caused around 60% increase in MRR and 28% reduction in WR
(Fig. 3).
Mohri et al. [6,13,14] studied the effects of silicon powder
addition on machining rate and surface finish in EDM. Silicon
powder of 10–30 ␮m size was uniformly mixed in the dielectric
fluid. The machining was performed at low discharge current
(0.5–1 A) for short discharge time (<3 ␮s) with negative polarity.
The fine and corrosion resistant surfaces of roughness less than
2 ␮m were produced. However, this performance can only be
(3)
Fig. 3. Effect of graphite powder addition into kerosene on MRR, TWR and
WR [11].
 H.K. Kansal et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41 35

achieved only at controlled machining conditions (even distribu-

tion of additives into dielectric, short discharge time, etc.). It was
further reported by Narumiya et al. [5] that under specific work-
ing conditions, aluminum (Al) and graphite (Gr) powders yield
better surface finish than the silicon (Si) powder. The best results
(Ra less than 2 ␮m) are obtained for aluminum and graphite pow-
der particles having diameter less than 15 ␮m and concentration
ranges from 2 to 15 g/l.
Kobayashi et al. [15] investigated the effects of suspended
powder in dielectric fluid on MRR and SR. It was reported
that the surface finish of SKD-61 material gets improved with Fig. 5. TIC generation mechanism [21].
the use of silicon powder. Yan and Chen [16–18] studied the
effect of suspended aluminum and silicon carbide powders on
which indicates that the deposited layer thickness increases with
EDM of SKD11 and Ti–6Al–4V. It was observed that the MRR
the increase in concentration of nickel powder.
improves considerably whereas the SR increases. Ming and He
Wong et al. [7] studied the “near-mirror-finish” phenomenon
[19] reported that the additives (conductive and inorganic oxide
in EDM using fine powder (silicon, graphite, molybdenum, alu-
particles) increase the MRR, decrease the TWR and improve the
minum and silicon carbide) mixed dielectric. It was shown that
surface quality of the workpiece quite effectively, especially in
there is great influence of the powder and workpiece properties
mid-finish machining and finish machining phases. The high
on MRR, TWR and SR. Aluminum powder has been reported
additive concentration (above 30 g/l) causes powder-settling
to give mirror finish on SKH-51 workpiece but failed to pro-
problem. A new dielectric circulation system was reported to
duce mirror like finish on surface of SKH-54 material. The
solve this problem. They also proposed the mechanisms of the
semi-conductive silicon and carbon powders were seen to be
machining. Yu et al. examined the effects of aluminum powder
effective in producing about very fine finish conditions. It was
on EDM of tungsten carbide [20]. The aluminum powder allows
further observed that the appropriate settings of electrode polar-
both higher discharge gap and MRR.
ity, pulse parameters and powder characteristics have significant
Uno and Okada [8] investigated the effect of silicon powder
influence on the mirror-finish condition. The negative electrode
mixing on the surface generation mechanism. The EDM with sil-
polarity (i.e. with the tool as the negative electrode) is neces-
icon powder mixed fluid produced glossier surfaces as compared
sary to achieve the mirror-finish condition. A new method for
to those produced by conventional EDM with kerosene fluid. It
forming hard layer containing titanium carbide by EDM with
was argued that EDM with silicon powder mixed fluid led to
carbon powder mixed fluid using titanium electrode is proposed
smaller undulation of a crater because the impact force acting
by Okada et al. [21]. Experimental analysis shows that a thick
on the workpiece is smaller. This results in the stable machining
and smooth TiC layer is formed on the machined surface. The
without short circuit between the electrode and the workpiece. In
phenomenon of deposition of TiC layer on the surface of work-
another study, Uno et al. [9] observed that nickel powder mixed
piece is shown in Fig. 5. The hardness and wear resistance of
working fluid modifies the surface of aluminum bronze compo-
the coated layer is found much higher than that of base material
nents. The nickel powder was purposely used to deposit a layer
(Figs. 6 and 7).
on EDMed surface to make the surface abrasion resistant. The
Furutani et al. [12] reported the accretion of titanium car-
effect of nickel powder on surface abrasion is shown in Fig. 4
bide by EDM with powder suspended working fluid. Titanium
powder of size <36 ␮m and concentration of 50 g/l was mixed

Fig. 4. Effect of nickel powder on surface abrasion [9]. Fig. 6. Effect of nickel powder addition on surface hardness [21].
36 H.K. Kansal et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41

Fig. 7. Effect of carbon powder mixed into dielectric on wear resistance [21].

into EDF-K (Mitsubishi oil). A gap voltage of 320 V and long

pulse interval with negative polarity was set for a smooth and
thick layer of accretion (please see Fig. 8 that depicts a range of
pulse duration and discharge current in which the accretion is
possible). TiC layer grows a thickness of 150 ␮m with a hard-
Fig. 9. Effect of addition of various powders on MRR [22].
ness of 1600 Hv on surface of carbon steel with an electrode of
1 mm diameter. Wang et al. [22] investigated the effect of Al
and Cr powder mixture in kerosene. It was found that machin- powder to the kerosene enhanced the gap distance resulting in
ing parameters (pulse duration, discharge current, polarity, gap higher debris removal rate and material removal depth as shown
between tool and workpiece, nature and concentration of addi- in Figs. 11 and 12. Furthermore, a bridging effect is created
tives in the dielectric fluid) have remarkable influence on the by the added powder and facilitates the dispersion of discharge
machining characteristics. The results indicate that Al and Cr into several increments. Thus, several discharge trajectories are
mixture in kerosene fluid reduces the isolation and increases the formed within a single input impulse and several discharging
gap between the electrode and workpiece. With this, the process spots are created and hence increase the MRR and surface fin-
gets stabilized and considerably enhanced the MRR (Fig. 9). ish. However, the addition of the powder to the kerosene disturbs
Small size particle would have higher suspension effect in the the adherence of carbon nuclides attached to the surface of the
dielectric fluid due to their higher concentration. As a result, electrodes and increases the TWR. It was also observed that SiC
there is higher probability of bridging the gap and producing yields better material removal depth than aluminum powder and
uniform discharge dispersion resulting in good surface finish the increased gap distance caused the extension of slit expansion
(Fig. 10). Rapid accretion of a thin electrode material and rapid during machining as shown in Fig. 13. As shown in Fig. 14, the
manufacturing of a thin electrode was proposed by Mohri [23]. highest removal depth was achieved at the optimal concentration
They reported that tungsten could be accreted in an instant onto of Al (5 g/l) and SiC (25 g/l).
a workpiece with a thin tungsten electrode through its explosion
process.
Chow et al. [24] studied the EDM process by adding SiC
and aluminum powders into kerosene for the micro-slit machin-
ing of titanium alloy. The addition of both SiC and aluminum

Fig. 8. Range of pulse duration and discharge current for accretion [12]. Fig. 10. Effect of addition of various powders on surface roughness [22].
 H.K. Kansal et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41 37

Fig. 11. Effect of addition of powder into dielectric fluid of EDM on gap distance
[24]. Fig. 14. Material removal depth vs. pulse duration [24].

Fig. 12. Variation of material removal depth with concentration of different

added powders [24].

The effect of various powder characteristics on EDM of SKD-

11 material was recently reported by Tzeng and Lee [4]. The
various additives mixed in the working fluid include Al, Cr,
Cu and SiC. It was found that the concentration, size, den-
sity, electrical resistivity and thermal conductivity of powders
significantly affected the machining performance. Addition of
appropriate amount of powders to the dielectric fluid increased
MRR (Fig. 15) and decreased TWR (Fig. 16). For a fixed con-
centration, the smallest size of the particle led to highest MRR
Fig. 15. Effect of pulse on time on MRR at different current [4].
and lowest TWR. It was further observed that Cu powder has
negligible effect on EDM due to its higher density.
A deposition method of lubricant layer during finishing EDM
process to produce parts for ultra high vacuum such as space

Fig. 13. Different added powders cause expansion of slits [24]. Fig. 16. Effect of pulse on time on TWR at different current [4].
38 H.K. Kansal et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41
environment was proposed by Furutani and Shiraki [25]. A solid
lubricant, molybdenum disulphide powder was mixed into the
dielectric fluid to deposit a lubricant layer on carbon steel and
stainless steel under the electrical conditions of high open volt-
age, low discharge current, a short pulse duration and medium
pulse interval. The surface produced by PMEDM showed lower
friction coefficient than that machined by traditional EDM.
Like the other machining method, PMEDM can be divided
into two phases, finish machining and rough machining [3].
Number of authors have reported their research on finish machin-
ing phase [5–9,11–14,22,23], but research on rough machining
phase has been reported only by Zhao et al. [3]. It was observed
that the PMEDM has a different machining mechanism from
conventional EDM. They performed experimental research on
the machining efficiency and SR of PMEDM in rough machin-
ing phase. Their results show that PMEDM process can clearly
improve machining efficiency and SR by selecting proper dis-
charge parameters.
The PMEDM also helps in modifying the surface properties
of the workpiece as explored by Simao [26]. Taguchi method
was used to identify the effect of key operating factors (open
circuit voltage, peak current, pulse on time, electrode polarity
and capacitance) on output measures (electrode wear, work-
piece surface hardness, etc.). It was reported that with the use
of partially sintered electrodes made from WC/Co, a uniform
alloyed/modified surface layer with relatively few micro-cracks
and an average thickness of up to 30 ␮m was formed. A simple
approach for robust design of high speed EDM was proposed
by Tzeng and Chen [27]. For process optimization, the ideal
function of an EDM system along with Taguchi method was
proposed. It was further investigated that the ideal function has
a linear relationship between the input signal (intended dimen-
sion) and the output response (product dimension). The various
control factors (powder concentration, pulse on time, duty cycle,
peak current, etc.) were optimized. Based on the experimental
results, it was concluded that the most important factors affect-
ing the EDM process robustness are pulse on time, duty cycle
and peak current.
Very recently, Pecas and Henriques [28] investigated the
influence of silicon powder mixed dielectric on conventional
EDM. The surface quality is assessed through quality surface
indicators and process time measurements over a set of different
processing areas. The results show that by addition of 2 g/l sili-
con powder, the operating time and SR decreases. The average
SR depends upon machining area and machining time. The SR
varies from 0.09 to 0.57 ␮m for the area range of 1–64 cm2 .
4.2. Process mechanism of PMEDM
Many researches [2–5,8–12,19,21,27,29] have observed the
behavior of powders added into the working fluid to analyze how
the debris in the gap affects the occurrence of discharge. Despite
the promising results, the key issue of machining mechanism of
PMEDM is not still clearly understood. The role of the powder
particles in the discharge mechanism seems to be complicated.
The absence of the particles results in arcing whereas the pres-
ence of too much powder may cause unstable and inefficient
EDM operation. A stable machining process demands evenly
distributed discharge locations, which depend mainly upon pow-
der concentration and its distribution, bubbles, deionization of
dielectric fluid and surface irregularities of the workpiece [4].
However, the powder in the discharge gap may be regarded as
the most important factor for process stability as it has a signifi-
cant influence on the factors like discharge transitivity, gap size,
breakdown strength and deionization of dielectric fluid [2,5–6].
It is required to investigate and co-relate the influence of these
factors for the control of PMEDM process.
Schumacher [30] suspended the powders into dielectric fluid
to improve the surface properties. The powder particle facilitates
the ignition process by creating a higher discharge probability
and lowering the breakdown strength of the insulating dielectric
fluid. He also reported the effect of material composition on
surface roughness.
The movement of the debris in the discharge gap of EDM
process was studied by Kunieda and Yanatori [29]. They made
the calculations of debris particle motion caused by the elec-
trostatic forces in the narrow discharge gap filled by dielectric
fluid. The debris particles move towards one electrode and return
to the other repeatedly due to the electrophoresis. The velocity
of the particles is so high that when a pulse voltage is applied,
numerous chains of particles bridge the gap in a very short time
period. During this discharge duration, in the vicinity of the dis-
charge spot, chains are broken due to the explosive expansion of
a bubble of vapour from the dielectric liquid and its dissociated
gases. But far from this discharge spot, most of the chains remain
sustained, and when the next pulse voltage is applied, discharge
occurs after a delay time at another closest spot. It was further
found that the discharge delay time (also called activation time)
is necessary for debris particles to form bridges between both
the electrodes.
Luo [2] confirmed the role of debris in EDM by conducting
experiments on precision EDM. It was observed that the debris
in the discharge gap plays a very dominant role in realizing the
discharge movement. It was reported that machining stability
and discharge transitivity during EDM is improved by the even
distribution of gap debris (please see Fig. 17).
The role of the added powder particles into the dielectric
fluid of EDM was also studied by Zhao et al. [3]. They observed
that the presence of conducting micropowders in the discharge
gap causes electric field aberration. Under the presence of gap
voltage, a plenty of positive and negative charges gather on to
the powder particles. The points, which are nearer to the top or
bottom, have higher electric charge density. The discharge break-
down gets initiated at these points when the electric field density
surpasses the breakdown resistant capability (Fig. 18). As a
result, the discharge passage becomes enlarged and widened.
With this, the redistribution of electric charges takes place and a
series discharge starts between the tool and workpiece causing
increase in MRR and surface finish.
4.3. Modeling of PMEDM process
Regarding the mathematical modeling of PMEDM process,
no research has been reported till date. The efforts by the present
 H.K. Kansal et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41
Fig. 17. Effect of debris in discharge transfer in a spark gap of EDM [2].
Fig. 18. Schematic diagram of “series discharge” in PMEDM [3].
authors are going on to develop a numerical model of PMEDM
process based on finite element method (FEM). The results will
be shown in the follow-up publications.
5. PMEDM applications
The various applications of powder mixed EDM which have
been reported in the literature are discussed in this section.
5.1. Micro-EDM
The use of light, thin, compact and sophisticated mechan-
ical elements has recently become a global trend. Number of
products such as micro-engines, micro-pumps, micro-robots
and other micro-mechanical equipments have been developed
to fulfill the requirements of market. The production of these
microelements with traditional methods is restricted due to var-
39
ious complications. The micro-slit machining of titanium alloy
(Ti–6Al–4V) using PMEDM has been reported by Chow et al.
[24]. The multiple slits microstructure (micro-heat scatter fin)
has been fabricated under the different process discharge con-
ditions. The deposition of lubricant layer on equipment used in
ultra high vacuum such as space, accretion and fabrication of
grinding wheel by depositing very fine abrasive grains has been
reported [12,28,31,32]. The applications of PMEDM technique
in microelectro mechanical systems are highly promising.
5.2. Machining of insulating materials
The machining characteristics of insulating Si3 N4 ceram-
ics by mixing the various powders into the dielectric fluid
were studied by Tani et al. [33]. It was reported that MRR
increased considerably while the surface finish was not suffi-
ciently improved by using the powder suspended dielectric fluid.
In order to improve surface finish, the powder suspended dielec-
tric fluid was used under the limited pulse duration. As a result,
the MRR was comparable to grinding and the surface finish was
improved down to 4 ␮m. Rozenek et al. [31] compared machin-
ing characteristics by using kerosene dielectric and mixture of
deionised water with different abrasive powders at different con-
centrations on hard material. It was reported that the addition of
powder in the dielectric enhances both MRR and TWR.
5.3. Mirror finish
Powders suspended into the dielectric fluid of EDM can also
be used to improve the surface characteristics. Near mirror finish
is reported to be obtained after suspending the metallic powders
(graphite and silicon) into the dielectric fluid of EDM [7]. Dif-
40 H.K. Kansal et al. / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 184 (2007) 32–41
ferent powders were mixed into kerosene oil to understand the
influence of powder and workpiece properties. Aluminum pow-
der reported to give mirror finish on SKH-51 workpieces while
it fails to produce gloss finish on SKH-54 material. The sili-
con and carbon powders seem to be effective in producing very
fine finish conditions. Further, it was noted that it is very impor-
tant to have the correct combination of powder and workpiece
materials.
6. Current problems in PMEDM
Number of issues need to be addressed in future for imple-
mentation of this modified process of machining. Few of them
are discussed here.
Many researchers have shown that powder suspended EDM
machining can distinctly improve the SR and surface quality
in the finish machining phase and obtain nearly mirror sur-
face effects. Despite the promising results, PMEDM process
is used in industry at very slow pace. One of the key reasons is
that many fundamental issues of this new development, includ-
ing the machining mechanism are still not well understood.
The complexity of this process, particularly in context with
thermo physical properties of the suspended particles deserves
a thorough investigation. Secondly, the difficulty in operation
of dielectric interchange, the high amounts of powder con-
sumption, the environmental requirements of fluid disposal and
its higher initial cost (two to three times higher than the one
required for a conventional EDM system) have restricted its fre-
quent use [32]. The optimization of powder characteristics (type,
shape, size concentration, etc.) also urgently needs a thorough
study. The other problems associated with the PMEDM are:
(1) cost effectiveness/working life of powders, (2) concentra-
tion of the working fluid, (3) circulation of mixture of additives
and working fluid, (4) filtration of additives from debris, (5)
agglomeration and (6) arcing. Moreover, very little research has
been reported on the application of PMEDM in rough machining
phase [3].
7. Conclusions
This paper presents a detailed summary of research results
reported in the area of powder mixed EDM. It can be con-
cluded from this review that PMEDM holds a bright promise
in application of EDM, particularly with regard to process pro-
ductivity and surface quality of workpiece. As such, extensive
study is required to understand mechanics of machining and
other aspects of PMEDM.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the support of M/S
Electronica Machine Tools Ltd., Pune, India. We are thankful
to Mr. Kulwinder Singh, Sr. Tech., Tool Room, Department of
Mechanical Engineering, SLIET. We are also grateful to Prof.
P.L. Bali, Department of Mechanical Engineering, LIET, Jaland-
har and Er. Baljit Singh, PSEB, India for their support and
guidance.
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