Grinding Wheel

A grinding wheel is a wheel containing abrasive compounds, used for grinding and abrasive machining operations, including in dedicated grinding machines. The wheel is generally a composite material, coarse abrasive particles pressed and bonded together by a cementing matrix, called the bond in grinding wheel terminology, into a solid circular shape, made in a range of profiles and cross sections depending on intended use; some are instead made from a solid steel or aluminium disc with particles bonded to its surface. Most grinding wheels today are artificial composites made with artificial abrasive grains, though the history of the grinding wheel began with natural composite stones such as those used for millstones. Manufacturing them is a precise and tightly controlled process, both for the safety risk of a spinning disc and because the composition and uniformity of the wheel must be controlled to prevent it exploding under the stress of rotation. Grinding wheels are consumable: as a wheel cuts it periodically sheds individual grains of abrasive as they dull and the increased drag pulls them free, exposing fresh grains beneath in a wear process whose rate is usually predictable for a given application.