A process planning strategy for removing an arbitrary profile by hydrodynamic polishing process

Abstract A process planning strategy for removing an arbitrary profile by a deterministic polishing process is proposed. This strategy suggested that to remove an arbitrary profile the time-distribution of the tool motion at themachining area can be designed to be a linear function of the profile. Because the area of the instantaneous machining zone is finite and the machining rate distribution at this zone is not uniform, this strategy may cause a difference between the desired and machined profiles. The possible errors are classified into two groups: the machining time-distribution error and the ripple error. It is shown that the machining time-distribution error is significant only at the boundary of the machining area. By increasing the size between two conjoint tool positions, this error can be reduced. The size of the instantaneous machining zone has little effect on this error if the size ratio between this zone and two conjoint tool positions is fixed. On the other hand, the ripple error will occur over the whole machining area. The smaller the distance between two conjoint tool positions, the smaller the ripple error will be. The experimental study indicated that the analytical prediction is correct and an arbitrary profile can be accurately removed according to this proposed strategy.