NON-ISOPARAMETRIC TOOL PATH PLANNING BY MACHINING STRIP EVALUATION FOR 5-AXIS SCULPTURED SURFACE MACHINING

Presented in this paper is a new approach to 5-axis NC tool path gener ation for sculptured surface machining. Techniques of feasible machini ng strip evaluation are used for non-isoparametric 5-axis tool path ge neration. A searching algorithm is proposed to find the parameter incr ements of adjacent cutter locations along orthogonal path intervals fo r optimal non-isoparametric path generation. Compared to the use of th e smallest path interval by the traditional constant parametric path p lanning, the proposed methodology can generate efficient tool paths fo r sculptured surface machining by reducing the redundant overlapping b etween adjacent tool paths. The proposed methodology includes three st eps: (1) evaluating feasible machining strip, (2) solving parameter in crements (Delta u, Delta v) along orthogonal path intervals, and (3) s earching for adjacent non-isoparametric cutter locations. The techniqu es presented in this paper can be used to improve 5-axis machined surf ace quality and to automate the non-isoparametric cutter path generati on for CAD/CAM systems. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights rese rved