A volume decomposition approach to machining feature extraction of casting and forging components

This paper reports a method for machining feature extraction of forging and casting components. it employs a volume decomposition approach to map machining removal faces into machining processes. The geometric reasoning from the characteristic surfaces produced by machining operations forms the basis of the recognition process. There are three phases in the mapping process: (1) Boolean decomposition of the final part model and raw part model; (2) identification of machined faces (M faces) and concatenation of M-faces into groups (M-group); and (3) mapping M-groups into all feasible machining process types. This recognition technique is process oriented, which is able to overcome the limitation of new feature additions. This approach is also able to deal with some types of feature intersecting. The results can be used directly for process planning of complicated geometric parts, e.g. casting and forging components. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.