Effects of Machining Parameters on the Quality in Machining of Aluminium Alloys Thin Plates

Antonio J Gamez,Irene Del Sol,Asuncion Rivero

doi:10.3390/met9090927

Abstract

Nowadays, the industry looks for sustainable processes to ensure a more environmentally friendly production. For that reason, more and more aeronautical companies are replacing chemical milling in the manufacture of skin panels and thin plates components. This is a challenging operation that requires meeting tight dimensional tolerances and differs from a rigid body machining due to the low stiffness of the part. In order to fill the gap of literature research on this field, this work proposes an experimental study of the effect of the depth of cut, the feed rate and the cutting speed on the quality characteristics of the machined parts and on the cutting forces produced during the process. Whereas surface roughness values meet the specifications for all the machining conditions, an appropriate cutting parameters selection is likely to lead to a reduction of the final thickness deviation by up to 40% and the average cutting forces by up to a 20%, which consequently eases the clamping system and reduces machine consumption. Finally, an experimental model to control the process quality based on monitoring the machine power consumption is proposed.

Highlights

Aluminium fuselage skin panel machining is considered a challenging operation due to its dimensional and surface requirements
This paper focuses on the study of thin plates in order to simulate the machining of large skin panels to evaluate the effect of the machining parameters on the final thickness, surface roughness and cutting forces of the part
The final thickness error can be defined as the difference between the experimental thickness and the expected one; this parameter measures the real part dimension

Summary

Introduction

Aluminium fuselage skin panel machining is considered a challenging operation due to its dimensional and surface requirements These parts are lightened by machining superficial pockets in order to increase the fuel efficiency of aircrafts by reducing their structure weight. Different projects and research studies have invested hundreds of thousands of euros to remove chemical milling, designing specific clamping systems to ensure surface quality and dimensional requirements while maintaining clamping flexibility. These systems are focused on twin-machining heads [2,3], magnetic slaves [4] or flexible vacuum beds [5] that control the deflection of the part avoiding overcut during the operation.

Methods

Results

Conclusion