CFD Analysis of Electrolyte Flow Pattern in Pulse Electrochemical Machining

− ECM emerges out to be one of the major non conventional machining techniques based on Faraday’s laws of electrolysis, highly efficient due to its zero tool wear characteristic. Occurrence of passivation is the major problem faced in ECM. In the present work, study of the flow pattern of electrolyte has been performed so that, the machining variable distribution can be predicted accurately thus passivation can be minimized. A tool was modeled in Pro-E design modeler. This problem is considered as steady state with turbulence model. The model was simulated for various inlet pressures. The results obtained showed that the flow velocity decreases when electrolyte moves towards the work piece and it increases at the outlet. The pressure is minimum at the inlet and maximum at the inter-electrode gap. Turbulence model also depends upon kinetic energy and eddy dissipation rate. The increase in turbulent kinetic energy increases the surface roughness.