Intelligen Energy and Sustainable Bio-Composite Manufacturing
Intelligen Energy manufactures sustainable products using a bio-composite material made from approximately 90% recycled content, combining hardwood particles with recovered HDPE.
The material offers several advantages for their products, including exterior durability, no requirement for paint or coatings and a Class B fire rating. However, its high hardwood-fibre content creates a significant challenge during machining: the material is extremely abrasive to cutting tools.
For Intelligen, this was leading to rapid wear of the tungsten-carbide cutters used during production.
Rapid Tool Wear in an Abrasive Material
Intelligen had been machining the bio-composite using cutters with tungsten-carbide cutting edges.
Although carbide performs well in many woodworking and composite applications, the fibres within this particular material progressively abraded the cutting edges over thousands of rotations.
As the cutting edges wore, maintaining consistent cutting performance and finish became increasingly difficult.
Developing PCD Tooling for the Application
Intelligen contacted Prima Tooling to investigate whether PCD tooling could provide a more durable solution.
PCD — polycrystalline diamond — offers extremely high resistance to abrasive wear. For this reason, it was particularly suitable for an application where hardwood fibres were progressively wearing the existing carbide cutting edges.
Prima Tooling manufactured new PCD cutters specifically for Intelligen's production requirements.
The tooling included a specially shaped PCD compression cutter, designed so that the opposing cutting action helps reduce chipping on the upper and lower surfaces of the bio-composite.
For more information about why PCD performs well in abrasive applications, see our Benefits of PCD Cutting Tools article.
Cleaner Cutting and Improved Wear Resistance
Initial production results have been very encouraging.
As a result, the PCD tooling provides a considerably more wear-resistant cutting edge than the previous tungsten-carbide tooling, while the compression geometry has produced a clean cut through the bio-composite material.
Importantly, the tooling was also designed and manufactured quickly, allowing Intelligen to introduce the new cutters without a lengthy interruption to production.
As Intelligen reported after receiving the tooling:
“So far so good and many thanks to the team at Prima for getting these out to us so quickly.”
Why PCD Suited This Application
Highly abrasive composites can quickly wear conventional cutting materials, especially in continuous production.
For suitable applications, PCD can provide:
- significantly greater resistance to abrasive wear
- longer periods between tool changes
- more consistent cutting geometry
- improved process stability
- consistent surface finish over longer production runs
- reduced production interruptions caused by worn tooling
For other applications involving difficult composite materials, see our Composite Tooling range.
Tooling Designed Around the Material
This project demonstrates why the correct cutting tool needs to match the material rather than simply relying on a standard cutter.
Prima Tooling manufactures Bespoke Cutting Tools in PCD, TCT, solid carbide and HSS for unusual materials, specialist profiles and demanding production applications.
Where customers experience excessive wear, poor finish or inconsistent tool performance, we can review the existing tooling, material and machining requirements and develop a more suitable solution.
Need Help Machining an Abrasive Composite?
If rapid tool wear is affecting your production, contact Prima Tooling with details of the material, machine and existing cutter. We can review the application and advise on a suitable tooling solution.