A Generalized and Efficient Approach for Accurate Five-Axis Flute Grinding of Cylindrical End-Mills

Wheel position (including wheel location and orientation) in the flute grinding process of an end-mill determines the ground flute's geometric parameters, i.e., rake angle, core radius, and flute width. Current technologies for calculating the wheel position to guarantee the three parameters' accuracy are either time-consuming or only applicable to the grinding wheels with singular points. In order to cope with this problem, this paper presents a generalized and efficient approach for determining the wheel position accurately in five-axis flute grinding of cylindrical end-mills. A new analytic expression of the wheel location is derived and an original algorithm is developed to search for the required wheel position. This approach can apply not only to the wheels with fillets but also to the wheels with singular points. Simulation examples are provided to validate the new approach and compared with the results from other literature. Besides the ability to determine the wheel position, the new approach can evaluate extrema of the core radius and flute width that a specified wheel can generate. Owing to the evaluated extrema, automatic 1V1 wheel customization according to the designed flute is realized in this paper. This work can improve the efficiency and automation degree of the flute grinding process and lay a good foundation for the development of a comprehensive computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing system for end-mill manufacturing.