Abstract
The milling of parts with multi-axis CNC machines is an area of the CAD-CAM field, which permits the machining of complex surfaces like those used in the mould and die industries. With these applications, one of the main goals is to achieve accuracy together with an improvement of the surface finish, in order to minimise polishing operations, which will still remain necessary in order to obtain the surface finish required by the motorcar industry and more generally in the plastic design industry.
Surface finish is the result of interactions between the tool and the part depending mainly on cutting parameters such as tool geometry and material, speed, feed per tooth, width of cut. The results of the surface finish analysis given by 3D measurements and data processing techniques show that micro-geometrical faults generated by a C, continuous tool path (each end path section has the same left and right tangency) are definitely less important than those obtained by classical linear interpolated tool paths.