Curved sawing of thin lightweight components

Increasing application of carbon fibre reinforced plastic (CFRP) in lightweight constructions in aerospace, automotive and other industries requires high-performance cutting processes for edge trimming of thin shell structures. As an alternative to conventional processes, e.g. milling, a rigid abrasive circular saw blade is introduced. The limitation of cutting only almost-straight contours with circular saw blades is overcome by a novel tool geometry and process kinematic that allows curve cutting with radius R < 500 mm on thin plane material (thickness t < 10 mm). The kinematic for cutting almost arbitrarily shaped outlines with a circular tool on a five-axis machine is described and proven by cutting a reference component. Besides high operating efficiency because of high feed rate the process features sound edge quality without noteworthy delamination of the outer layers, which is shown in pilot tests on CFRP with unidirectional top layers.