Characterisation of Polishing 316L Stainless Steel with Structured Abrasive Belts

Finishing process like polishing is usually used to obtain high quality mechanical surface characteristics such as texture and roughness. These operations are mainly handmade and need highly trained operators thus limiting their repeatability and profitability. To optimize the industrialization of the polishing process, it is therefore necessary to modelize the process to built efficient parameter database. The aim of this study is to characterise the polishing of 316L stainless steel with structured abrasive belts. The geometric data of the belts are given, and we then propose a model to determine material removal. An experimental test bench is set up to test this model and characterise the polishing process in terms of forces. It produces samples for different polishing conditions. The different polished surfaces are then analyzed thanks to the roughness and the wettability. Using experimental designs, we are able to validate the proposed model and identify the parameters that influence a polishing operation.