A major benefit of the electro discharge z machining process, due to its electro-thermal nature of ablation, is independency of material hardness and brittleness.
The noncontact nature of the process results in a nearly force-free machining, allowing the usage of soft, easy to machine electrode materials even when shaping very hard workpieces.
This also enables the machining of fragile or thin workpieces.
Additionally, there is no limitation to the angle between the tool and workpiece, so round or
irregularly shaped surfaces can be used.
For all those reasons, EDM has been widely used in the generation of micro parts and geometries such as spinnerets (Fig. 2) [1].