Aluminium metal matrix composites are considered to be one of the most difficult to machine materials, because of the presence of reinforcements which are much harder than the parent matrix. The machining of these materials has become a very important subject for research. The review of literature on machining and mechanism of chip formation reveals that these aspects have been given relatively little attention during the machining study. This study focuses on the chip formation during the turning of aluminium metal matrix composites and to study the influence of machining conditions and surface roughness on the chip geometry. Coated tungsten carbide inserted cutting tool was used in the present study. Based on the experimental results on chip formation mechanism in machining of Al/SiC composites following conclusions can be drawn. At lower spindle speed (1500 rpm) continuous, spring type and c-type curl chips are formed, whereas at higher spindle speed (2500 rpm) generally, thin segmented, larger c-type thin chip, and tabular helix type chips are formed. At lower spindle speeds and high feed rates the chips formed were found to be unfavorable as the surface roughness values were found to be larger.
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