On Minimum Depth of Cut in nanomachining

The concept of Minimum Depth of Cut (MDC) is that the depth of cut must be over a certain critical thickness before any chip is formed. It is actually a major limiting factor on achievable accuracy in nanomachining, because the generated surface roughness is primarily attributed to the ploughing process when the uncut chip thickness is less than the MDC. This paper presents an analysis of a cutting process where a sharp pointed diamond tool with an edge radius of an atom acts on a crystalline copper workpiece. From the molecular dynamics (MD) simulation results, the phenomena of rubbing, ploughing and cutting were observed. The formation of chip occurred from the depth of cut thickness of 30.0 Ǻ (3nm).