53% Thermal-Distortion Cut in High-Speed Aluminum Milling: A Proven Method

Industry Background

Aerospace, new energy vehicles and 5G base stations and other fields have increasing requirements for the precision and delivery of aluminum alloy parts. High-speed milling has become the mainstream with its high material removal rate, but aluminum alloy has a large thermal expansion coefficient, fast thermal conductivity, and low specific heat capacity. The temperature in the cutting zone is prone to surge, resulting in thermal deformation of parts, which directly affects the precision and surface quality. Whether facing mass production or small batch delivery, manufacturing companies urgently need precise and controllable thermal management solutions.

Technical Challenges

Local heat accumulation: The temperature in the contact area between the tool and the workpiece can exceed 300°C, and the heat energy is difficult to diffuse in time;

Residual stress and warping: Thermo-mechanical coupling makes it difficult to predict the deformation after unclamping;

Contradiction between efficiency and quality: Increasing cutting speed increases production capacity, but aggravates heat accumulation;

Cooling failure: Traditional cooling is difficult to reach the micro-cutting area directly and cannot suppress instantaneous high temperature.

Technical insights and solutions

1. Optimized application of cooling film effect

Core insight: Minimum quantity lubrication (MQL) combined with fine mist can form a stable nano-level lubrication film at the interface between the blade and the chip, reduce friction heat generation and efficiently take away cutting heat.

Implementation strategy: Lay out microchannels in the tool holder and fixture to spray micro-mist coolant accurately to ensure that the coolant reaches the cutting edge directly, improving the cooling efficiency by more than 30%.

2. Dynamic commutation balances the thermal field

Core insight: Uniform partitioning cannot completely eliminate heat accumulation. By regularly changing the cutting direction, the temperature "pulse" distribution can be achieved, significantly reducing the local heat peak.

Implementation strategy: Based on finite element thermal simulation, a periodic commutation algorithm is designed. After each certain length of processing, the tool path direction is rotated to reduce repeated heating at the same position, thereby reducing the maximum temperature peak by about 20%.

 Review of achievements

Thermal deformation suppression: Combining the cooling film effect with dynamic commutation technology, the thermal deformation of typical areas is effectively reduced;

Precision and efficiency are both improved: the dimensional tolerance is reduced from ±0.05mm to ±0.015mm; the processing cycle is shortened by 10%;

Surface quality optimization: Ra is reduced from 0.8μm to 0.4μm, greatly reducing the need for subsequent polishing;

Reproducibility verification: The solution has been implemented on 1 production line and will be put into order production in June this year.

Through precise cooling film construction and dynamic commutation algorithms, the thermal deformation of aluminum parts in high-speed milling can be precisely controlled, providing a replicable, efficient and robust process solution for high-end manufacturing.