Materials Today: Proceedings 42 (2021) 1202–1206

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Materials Today: Proceedings

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Design, fabrication and performance analysis of mini ball miller

Priyanka Singh a,⇑, Nathi Ram Chauhan a, S. Rajesha b
a
Indira Gandhi Delhi Technical University for Women (IGDTUW), New Delhi 110006, India
b
JSS Academy of Technical Education, Noida 201301, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper focuses on designing and fabrication of two axis rotation mini ball miller that can be used to
Received 25 September 2020 grind various materials into nano form in a short period of time. The ball miller shaft continuously rotates
Received in revised form 9 December 2020 about its own axis, with the frame rotating about horizontal axis. CREO Parametric software is used to
Accepted 15 December 2020
design different parts of the ball miller to required dimension. High speed motor is used to run the ball
Available online 11 February 2021
miller and a regulator to control the speed of rotation of the ball mill. Frame is designed to withstand the
weight of ball mill and prevent vibration due to rotation. After fabrication, Alumina and SiC powder is ball
Keywords:
milled at same speed for varying time period. Observation and microstructural study is done to under-
Ball mill
Ball milling speed
stand the effect of milling speed and time on the microstructural bonding on Alumina/SiC composite.
Intermolecular bonding Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Grinding media Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the Second International
Ceramic composite Conference on Recent Advances in Materials and Manufacturing 2020.

1. Introduction sel is mounted is driven by a motor equipped with gear for speed
variation of the vessel. The vessel or mill jar is charged with the
Composite materials are the materials made from the combina- material to be mixed and grinding media (ball) with powder to ball
tion of different constituent materials (two or more) with different ratio (usually 1:10) [5–7]. Different grinding media are available
chemical and physical properties which when combined develops for suitable use in ball miller having specific properties like size,
a single material with enhanced properties compared to individual hardness, density and composition [8–11]. The milling process
material. Based on the main constituent, composite can be divided takes place due to transfer of kinetic energy of the balls to the pow-
into metal matrix composite (MMC), polymer matrix composite der as shown in Fig. 1[12]. Grinding media in the mill jar travel
(PMC) and ceramic matrix composite (CMC). The initial prepara- with different velocities due to which the collision forces and the
tion methods used in the development of composite mainly kinetic energy varies significantly.
includes casting method or powder metallurgy route [1]. CMCs These forces are generated due to particle movement in the mill
are prepared by powder metallurgy route due to its high tempera- jar, the motion of balls and contact zones. The ball milling design
ture. Powder metallurgy fabrication process involves three stages: significantly depends on the size of mill jar, required particle size
mechanical alloying of powder, compaction to provide green distribution of powder and grinding media (balls) [13–15].
strength and consolidation of green compact through sintering The main purpose of milling process is to obtain required parti-
technique. The mixing of the constituent material in the develop- cle size of the powder without any contamination, increasing the
ment of composite can be done by using a ball miller. Grinding output of the milling circuit and overall reduction in production
the powders in a ball miller is a process to uniformly mix the con- cost. In the present paper, two axis rotation ball miller is designed
stituent material and to reduce the particle size for better bonding and fabricated to increase the effectiveness of the ball miller.
during sintering. Apart from mechanical alloying in development Microstructural study is done to understand the effect of milling
of composite, ball miller can be used in chemical, pharmaceutical, time and speed on the microstructural bonding on Alumina/SiC
mining, cement and cosmetic industries. [2–4]. the ball miller con- composite.
sists of cylindrical or circular vessel mounted on a shaft which
allows rotation about the central axis. The shaft on which the ves-
2. Design & fabrication of ball miller

⇑ Corresponding author. In the experimentation, the ball miller is designed to mix 200 g
E-mail address: priyanca.smit@gmail.com (P. Singh). of powder with the powder to ball ratio as 10:1. Design calcula-

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2020.12.690
2214-7853/Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the Second International Conference on Recent Advances in Materials and Manufacturing 2020.
P. Singh, N. Ram Chauhan and S. Rajesha Materials Today: Proceedings 42 (2021) 1202–1206

Table 1
Specification of ball miller.

SN Apparatus Specification & Size

1 Cylinder Length: 80 mm
OD: 50 mm
ID: 38 mm
Material: Stainless steel (SS)
2 Frame 145 X 305 mm stain
Material: SS
3 Motor (Cylinder rotation) 12 V, 10amp, 120 Watt, 300 rpm
4 Motor (Frame rotation) 12 V, 9amp, 108 Watt, 200 rpm
5 Grinding media(Balls) 2.0 mm dia. (20), 2.5 mm dia. (20),
Material: SS
6 Shaft SS

Fig. 1. Operating Principle of Ball Mill [12]

gular frame made of stainless steel rectangular pipes. This frame is
rotated with the horizontal shaft and the ball mill jar is rotated
tions are done and CREO PARAMETRIC 2.0 software is used to cre- inside the frame about its own axis. The milling jar is driven by a
ate the model as shown in Fig. 2. small motor with gear messing. In order to rotate the frame, the
Specification of Ball Miller is shown in Table 1. motor is also mounted. To supply the power to the small motor,
For the experiment setup, a 180 ml of mill jar is made. In order slip rings are mounted on the shaft. To make the slip ring, a woo-
to make a 180 ml volume of mill jar, AISI 304 stainless steel mate- den cylindrical rod of length 40 mm, two metal strips and two mild
rial having inner diameter of 38 mm and thickness of 6 mm is cal- steel wires are used. Metal strips are wrapped around the wooden
culated and chosen as well. Based on the literature survey, cylinder with 3 mm gap between two strips and mild steel wires
Stainless steel balls of 2.5 mm and 2 mm diameter are placed are wrapped around metal strips to maintain connection. The var-
inside the mill jar. The two ASIS stainless steel shafts are placed ious fixtures developed are shown in Fig. 3.
at mutually perpendicular to each other. One shaft is used to pro- The critical speed for the milling jar is calculated using the
vide rotation to the mill jar and other one rotates the frame. The equation 1. Critical rotation speed is a function of a ball radius
bearings are provided on both sides with housings having dimen- and a mill jar diameter.
sion of (50 mm outer diameter X 30 mm inner diameter X 20 mm
265:45
length). To connect the bearing housing with the frame of ball CS ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
miller, a rectangular 3 mm thick mild steel sheet of dimensions ID  d
(75 mm X 65 mm) are welded to the housing on the sheet. Two Where C.S is critical speed, I.D is the internal diameter of jar and
pass holes are drilled in the sheet and the frame of the ball mill d is the size of balls and speed in revolution per minute (RPM).
which are attached using nuts and bolts. To drive the horizontal Usually 55% to 75% of critical speed is required.
shaft, a belt pulley arrangement is used. One end of the pulley is
mounted on the horizontal shaft and other one on the motor shaft.
3. Experimental details
The motor is mounted on L-angles welded to the base of the frame.
The mill jar is of cylindrical shape with the cap that fits in with the
The aim of ball milling is to reduce the particle size and
interference fit. At both ends of the jar, collinear shaft of diameter
homogenously mix the compositions for better green strength
16 mm is welded which goes in bearing for the rotation and bear-
and sinterability of compact. To carry out the performance test,
ings fits in the housing. Whole assembly is nut bolted in a rectan-
Alumina with particle size (53 mm) and silicon carbide powder of

Fig. 2. Model of the Ball miller.

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P. Singh, N. Ram Chauhan and S. Rajesha Materials Today: Proceedings 42 (2021) 1202–1206

Fig. 3. a) Bearing Fixture b) Ball Miller Frame c) Belt and Pulley Arrangement d) Cylindrical Mill Jar e) Ball Miller.

particle size (37 mm) are considered for study. Three samples each ticle shape is observed with varying milling time. In all the sam-
of 95 vol% of Alumina and 5 vol% of SiC are prepared. Mixture rule ples, powder particles are irregularly shaped with fracture
is used to calculate mass of each component required. 14.19 gm of surfaces. Agglomerates of particles are also observed. After 12 h
Alumina /SiC composite powder is milled in the designed ball of milling, bulky irregular shaped particles of alumina are observed
miller for different time periods (12, 24 & 36 Hours) at same speed as shown in Fig. 6a. As the milling time is increased from 12 to
(300 rpm). Infrared non contact thermometer was used to measure 24 h, the size of the particles decreases with less bulky aggregate
the temperature of the ball mill jar. It was observed that increase in particles as shown in Fig. 6b. Agglomerate of powder particles
temperature is minimal causing no change in the properties of are formed after 36 h of milling. The particle size is decreased with
milled powder. The powder after milling is shown in Fig. 4. The particle shape deviating less from the spherical shape as shown in
milled powder was compacted at 10 tons of pressure on mount Fig. 6c.
press as shown in Fig. 5.
4.2. Effect of milling time on particle size

4. Result and discussion Ball miller with fixed rpm (3 0 0) and 2.0 mm grinding balls pro-
duce powders of different particle size with varying milling time. It
4.1. Effect of milling time on particle size is observed that with increase in milling time, fine powder with
reduced particles size is obtained. From Fig. 7, it can be concluded
Particle shape and size are analyzed using Scanning electron that as milling time is increased from 12 h to 36 h , the particle size
Microscope as shown in Fig. 6. Difference in the appearance of par- is reduced from 16 (mm) to 3 mm. It is also observed that reduction
in particle size is not much affected with increased milling time.
Increase in milling time after 12 h only decreased the powder par-
ticle size from 9 mm to 3 mm. Further increase in milling time will
consume energy input with less effect on powder properties.

5. Conclusion

Two axis rotation mini ball miller has been designed in CREO
Parametric software and fabricated to grind various materials into
nano form in a short period of time. After fabrication, Alumina and
SiC powder was ball milled at different speed and time.
Microstructural study of ball milled powder was done to under-
stand the effect of milling speed and time on bonding of Alu-
mina/SiC composite.

a. SEM morphologies of ball milled powder reveals that with

increase in milling time from 12 to 36 h, particle size is
decreased with particle shape deviating less from the spher-
ical shape.

Fig. 4. Ball Milled powder.

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P. Singh, N. Ram Chauhan and S. Rajesha Materials Today: Proceedings 42 (2021) 1202–1206

Fig. 5. a) Mount Press b) Green Pellet of Alumina/SiC. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this
article.)

Fig. 6. SEM images of Ball Milled powder a) Alumina/SiC ball milled for 12 h b) Alumina/SiC ball milled for 24 h c) Alumina/SiC ball milled for 36 h.

b. With increase in milling time from 12 h to 36 h, the particle

size is reduced from 16 (mm) to 3 mm. It is also observed that
reduction in particle size is not much affected with increased
milling time. Increase in milling time after 12 h only
decreased the powder particle size from 9 mm to 3 mm.

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-

cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.

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