Study of improving accuracy of a desktop machine tool

Abstract

This study will develop a desktop machine tool that can process steel materials with high precision. To reduce the size of conventional large-scale factories and increase production efficiency, it is necessary to reduce the size of machine tools. However, small machine tools have low rigidity and are easily deformed, thus machining hard materials is difficult. Therefore, a 3-axis small NC milling machine that can cut steel has been prototyped. However, due to insufficient rigidity, the machine body is deformed during machining, resulting in insufficient machining accuracy compared to ordinary large machine tools. Therefore, in this study, the method for reducing the machining error of the prototype by optimally controlling the tool path according to the body’s deformation estimated by cutting forces is proposed, and improvement the effect by applying the method to the prototype machine. As a result, the processing error was improved by the proposed method.