5-axis dry milling of bottom of pocket by ball and circle-segment end mills

Abstract

At present, 5-axis machining is often realized with ball end mills that do not achieve the advantages of modern circle-segment end mills. However, to exploit the potential of these modern tools, it is necessary to use a special CAM software, including hyperMILL from Westcam. This software, increasing the efficiency of machining, was used in the present study, which compared these tools with respect to the quality of the machined surface, machining time and cutting forces. The workpiece material was aluminum alloy EN AW 7075-T6. At given cutting parameters, the circle-segment end mills achieved a lower Ra value and generally higher machining efficiency. At the end of the study, an assessment was made with respect to the economy.