Tungsten Carbide And Cutting Tools
A chemical compound composed of equal parts of tungsten and carbon atoms. Its chemical formula is WC. Its most basic form is a fine gray powder. Tungsten carbide can be pressed and formed into shapes for use in various industrial applications. It is extremely hard, making it one of the best materials for cutting tools.
Tungsten carbide is twice as stiff and twice as dense as steel. This makes it excellent for cutting workpieces made of steel or materials with similar hardness to steel. Tungsten carbide rotary files are popular for deburring steel workpieces due to the ease in which it removes unwanted materials.
Due to the hardness of tungsten carbide, it can only be polished or sharpened using much harder abrasive compounds. Diamond grinding wheels are often used to sharpen edges of dulled cutting tools. While tungsten carbide tools are relatively affordable, the tools required to keep them in good working condition, like the aforementioned diamond grinding wheels, can be expensive.
Tungsten carbide also has very good resistance to heat. This makes it suitable for high-speed cutting applications which tend to generate enormous amount it. Whereas diamond cutting tools can get damaged, with the diamond particles turning into graphite, tungsten carbide keeps its molecular structure intact and its cutting ability unaffected by the heat.
