Investigation of the Machining Performance of Neem Oil as a Dielectric Medium of EDM: A Sustainable Approach

The Electric Discharge Machining is one of the popular non-traditional approaches which has huge utility in industrial sectors, mostly in die-making industries and as well as in bio-medical fields. But more power consumption, evolvement of unhygienic gases, development of non- biodegradable wastes, etc. are some curtail issues, which leads the poor sustainability of the EDM operation. In this approach, transesterified neem is introduced as a new and green dielectric medium of EDM, and its impacts on EDM responses are examined. Here, machining is carried out between 4 A to 10 A ranges of input current, 100 μ-sec to 200 μ-sec of pulse ON time and 10 μsec to 30 μ-sec of pulse OFF time using both kerosene and transesterified neem as a dielectric medium. The responses like MRR, surface roughness, and microscopic views of machined surfaces are analyzed to check the viability of transesterified neem as a dielectric medium of EDM.It is experimentally observed that transesterified neem as a dielectric medium ensured 6.2 % to 15.6 % more removal rate and 12.25 % to 15.45 % less surface roughness than kerosene.