Modeling of Interelectrode Gap in Electric Discharge Machining and Minimum Variance Self-Tuning Control of Interelectrode Gap

In the electric discharge machining system, the determination of the gap between the anode and the cathode is a difficult point of this kind of machining approach. An accurate mathematical model of interelectrode gap is obtained, and the precise control of the gap is achieved on this basis. In this paper, based on the example of discharge machining of P-type single crystal Si, the theoretical analysis proved that the discharge channel can be equivalent to pure resistance, and the physical model of the interelectrode gap and voltage and current was established. The order and parameters of the EDM system model were determined by adopting the system identification theory. We designed the minimum variance self-correcting controller to accurately control the interelectrode gap in combination with the actual machining process. Experimental results show that the interelectrode gap model can correctly reflect the interelectrode gap in the actual machining process; the minimum variance self-correcting controller eliminates the short circuit phenomenon during processing and can stably track different desired gaps; the material removal rate and the surface roughness decrease with the increase of the interelectrode gap.