Abrasive finishing is a method where a large number of multipoint or random cutting edges are coupled with abrasive grains as a bond or matrix material for effective removal of material at smaller chip sizes. This article provides a broad overview of the various categories of abrasive products and materials, abrasive finishing processes, and the mechanisms of delivering the abrasives to the grinding or machining zone. Abrasive finishing processes, such as grinding, honing, superfinishing, microgrinding, polishing, buffing, and lapping, are discussed. The article presents a brief discussion on abrasive jet machining and ultrasonic machining. It concludes with a discussion on the four categories of factors that affect the abrasive finishing or machining: machine tool, work material, wheel selection, and operational.

Cutting fluids play a major role in increasing productivity and reducing costs by making possible the use of higher cutting speeds, higher feed rates, and greater depths of cut. After listing the functions of cutting fluids, this article then covers the major types, characteristics, advantages and limitations of cutting and grinding fluids, such as cutting oils, water-miscible fluids, gaseous fluids, pastes, and solid lubricants along with their subtypes. It discusses the factors considered during the selection of cutting fluid, focusing on machinability (or grindability) of the material, compatibility (metallurgical, chemical, and human), and acceptability (fluid properties, reliability, and stability). The article also describes various application methods of cutting fluids and precautions that should be observed by the operator.

This article is a comprehensive collection of machining data, presented in tables, covering most of the commonly used machining operations including turning, face milling, end milling (peripheral), drilling, reaming, and tapping of several materials. It provides starting recommendations for the range of speeds and feeds for various machining operations, parameters for the selection of tool geometry, and guidelines on the selection and identification of cutting fluids.

Engineered components fail predominantly in four major ways: fracture, corrosion, wear, and undesirable deformation (i.e., distortion). Typical fracture mechanisms feature rapid crack growth by ductile or brittle cracking; more progressive (subcritical) forms involve crack growth by fatigue, creep, or environmentally-assisted cracking. Corrosion and wear are another form of progressive material alteration or removal that can lead to failure or obsolescence. This article primarily covers the topic of abrasive wear failures, covering the general classification of wear. It also discusses methods that may apply to any form of wear mechanism, because it is important to identify all mechanisms or combinations of wear mechanisms during failure analysis. The article concludes by presenting several examples of abrasive wear.

This article describes the use of conventional machining techniques, laser cutting and water-jet cutting for producing finished composite parts. It explains two representative polymer-matrix composites--graphite and aramid composites--and discusses the machining and drilling problems such as delamination and fiber or resin pullout. The article describes machining and drilling techniques and the necessary tools and cutting parameters. It presents a description of laser cutting. The article also provides information on the advantages, disadvantages, cutting characteristics, and applications of water-jet cutting and abrasive water-jet cutting.

Stainless steels, based on forging pressure and load requirements, are more difficult to forge because of the greater strength at elevated temperatures and the limitations on the maximum temperatures at which stainless steels can be forged without incurring microstructural damage. This article discusses the forging methods, primary mill practices (primary forging and ingot breakdown), trimming, and cleaning operations of stainless steels. It describes the use of forging equipment, dies, and die material in the forging operation. The article provides an overview of the forgeability of austenitic stainless steels, martensitic stainless steels, precipitation-hardening stainless steels, and ferritic stainless steels. It concludes with a discussion on the heating and lubrication of dies.

This article reviews the friction and wear of various dental materials that have been studied by fundamental wear measurements, simulated service wear measurements, and clinical measurements. The materials include dental amalgam, composite restorative materials, pit and fissure sealants, dental cements, porcelain and plastic denture teeth, dental feldspathic porcelain and ceramics, endodontic instruments, periodontal Instruments, and orthodontic wires. The article describes the correlations of properties, such as hardness, fracture toughness, and wear. It discusses wear mechanism such as sliding adhesive wear, two-body abrasion, three-body abrasion, erosion, and fatigue.

This article identifies the coatings applied to many substrates for both beautification and protection, and the inherent conflicts that exist between the coatings and the buildings they are designed to protect; emphasis is placed on masonry walls. It provides information on the purposes of the coatings in the commercial buildings. The article briefly describes some of the most common types of substrates found in buildings and the coatings commonly associated with each substrate. The selection of the coating system depends on the substrate and service expectations. The article addresses the primary causes of masonry coating problems and also provides a detailed discussion on the wall design considerations, moisture considerations, and coating system challenges in the masonry buildings.

Cold extrusion is a push-through compressive forming process with the starting material (billet/slug) at room temperature. This article provides information on the different types of steels that can be cold extruded. Mechanical presses and hydraulic presses that are specifically designed for cold extrusion with high rigidity, accurate alignment, and long working strokes are described. The article details the factors that are critical in cold extrusion: punch design, die design, and tool design. It summarizes the role of lubricants during extrusion of steel, such as soap lubricant and polymer lubricants. The article describes several procedures for extruding specific steel parts such as tubular parts and stepped shafts. It lists problems such as tool breakage and galling or scoring of tools and explains cold extrusion of aluminum, copper, and nickel alloy parts. The article also discusses the impact extrusion of magnesium alloys.

This article describes some of the mechanical/ electrochemical phenomena related to the in vivo degradation of metals used for biomedical applications. It discusses the properties and failure of these materials as they relate to stress-corrosion cracking (SCC) and corrosion fatigue (CF). The article presents the factors related to the use of surgical implants and their deterioration in the body environment, including biomedical aspects, chemical environment, and electrochemical fundamentals needed for characterizing CF and SCC. It provides a discussion on the use of metallic biomaterials in surgical implant applications, such as orthopedic, cardiovascular surgery, and dentistry. It addresses the key issues related to simulation of the in vivo environment, service conditions, and data interpretation. Theses include frequency of dynamic loading, electrolyte chemistry, applicable loading modes, cracking mode superposition, and surface area effects. The article describes the fundamentals of CF and SCC, testing methodology, and test findings from laboratory, in vivo, and retrieval studies.

Rotary swaging is an incremental metalworking process for reducing the cross-sectional area or otherwise changing the shape of bars, tubes, or wires by repeated radial blows with two or more dies. This article discusses the applicability of swaging and metal flow during swaging. It describes the types of rotary swaging machines, auxiliary tools, and swaging dies used for rotary swaging and the procedure for determining the side clearance in swaging dies. The article presents an overview of automated swaging machines and tube swaging, with and without a mandrel. It analyzes the effect of reduction, feed rate, die taper angle, surface contaminants, lubrication, and material response on swaging operation. The article discusses the applications for which swaging is the best method for producing a given shape, and compares swaging with alternative processes. It concludes with a discussion on special applications of swagging.

This article presents a detailed account on the process flow, composition, alternative sources, and the advancement of ironmaking, steelmaking and secondary steelmaking practices. Some steels, such as bearing steels, heat-resistant steels, ultrahigh strength missile and aircraft steels, and rotor steels have higher quality requirements and tighter composition control than plain carbon or ordinary low-alloy steels. The production of special-quality steels requires vacuum-based induction or electric remelting and refining capabilities. The article explores the types and characteristics of various steel manufacturing processes, such as ingot casting, continuous casting, and hot rolling. It provides an outline of specialized processing routes of producing ultralow plain carbon steels, interstitial-free steels, high strength low-alloy steels, ultrahigh strength steels, stainless steels, and cold-rolled products, and briefly explains the analytical techniques for liquid steels.

This article discusses the classifications, compositions, properties, advantages, disadvantages, limitations, and applications of the most commonly used methods for surface engineering of carbon and alloy steels. These include cleaning methods, finishing methods, conversion coatings, hot-dip coating processes, electrogalvanizing, electroplating, metal cladding, organic coatings, zinc-rich coatings, porcelain enameling, thermal spraying, hardfacing, vapor-deposited coatings, surface modification, and surface hardening via heat treatment.

Independent verification of coating system performance can be based on laboratory testing and/or field exposure. Qualification testing is a critical component to coating system selection. This article focuses on performance evaluations that are used to prequalify coating systems, namely, facility-specific, industry-specific, coating-type-specific, or a combination of these. It describes the standard laboratory tests used to generate performance data, namely, physical, compositional, chemical exposure, and application characteristics tests. The pros and cons of using manufacturer-generated data versus independently generated data are discussed. The article provides information on accelerated corrosion/weathering testing and nuclear level 1/level 2 service coatings qualification. It also describes the procedures for establishing minimum performance requirements and for determining when requalification testing may be required.