Machine tool thermal error reduction - an appraisal

It has been shown that machine tool thermal distortion can account for 75 p er cent of the total machining error. As a result there has been a great de al of interest in techniques for reducing thermal errors. The approaches ta ken to thermal error reduction can be divided into two broad categories of reducing structural temperature change and reducing the effect of structura l temperature change. This paper discusses a number of representative examp les of applied thermal error reduction techniques that utilize machine desi gn and compensation. The paper appraises these techniques, highlighting the ir relative merits. Based on this appraisal the requirements for a general thermal error reduction technique are established.