Use of monocrystalline silicon as tool material for cutting thin metallic foils
Third party funded individual grant
Start date : 01.01.2008
Project details
Short description
The objective of this collaborative project with the University of Applied Science in Furtwangen is the qualification of monocrystalline silicon as a tool material for cutting thin metal foils. For this purpose the precision of well-established manufacturing techniques in microsystems technology is used for the miniaturisation of cutting tools. Aiming at an application for blanking operations especially the brittle material properties of silicon are a limiting factor. On the basis of microcutting experiments in a special test rig and FE simulations a fundamental process knowledge has been created. By means of selective positioning errors as well as different surface properties of the punches due to different manucturing methods, the sensitivity of the silicon punches against process errors was evaluated based on the tool wear and the punch load distribution during the blanking process. The acquired knowledge will be used in the further course of the project for the entire manufacturing of a complete tool system for blanking by microsystems technologies.