Development of a System for the Evaluation and Recommendation of Solution Methods for Thermally Induced Errors on Machine Tools

Abstract

Thermally-induced displacements cause large parts of residual machining errors on modern machine tools. Their transient behavior makes it difficult to manufacture with high accuracy. To still increase machining accuracy and to meet the demands of the industry, research offers various solution methods to minimize this error. Within the Collaborative Research Centre Transregio 96 (CRC/TR96), various solutions have been developed that either try to compensate the heat flow in the machine so that large temperature gradients and resulting displacements are avoided or aim to predict the amount and direction of the thermally induced deviation at the TCP. In order to make these solutions comparable, they were first consistently classified and analyzed in terms of their implementation effort and risks. Potential benefits were proved by measurements. The benefits and efforts identified in this way were evaluated with the help of a multi-criteria decision analysis method so that the feasibility and implementation effort of the various solutions can be estimated for manufacturers and users of machine tools. A software-based tool was developed to help interested industrial users to select a suitable process for their individual production scenario from the available processes via an input mask. The tool thus fulfills two aspects. On the one hand, it facilitates the transfer of the developed solutions into industrial applications. On the other hand, it documents the research status of the various solutions, shows potential for improvement, and new methods can be uniformly documented in the future and thus, made comparable.