Measurement of synchronous motion in five-axis machining centers

Abstract

This paper describes a newly proposed method for evaluating the synchronous inaccuracy of the translational and rotational axes in five-axis controlled machining centers. The circular motion of which shape is easy to evaluate is adopted for measuring the trajectory described by the axes in the proposed method. The influence of inaccurate synchronization on the circular trajectory was simulated changing the distance between the centers of the rotary table and the circular motion, the radius of the circular motion, and the feed speed. The measurement conditions were determined based on the result of the simulation, and the cutting experiments and the measurements with the ball bar were conducted. From the simulation and experimental results, it is confirmed that the proposed method is able to use for evaluating the inaccurate synchronization of the translational and rotational axes. The ratio of the distance between both centers of the rotational axis and the circular path to the radius provides useful information for the evaluation.