What Is a 5 Axis Milling Machine?

Five-axis linkage means that there are at least five coordinate axes (three linear coordinates and two rotation coordinates) on a machine tool, and it can simultaneously coordinate movement for processing under the control of a computer numerical control (CNC) system.

5-axis linkage

Five-axis linkage is a NC term. Linkage means that the axis of a CNC machine tool reaches a certain set point at a certain speed at the same time. Five-axis linkage is possible with five axes. Equipment manufacturing is the cornerstone of a country's industry. It provides an important means for the development of new technologies, new products, and modern industrial production. It is an indispensable strategic industry. Even the developed industrialized countries attach great importance to it.

With the rapid development of China's national economy and the need for national defense construction, there is an urgent demand for high-end CNC machine tools. Machine tools are a symbol of a country's manufacturing level. And representing the highest state of the machine tool manufacturing industry is the five-axis linkage CNC machine tool system, in a sense, it reflects the state of industrial development of a country.

1, can effectively avoid tool interference

2. For ruled surface parts, side can be used

The most widely used five-axis machining type

The so-called point contact processing refers to the processing method of point contact molding during the processing, such as spherical milling cutter processing, spherical grinding wheel

The so-called surface contact processing refers to the processing method of surface contact molding, such as the end face

Current and future research focus of five-coordinate linkage CNC machining

The so-called line contact processing refers to the processing methods that use line contact molding during processing, such as cylindrical peripheral milling, conical peripheral milling, camphor cutting, and abrasive belt grinding. The characteristics of this machining method are:

At present, five-axis linkage machine tools abroad are represented by Europe, America and Japan. The five-axis linkage CNC machine tools in these countries represent the highest level of development of today's five-axis linkage CNC machine tools. The technology development focus of five-axis linkage CNC machine tools from well-known foreign machine tool factories can be summarized as: high speed, high precision, environmental protection, intelligence, and compounding. The widespread use of torque motors as rotary coordinate drive devices abroad has enabled foreign machine tool feed mechanisms to achieve the goals of high speed, low loss, high accuracy, and high efficiency.

The first is the use of linear motor drive technology. After more than ten years of development, linear motor technology has become very mature. The problems of susceptibility to interference and high heat generation that have just been developed for linear motors have been solved. The positioning technology of linear motors not only stops quickly at high speeds, but also some machine tool manufacturers use damping technology to solve them. The advantages of linear motors are linear drive, no transmission chain, no wear and no backlash, so it can achieve the best

5-axis simultaneous machining center

Machining centers are generally divided into vertical machining centers and horizontal machining centers. The most effective machining surface of a vertical machining center (three axes) is only the top surface of the workpiece. With the rotary table, the horizontal machining center can only complete the workpiece. Four-sided processing. The high-end machining center is developing in the direction of five-axis control. The five-axis linkage machining center has the characteristics of high efficiency and high precision, and the workpiece can be processed in one clamping. If equipped with a five-axis linkage high-end CNC system, it can also perform high-precision machining of complex space curved surfaces, which is more suitable for the processing of modern molds such as automobile parts and aircraft structural parts. (Introducing the vertical five-axis machining center in this issue) There are two ways for the rotary axis of a machining center such as a vertical five-axis machining center. One is the rotary axis of the table. The table set on the bed can be rotated around the X axis, which is defined as the A axis. The A axis generally has a working range of +30 degrees to -120 degrees. There is also a turntable in the middle of the table. It rotates around the Z axis at the position shown in the figure. It is defined as the C axis, and the C axis is 360 degrees. In this way, through the combination of A axis and C axis, except for the bottom surface of the workpiece fixed on the table, the remaining five surfaces can be processed by the vertical spindle. The minimum indexing value of A axis and C axis is generally 0.001 degree. In this way, the workpiece can be subdivided into arbitrary angles, and inclined surfaces and inclined holes can be processed. If the A axis and C axis are linked with the XYZ three linear axes, complex spatial surfaces can be machined. Of course, this requires the support of high-end CNC systems, servo systems and software. The advantage of this setting method is that the structure of the spindle is relatively simple, the rigidity of the spindle is very good, and the manufacturing cost is relatively low. However, the general worktable cannot be designed too large, and the load bearing is also small. Especially when the A-axis rotation is greater than or equal to 90 degrees, the workpiece will bring a large load moment when the workpiece is cut. The other is to rely on the rotation of the vertical spindle head. The front end of the main shaft is a swivel head, which can surround the Z axis 360 degrees by itself and become the C axis. The swivel head also has an A axis that can rotate around the X axis, which can generally reach more than ± 90 degrees to achieve the same function as above. The advantage of this setup is that the spindle is very flexible and the worktable can also be designed very large. The huge fuselage of the passenger aircraft and the huge engine casing can be processed on this type of machining center. This design also has a big advantage: when we use a spherical milling cutter to machine a curved surface, when the tool center line is perpendicular to the processing surface, the vertex linear velocity of the spherical milling cutter is zero, and the surface quality of the workpiece cut out by the vertex will be poor. The design of the spindle rotation makes the spindle rotate an angle relative to the workpiece, so that the spherical milling cutter avoids apex cutting, guarantees a certain line speed, and can improve the surface processing quality. This kind of structure is very popular with the high-precision curved surface processing of the mold, which is difficult to achieve by the rotary table machining center. In order to achieve high-precision rotation, the high-end rotary axis is also equipped with a circular encoder feedback, and the indexing accuracy is within a few seconds. Of course, the rotary structure of this type of spindle is more complicated and the manufacturing cost is higher.

Strategic significance of five-axis linkage

Because the five-axis linkage CNC machine tool system is very expensive, and the NC program is difficult to make, it is difficult for the five-axis system to be used for civilians. With the breakthrough development of computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) systems, many Chinese CNC companies such as Shanxing Company have launched five-axis linkage CNC machine tools systems, breaking foreign technical blockades and occupying The highest point of this strategic industry has greatly reduced its application costs, and thus ushered in a brand new era for China's equipment manufacturing industry! The development of modern science, represented by information technology, has injected a strong impetus into the equipment manufacturing industry. At the same time, it has also put forward stronger requirements for it. There is no irreplaceable fundamental role in the upgrade. As the driving force behind the growth of the national economy and technological upgrading, the machinery and equipment manufacturing industry marked by the five-axis linkage will progress together with the development of high-tech and emerging industries. China is not only going to be a big country made in the world, it is also going to be a big country made in the world! It is expected that in the near future, with the popularization and promotion of 5-axis linkage CNC machine tool systems, China will surely lay a solid foundation for becoming the world's strongest country!