Drilling fiber reinforced plastics (FRPs) manufactured by hand lay-up: influence of matrix (Viapal VUP 9731 and ATLAC 382-05)

Drilling composite materials is a very common and an important process used in industry to perform the assembly of aerospace and automotive composite structures. However, drilling composite materials present a number of problems such as delamination associated with the characteristics of the material and with the used cutting parameters. In order to reduce these problems a study is present with the objective of evaluating the cutting parameters (cutting velocity and feed) and the influence of the matrix under specific cutting force (kc), delamination factor (Fd) and surface roughness (Ra) in two types of matrix (Viapal VUP 9731 and ATLAC 382-05). A plan of experiments, based on the orthogonal array, was established considering drilling with prefixed cutting parameters in two hand lay-up FRPs materials. Finally the analysis of variance (ANOVA) was preformed to investigate the cutting characteristics of FRPs composite material using a cemented carbide (K10) drill with appropriate geometry.