An operation planning system for multi-axis milling of sculptured surfaces

Multi-axis milling of sculptured surfaces with cylindrical or toroidal cutters has many advantages compared to the use of three-axis milling with ball nose cutters. Surfaces to be machined are often of complex shape and characterised by convex, concave and saddle areas. Today, CAM-systems do not support the user in the selection of the different operations in order to finish the workpiece. This paper describes an operation planning system, which facilitates process planning for the multi-axis machining of sculptured surfaces. The core of the system is surface analysis, which divides the surfaces into regions, each characterised by a preferred milling direction and tool diameter Further, for each region or set of regions, a drive surface is constructed that is used as the basis for the tool-path calculation. The drive surface approximates to the original workpiece as closely as possible, and the isoparametric lines which will be the tool-path feed direction lie in the preferred milling direction.