Inspection of the machined surfaces using manufacturing data

Accuracy of complex machined parts is usually estimated using coordinate measurement machines. The inspection results can be used to control or monitor a production system. Traditional inspection process of a machined surface commonly compares the resulting manufactured surface with the CAD-model or the nominal designed surface. Although, the result of this CAD-based inspection can be used to accept or reject the machined part, it does not provide the correct information required to study the machining errors and their behaviour. This paper presents a methodology to inspect a machined surface directly based on its actual CAM geometric model. The presented CAM-based inspection methodology can be used to model and understand the real machining errors, which can be utilized for process control, design for manufacturing or closed-loop machining.