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International Journal of Machine Tools and Manufacture, Volume 89, 2015, Pages 151-158.
Xiaogeng Jiang, Robert J. Cripps.
School of Mechanical Engineering, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston B15 2TT, United Kingdom.
Abstract
Ensuring that a five-axis machine tool is operating within tolerance is critical. However, there are few simple and fast methods to identify whether the machine is in a “usable” condition. This paper investigates the use of the double ball bar (DBB) to identify and characterise the position independent geometric errors (PIGEs) in rotary axes of a five-axis machine tool by establishing new testing paths. The proposed method consists of four tests for two rotary axes; the A-axis tests with and without an extension bar and the C-axis tests with and without an extension bar. For the tests without an extension bar, position errors embedded in the A– and C-axes are measured first. Then these position errors can be used in the tests with an extension bar, to obtain the orientation errors in the A– and C-axes based on the given geometric model. All tests are performed with only one axis moving, thus simplifying the error analysis. The proposed method is implemented on a Hermle C600U five-axis machine tool to validate the approach. The results of the DBB tests show that the new method is a good approach to obtaining the geometric errors in rotary axes, thus can be applied to practical use in assembling processes, maintenance and regular checking of multi-axis CNC machine tools.
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