Abstract
Previous investigations into the characteristics of saw operations have concentrated on workpieces of rectangular section. It has been shown that during the early stages of the saw-blade tooth engagement, the size of the chip formed and the thrust force required to achieve a given penetration gradually increase as the tooth traverses the cut. These effects make the characteristics of saw operations sensitive to the breadth of the workpiece, i.e. to the length of the cut. When a workpiece of circular section is cut, the breadth of the workpiece varies throughout the cut. This variation causes changes in the chip-forming action and penetration of the blade as the cut progresses. This paper is a study of these effects with the objective of obtaining analytical expressions for the cutting and wear rates achieved by the blade. An average cutting constant, the ratio of blade penetration to thrust load, has been determined for circular sections, which enables the cutting time to be determined. The wear rate of the blade has been investigated using dimensional analysis and a number of results have been obtainedfor wear testbar materials. The results of these investigations show good agreement with those obtained using rectangular sections when the diameter of the workpiece exceeds a certain minimum value.
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