Title: Tool path generation for five-axis sculptured surface machining with a toroidal cutter

Authors: Tao Chen, Changping Li, Haichun Wang

Addresses: School of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, China. ' School of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, China. ' School of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, China

Abstract: This paper presents an algorithm to generate tool paths for five-axis sculptured surface machining with a toroidal cutter based on optimal tool position and orientation. The toroidal cutting surface offers a large range of radius of curvatures. Furthermore, the cutter orientation varies depending on the curvature of surface. Thus, the proposed method is much better than the conventional method with a fixed orientation. To verity the usefulness of the developed algorithm, a computer simulation program is coded using C+ + language. The proposed method can be integrated into CAM systems to improve five-axis sculptured surfaces machining.

Keywords: sculptured surfaces; curvature; toroidal cutters; tool path generation; 5-axis machining; five-axis machining; optimisation; tool position; tool orientation; simulation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMMM.2010.036145

International Journal of Machining and Machinability of Materials, 2010 Vol.8 No.3/4, pp.372 - 383

Published online: 22 Oct 2010 *

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