Latest trends in chemical machining: a systematic review in Open Access

This document presents a systematic review in which the latest and most relevant trends in chemical machining over the past 5 years are analysed. The adaptation of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) methodology to the field of manufacturing engineering has been followed for the selection of the most relevant works using the Web of Science (WOS) search tool. Basically, this tool consists of: (1) applying a series of filters and Boolean equations in the search fields, thus establishing the inclusion and exclusion criteria; (2) creating a database with the selection of the best-found articles and justifying the rejection of non-selected articles to avoid bias in their selection, based on criteria such as journal percentile ranking, publication area of the study, number of citations, or if it addresses the study area; (3) conducting a statistical analysis of the collected data. Additionally, an analysis and discussion on the results of the selected works have been carried out. As the main conclusions drawn from the statistical analysis, it has been found that metals, specifically aluminium, are the most studied materials in chemical machining, and that the United States of America is the country with the highest number of publications on this technology in the last 5 years. Likewise, from the discussion on the results of the articles, the following conclusions can be highlighted: (1) for geometries with complex shapes or small sizes and in finishing operations with additive manufacturing, chemical polishing is the most cost-effective option and provides very good results, particularly at the micro and nano-scale; (2) different options are being investigated to make chemical machining more environmentally friendly through the regeneration of the used chemical agent.