A unified instantaneous cutting force model for flat end mills with variable geometries

A new and unified instantaneous cutting force model is developed to predict cutting forces for flat end mills with variable geometries. This model can routinely and efficiently determine the cutting properties such as shear stress, shear and normal friction angles (SSSNFAs) involved in the cutting force coefficients by means of only a few milling tests rather than existing abundant orthogonal turning tests. Novel algorithms are developed to characterize these properties using following steps: transformation of cutting forces measured in Cartesian coordinate system into a local system on the normal plane, establishment of explicit equations to bridge SSSNFAs and the transformed cutting forces, determination of SSSNFAs by solving the equations and fitting SSSNFAs as functions of process geometries. Results definitely show that shear stress can be treated as a constant whereas shear and normal friction angles should be characterized by Weibull functions of instantaneous uncut chip thickness. Experiments verify that the proposed unified model is effective to predict the cutting forces in flat end milling in spite of cutter geometries and cutting conditions.