Abrasives

Abrasives are materials, usually minerals, that are used to finish or shape a working piece or other material through friction or rubbing, which in turn wears away the surface of the workpiece or subject material. There are a multitude of domestic (residential), commercial, industrial and research and development (R&D) or technological applications in processes such as buffing, cutting, drilling, grinding, honing, lapping, polishing, sanding (abrasive machining), and sharpening.

Many factors are at play in determining how quickly a substance is abraded, including the adhesion between the grains, contact force, hardness differential between the two substances, grain size, loading, and the use of coolant, lubricant, or metalworking fluid.

There are many kinds of natural and synthetic abrasives or abrasive materials. Sharpening stones are generally considered better when natural, and naturally occurring abrasives include calcite, or calcium carbonate, diamond dust, emery, or impure corundum, novaculite, pumice dust, rouge, and sand. Various abrasive minerals, like zirconia alumina, are naturally occurring but too rare or costly that synthetic stones are used for industrial purposes. Other artificial abrasives include ceramics, borazon, or cubic boron nitride (CBN), ceramic aluminum oxide, ceramic iron oxide, corundum, or aluminum oxide, dry ice, steel abrasive, silicon carbide, or carborundum, and the aforementioned zirconia alumina. Manufactured abrasives include bonded abrasives housed in a matrix or binder made of clay, glass, resin or rubber. Grinding wheels, cutting wheels, sand paper, abrasive paperboard products, and coolants are also manufactured abrasive tools that can be employed.