Abstract:

5-axis milling processes are used widely in various industries such as aerospace, die-mold and biomedical industries where surface quality and integrity is important and the production tolerances are very tight. Therefore, improving surface quality and integrity without sacrificing productivity is crucial in these industries. Improvements in CAD/CAM, cutting tool and the machine tool technologies allow the production of high precision parts in less cycle times. However, desired quality and productivity can be obtained if process parameters such as feedrate, spindle speed, axial and radial depth of cut are selected appropriately. In general, these parameters are selected conservatively based on engineering expertise or trial and error methods in order to prevent workpiece, cutter of the machine to be damaged. Therefore, virtual machining simulation for milling processes is an increasing demand before the production of the part. This paper presents a mechanistic cutting force model for 5-axis ball-end milling process simulation. Cutter/workpiece engagement is determined via newly developed solid modeler based engagement model. Two different 5-axis machining tests are conducted on A17039 workpiece material for the validation of the proposed model. Validation tests demonstrate that presented model is computationally efficient and force predictions are in good agreement with the experimental data.