Product quality assurance is a very important concern in industries these days. Surface quality is an important constituent of the overall product quality. Although the desired surface quality of a product is dependent on the functional requirements of the product, the actual surface quality of the finished product depends mainly on the chosen manufacturing processes. In the case of machining, it depends mostly on the finishing process. One of the commonly used finishing processes is grinding. And therefore, it is important to understand the surface quality produced during a grinding process.

In grinding surface quality depends on the grain geometry, the kinematics of the grinding process and the dynamics of the grinding system. In this thesis work, a grinding model is formulated taking the random wheel topography into consideration. An analytical representation of the ideal ground surface is developed. To include the effect of grinding wheel vibration on ground surface topography generation, a grinding force model and a mathematical model representing the grinding system are developed.

The above three models are implemented in a simulation package which can predict the behavior of the surface grinding process. With the help of this package, surfaces ground at different cutting conditions can be compared quantitatively and qualitatively. The simulation package facilitates the selection of a proper grinding wheel and cutting conditions to achieve the desired surface quality.