Mechanistic approach to predicting the cutting forces in drilling: With application to fiber-reinforced composite materials

In this paper models are developed to predict the thrust and torque forces at the different regions of cutting on a drill. The mechanistic approach adopted to develop these models exploits the geometry of the process, which is independent of the workpiece material. The models are calibrated to a particular material using the well-established relationships between chip load and cutting forces, modified to take advantage of the characteristics of the drill point geometry. The models are validated independently for the cutting lips and the chisel edge for drilling both metals and fiber-reinforced composite materials for a wide range of machining conditions and drill geometry. While the cutting-lips model predictions agree well with the experimental data for both materials, only the chisel-edge model proposed for metals agrees well with the experimental data.