Академический Документы
Профессиональный Документы
Культура Документы
Abstract
This paper presents a generic ve-axis postprocessor system for various ve-axis machine tools. The generalized kinematics model of
common ve-axis machines is constructed by combining two rotational degrees of freedom on the xture table and two rotational
degrees of freedom on the spindle. The complete analytical equations for NC data are obtained through homogeneous coordinate
transformation matrix and inverse kinematics. The derived ve-axis NC code expression is a general form suitable for all kinds of
ve-axis machine tools with three orthogonal linear axes and two orthogonal rotational axes. A window-based postprocessor
software written by Borland C++ Builder and OpenGL has been developed according to the presented algorithm. The wireframe model
of the congured ve-axis machine tool can be promptly shown and rotated/zoomed dynamically on the screen to assist the user to
input relevant parameters correctly and efciently. Through the implementation of the developed postprocessor and the verication
by the solid cutting simulation software as well as the real machining experiment, the effectiveness of the proposed scheme was
conrmed.
r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Five-axis; Postprocessor; Kinematics model; Coordinate transformation matrix; NC programming
1. Introduction
Five-axis machining is one of the important processes in
precision manufacturing. It has been used in defense,
aerospace and even consumer industry. Compared with
conventional three-axis machine tools, ve-axis machine
tools can provide the exibility of tilting the tool axis to
various orientations, increase the cutting efciency and
avoid the tool collision against workpiece. However, it is
almost impossible to generate the ve-axis numerically
controlled (NC) data manually. The data should be
transformed by the postprocessor depending on the
conguration of the machine tool. Postprocessor is the
important interface that coverts the cutter location (CL)
data including cutter tip position and the tool orientation,
to NC data. Since various combinations may be synthesized to congure the ve-axis machine tool, Sakamoto and
Corresponding author. Tel.: +886 4 8511888x2121;
fax: +886 4 7554175.
E-mail address: chshe@mail.dyu.edu.tw (C.-H. She).
0890-6955/$ - see front matter r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijmachtools.2006.06.002
ARTICLE IN PRESS
538
C.-H. She, C.-C. Chang / International Journal of Machine Tools & Manufacture 47 (2007) 537545
This paper extends the previous researches [5,8] proposed by the authors and develops a generic ve-axis
postprocessor system from a generalized kinematics model
adding four rotational degrees of freedom where two of
them are applied to the workpiece table and the other two
are applied to the spindle. The analytical equations for NC
data are determined by equating the CL data matrix and
the form-shaping function matrix. In addition, the original
NC data for a specic machine tool can be transformed to
the other machine tool conguration using the derived
analytical equations so that the portability of the NC data
can be greatly promoted. A window-based postprocessor
software is developed and implemented with two typical
congurations of ve-axis machine tool. Verication by the
solid cutting simulation software and the real machining
experiment conrms the validity of the proposed methodology.
2. Postprocessor of generalized ve-axis machine tools
Isp
I ws
I ss
I wp
Y
(1)
ARTICLE IN PRESS
C.-H. She, C.-C. Chang / International Journal of Machine Tools & Manufacture 47 (2007) 537545
539
YTy , Ysp
nss
nsp
X Ty , X sp
OTy , Osp
Yss , Yt
Yw
L sp ,ss
Workpiece
ZTy , Z sp
Ow
Oss , Ot
Yws
Py
Z ss , Z t
Zw
L w,ws
nws
Xss , Xt
Xw
X ws
Ows
Z ws
rpt
t tax
Yb
Cutting tool
nwp
Ob
Xb
L ws ,wp
YTz
Ywp , YTx
Owp , OTx
Zb
Pz
X wp , X Tx
OTz
X Tz
Px
Z wp , ZTx
ZTz
The tool axis vector ttax and the position vector of the
cutter tip center rtp with respect to system Ot X t Y t Z t can be
transformed to system Ow X w Y w Z w , and obtain ttax ,rtp
using Eq. (2). The transformation is as follows:
"
tw
ax
rw
p
"
#
w At
ttax
rtp
(4)
ARTICLE IN PRESS
540
C.-H. She, C.-C. Chang / International Journal of Machine Tools & Manufacture 47 (2007) 537545
Two of the joint angles (fnwp , fnws , fnsp and fnss ) on the
right-hand side of Eq. (5) are unknown and should be
solved. According to the rotational movement characteristics, the ve-axis machine tool can be designated as six
types, i.e. AB, AC, BA, BC, CA and CB types. There are
two feasible tool orientations for each type, which meet the
ve-axis machining requirement. The spindle-tilting AB
type is chosen as an example. In this case, fnws fnwp 0,
nsp x and nss y, the right-hand side of Eq. (5) for tool
orientation along the X, Y and Z axis can be obtained as
follows:
T
Rotx; fx Roty; fy 1 0 0 0
h
iT
Cfy Sfx Sfy Cfx Sfy 0 ,
6
T h
Rotx; fx Roty; fy 0 1 0 0 0 Cfx
Sfx
iT
(7)
T
Rotx; fx Roty; fy 0 0 1 0
h
iT
Sfy Sfx Cfy Cfx Cfy 0 ,
Table 1
General joint angle solutions for spindle-tilting type machine tool
Conguration type
Tool orientation
AB
AB
AC
AC
BA
BA
BC
BC
CA
CA
CB
CB
X-axis
Z-axis
X-axis
Y-axis
Y-axis
Z-axis
X-axis
Y-axis
Y-axis
Z-axis
X-axis
Z-axis
11
ARTICLE IN PRESS
C.-H. She, C.-C. Chang / International Journal of Machine Tools & Manufacture 47 (2007) 537545
1 T
rtp
1
#)
rtp
12
Eq. (12) represents the complete desired analytical
solutions for NC data of the generalized ve-axis machine
tool. Once the appropriate joint angle values shown in
Table 1 are specied, the NC data of the specic ve-axis
machine tools conguration can be readily obtained.
3. Discussion
1. The joint angle solutions shown in Table 1 for each type
of conguration are typical solutions. For the same CL
data, there is another possible solution. The AB
conguration type with the X axis tool orientation is
chosen as an example. The joint angle solution of the B
axis is fy arccosK x , whose value is in the range of
0pfy pp. However, if the operating range of the tilting
head is in the range between p and 0, the solution
should be modied as fy arccosK x . On the other
hand, if the operating range of the tilting head meets the
two possible solutions, the shortest rotational angle
movement of the tilting head is usually to be chosen.
2. The advantage of the proposed algorithm is that the
linear joint parameters (Px , Py and Pz ) are explicitly
determined in the matrix form. On the contrary, the
conventional approach, which solves three simultaneous
equations to derive the parameters, is tedious and timeconsuming for various kinds of congurations. More-
541
ARTICLE IN PRESS
542
C.-H. She, C.-C. Chang / International Journal of Machine Tools & Manufacture 47 (2007) 537545
ve-axis machine tool. The user rst selects two rotary axes
and the corresponding rotational directions. The system
will automatically display the wireframe model of the
congured machine tool and two feasible tool orientations.
The user can use the mouse to rotate/zoom the model to
assure whether the kinematics model is correct or not,
or pick the Reset button to restart the conguration
procedure.
Once the kinematics model has been congured
correctly, the user should enter the relevant parameters
for NC machining, e.g. the offset vector from the program
origin to the centre of the secondary rotary table, the offset
vector from the centre of the secondary rotary table to the
centre of the primary rotary table, the offset vector from
the centre of the primary rotary spindle to the centre of the
secondary rotary spindle and the tool tip vector. Finally,
the target CL data are opened by clicking the File button
and the NC data will be generated accordingly. Moreover,
since the presented system is a generalized postprocessor,
the corresponding CL data can also be transformed if the
user opens the NC data for the congured machine tool. In
addition, to conrm the feasibility of the proposed
algorithm, two typical machine tools congurations,
namely the table-tilting type and the spindle-tilting type,
are tested respectively. Figs. 4 and 5 show the screenshots
of the system execution dialogue for the table-tilting type
and the spindle-tilting type with Z-axis tool orientation.
4.2. VERICUTs verification
The generated ve-axis NC data are further veried on
the solid cutting simulation software VERICUTs [13],
which can build the kinematics model of an NC machine
ARTICLE IN PRESS
C.-H. She, C.-C. Chang / International Journal of Machine Tools & Manufacture 47 (2007) 537545
543
Fig. 4. Execution dialog for generating the table-tilting type machine tools NC data.
Fig. 5. Execution dialog for generating the spindle-tilting type machine tools NC data.
ARTICLE IN PRESS
544
C.-H. She, C.-C. Chang / International Journal of Machine Tools & Manufacture 47 (2007) 537545
Fig. 6. Screenshot of the VERICUTs simulation and verication for the table-tilting type machine tool.
Fig. 7. Screenshot of the VERICUTs simulation and verication for the spindle-tilting type machine tool.
5. Conclusion
This paper has proposed a generic ve-axis postprocessor methodology based on the generalized kinematics
model. The analytical equations of NC data for various
ARTICLE IN PRESS
C.-H. She, C.-C. Chang / International Journal of Machine Tools & Manufacture 47 (2007) 537545
545
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to the National Science Council
of Taiwan for supporting this research under Grant NSC
94-2212-E-212-015. Thanks are also extended to graduate
student Mr. Hong-Ming Su for his experimental assistance.
References