On the Influence of Binder Material in PCBN Cutting Tools for Turning Operations of Inconel 718

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper is interesting and describes important practical aspects of turning of Inconel 718.

However, a few inaccuracies can be found in the paper.

I suggest the Authors address the following items:

-        location of the radius measurement presented in Fig.2 on the cutting edge;

-        graph (Fig. 3) presents the recorded cutting force components Fx, Fy and Fz. There is no consistency in description of the vertical axis and forces;

-        line 349 – figure numbering error;

-        I suggest improving the legibility of linear dimensions in Fig. 8, 13, 14, 15,16.

Author Response

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The WORD file has the comments of this review separated in a Table, with each one being answered. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Technically, it is a well-written manuscript. The following minor changes are suggested to improve the quality of manuscript.

Improvement in English language, style and sentence making is required throughout the manuscript.

Line 14-19

These lines are unnecessary in abstract. These should be included in Introduction.

Line 30

….retaining them even at elevated temperatures.

Rewrite the sentence.

Line 43

….when being cut.

Rewrite the sentence

Line 46

What do you mean by “metallurgical damage”?

Line 133-137

These lines appear to be a part of PhD dissertation. Usually not written in such style in a research paper.

Line 145

SEM operating parameters are required.

Line 230

Figure 4a. Provide an optical image showing the clear presence of precipitates.

Line 352

Enlarge the images shown in Figure 8 b, c, and d.

Line 381

Include better quality images in Figure 10, such as in Figure 14.

Line 445

Include better quality images in Figure 13, such as in Figure 14.

Line 532

“……more experiments should be done.” What type of experiments?

Author Response

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The WORD file has the comments of this review separated in a Table, with each one being answered. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

This paper is scientifically interesting and presents the up-to-date subject concerning the machinability of Inconel alloy with superhard tool materials. However, in order to accept, the paper should be subjected to a some revision. The detailed remarks are as follows:  

1. In the current form, the Introduction section could be not interesting for a reader. Please avoid blocks of references, e.g. “ In addition to  their high mechanical properties, these alloys also exhibit high resistance to corrosion and oxidation phenomena, making them suited for a wide variety of industries, such as defense, food processing, automotive and for the aeronautical and aerospace industries, which are the ones that see more use of Inconel 718 [3-5].”, as these do not emphasize the particular aspects from the cited papers. Particularly, when citations are made in reference to specific technical aspects, single/double, e.g. [1, 2] references are encouraged. It is strongly suggested that the references need to make in-depth comments on the content of the cited papers; avoid generic comments. Mention/comment the relevance of the cited paper and especially the research gap associated to it.

2. It is recommended to extend the literature survey by adding the newest works within the scope of machinability heat resistant alloys and novel tool materials, as: - 10.1051/matecconf/201713601006

3. At the end of Introduction please clearly present the novelty of the proposed method towards others in this area.

4. Please put the caption of a Y-axis, of a chart 5c.

5. The statistical sense of fig. 7 is doubtful! Why Authors have applied the regression equation of "kc" parameter for only 2 experimental points (e.g. 602 max and 603 max series)?

6. Please clearly provide how many repetition tests were made for evaluating the flank wear and tool life? In machining science, it is well-known that tool life is a random variable. Thus, the charts depicting tool wear/tool life should have some statistical measures characterizing the variability of the obtained results.  

Author Response

Please see attachment.

The WORD file has the comments of this review separated in a Table, with each one being answered. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

The text is worth publishing. There are small shortcomings. Worth improving. Add more information. Keywords and abstract if they are better, it will probably allow for better indexing in search engines. This will increase the number of article and journal citations. Key considerations are listed below: 1. Provide the full affiliation of all authors. 2. Provide the author's e-mail address for correspondence. 3. In abstract, general content should be eliminated. Include research details and main results. 4. Keywords -start with the most important. Add a keyword related to binder material. This will allow for a better search in the journal's resources. This will increase the number of possible citations. 5. Introduction - You can cite several publications in total in a review. However, a brief characterization of what the authors did should be made later. Each author or team has their own perspective on a given topic. Edge quality control and tool wear control apply to a range of Inconel 718 alloy cutting operations. Refer to "Experimental Study of Inconel 718 Surface Treatment by Edge Robotic Deburring with Force Control" and similar publications. 6. Materials and Methods -Provide the mechanical properties of the alloy being machined. - Give the characteristics of the coating on the blade. - Specify exactly what devices you used to measure. Give their parameters and measurement error. What device did you measure the amount of consumption with? -Enter SI units. -Unify the format of units, e.g. s, or [s], etc. 7. Results and discussion -Provide the hardness measurement methodology. -Make sure all drawings are legible. For example, Fig. 4a is not legible. Show the scales in a bright field. - The values shown in Figure 6 are averages? -Explain the markings in Figure 7 (right side). - Improve the readability of Fig. 8b, c, d. -Why did you adopt the description of the vertical axis on tool life in [min]. These are very small values. Are they for such a combination of coverings! Inconel alloy is a very difficult material, but have these values been obtained? Please provide a description in the publication and a more detailed explanation. -Lynx. 16 is good, take care to enlarge the scale division. Fig. 17 is very good. 8. Conclusions You've done parametric research. Make a quantitative and qualitative summary of the results obtained. Try to describe the general research done in the first few sentences. Then summarize your results quantitatively and qualitatively in points.

Author Response

Please see attachment.

The WORD file has the comments of this review separated in a Table, with each one being answered. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 4 Report

Thanks to the improvement, the text has improved in quality. The final decision is made by the chief editor. Thank you for taking the suggestions into account when improving the text. I wish you success in your further scientific career.