Materials, properties, manufacturing methods and cutting performance of innovative ceramic cutting tools − a review

For mechanical machining the quality of cutting-tool materials is one of the most significant issues that need to be addressed. Enhancement of cutting tool performance may be achieved through the use of modern composition ceramic cutting tools This may be enabled through surface treatment, and also hot pressing and spark plasma sintering – the two main processes used for manufacturing such tools. In this article the advantages and disadvantages of the technologies and processes involved are analyzed and compared to identify the most appropriate methods for creating ceramic cutting-tools. In parallel the latest improvements in ceramic cutting-tool materials are reviewed. The paper shows that the choice of ceramic cutting tools is a quite complex process with a number of important factors to be taken into account.