Development and Application of a Wheel Based Process Monitoring System in Grinding

As an advantage to conventional monitoring systems sensor equipped grinding wheels offer the possibility to gain information on the process status from direct measurements of physical quantities in the contact zone. This can be realized by the integration of small temperature and force sensors into segmented grinding wheels. A new thermocouple sensor concept was developed whose novelty is the continuous contacting of the thermocouple by the grinding wheel wear. Further tests where conducted using a piezoelectric sensor integrated into the grinding wheel. By this set-up, forces in grinding as well as in dressing processes were obtained. After assessing the system's capability for monitoring grinding and dressing processes tests in an industrial environment showed the reliability of the monitoring system which therefore may become the basis for a novel kind of process control in the future.