Wire Electrical Discharge Machining (wEDM) is a thermal material removal process that incorporates electrical discharge erosion method for machining conductive materials. A high potential difference across the inter-electrode gap between wire electrode and the workpiece in the presence of dielectric fluid leads to the pulsed discharges. Several sensors have been investigatedfor adaptive control and monitoring of wEDM process by detecting and classifying these discharges. The present work discusses the use of electric and magnetic near-field probes to detect the radio signals emitted during the machining process. Numerical modelling, fabrication and probe characterization for both the probes have been done.Theradio signals captured by the probes are further analyzed using machine learning techniques to investigate the feasibility of monitoring the process for different work pieces using this technique.
Keywords: Machine learning techniques, near-field probes, radio signals, Wire Electrical Discharge Machining