Determination of wheel position in flute grinding of cylindrical end-mills considering tolerances of flute parameters

Flute parameters, i.e. rake angle, core radius, and flute width, have significant effects on the cutting performance of an end-mill. These parameters should be controlled within tolerances in flute grinding process by adjusting wheel position properly. Existing methods do not take the tolerances into consideration, resulting in that the wheel position cannot be determined properly in the case where the designed flute parameters are out of the valid range. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a new method of determining the wheel position in flute grinding of cylindrical end-mills considering the tolerances of the flute parameters. The accuracy of rake angle is guaranteed by conjugation of the wheel surface with the flute cutting-edge. Taking error controlling of core radius and flute width as the objective, the problem of wheel-position determination is formulated by an optimization model. On this basis, a search strategy for determining wheel position is proposed to include the effects of the tolerances. Several simulation examples are provided for validation. The simulation results indicate that the new method can determine the wheel position properly and efficiently, and the errors of the flute parameters can be minimized within the tolerances, even though the designed flute parameters are out of the valid range.