The performance of a grinding wheel, however, is not only a complicated function of all grinding wheel parameters such as grain nature and grain dimensions, nature of bond material, volumetric composition of the wheel etc., but, as said before, depends on the grinding conditions also [DECN70].
Micro-design of grinding wheels, i. e. structure and composition of the abrasive layer, follows from the tool components and manufacturing processes as described in the preceding chapters and affects tool performance significantly. The tool topography in the form of the cutting edge density results from the abrasive layer composition and will be characterized in Sect. 6.2 “Cutting Edge Density”. Since grinding wheels wear constantly, tool wear effects (what?, Sect. 6.3) and mechanisms (why?, Sect. 6.4) need to be considered comprehensively when evaluating tool performance. Tool conditioning is a means to secure defined tool profile and sharpness and will also be introduced in Sect. 6.5. This knowledge will allow first discussions of sustainability about tool micro-design and wear at the end of the chapter.
Grinding tool performance is evaluated by several characteristics:
• Grinding ratio G,
• Specific grinding energy,
• Workpiece surface roughness,
• Heat flow into workpiece surface layer,
• Grinding forces in tangential and normal direction Ft and Fn,
• Grinding force ratio p between tangential and normal grinding force, etc.
These characteristics are not only affected by the process design, but significantly by the tool design as described in the following.
© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016 B. Linke, Life Cycle and Sustainability of Abrasive Tools, RWTHedition, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-28346-3_6