Surface roughness aspects in milling MDF (medium density fibreboard)

Medium density fibreboard (MDF) is an industrial wood product. It is made out of wood waste fibres glued together with resin by heat and pressure. Nowadays MDF products are preferred over solid wood in many applications due to certain comparative advantages. Milling is the machining operation frequently used in manufacturing parts of MDF. The aim of this article is to study the influence of cutting parameters (cutting speed and feed rate) on surface roughness in MDF milling. A plan of MDF milling experiments was performed with prefixed cutting parameters. The objective was to establish correlation between cutting speed and feed rate with the surface roughness in MDF panels after milling. The surface roughness decreases with an increase of spindle speed and increases with the feed rate. The milling tests showed the important role spindle speed plays on the evolution of the surface roughness as a function of material removal rate (MRR). The advantage of using a high cutting speed in MDF milling is evident.