Enhancing precision machining: evaluation of magneto-rheological abrasive finishing (MAF) for brass and SS-304 material using composite abrasives

Modern machining technique called Magneto-rheological Abrasive Finishing (MAF) overcomes the drawbacks of traditional finishing procedures. Materials with excellent characteristics like brass and SS-304 are widely used in engineering and other fields. Their hardness, however, makes it difficult for conventional finishing techniques to achieve high precision and reduce surface imperfections. The goal of this study is to polish these materials with composite abrasives that have been created using different methods, and it assesses their effectiveness using MAF. To find the best workpiece-abrasive combination, two separate workpieces made of these materials were evaluated with two different abrasives. The output metric of choice was surface finish improvement, expressed as Percentage Improvement in Surface Finish (PISF). The findings showed that, once surface topography was analysed, SiC abrasives produced a PISF of roughly 52.48% for brass when used in wet conditions, whereas Al₂O₃ abrasives produced a PISF of 47.24% for brass under the same settings.