Soichi Ibaraki, Kyoto University

In order to obtain higher productivity under unmanned operations in end milling, a reliable technique for process monitoring and control is required. This paper presents a monitoring method of cutting forces by using high-accuracy displacement sensors installed in a spindle of a machining center. Its estimation performance is experimentally investigated by machining tests on carbon steel under different cutting conditions. It is found that the estimation error is caused mainly by the drift in the displacement sensor output. With its compensation scheme implemented, the experimental result shows that the monitoring of small and medium scale cutting forces is possible, if cutting process is intermittent.