Identification of machining features based on available resources of cutting tools

In research on machining feature recognition, the problems of interacting features and availability of cutting tools are considered two major obstacles for developing industrial applications. In this research, a new machining feature recognition approach is developed to address these problems. In this work, a new concept called cutting mode is introduced to associate generic machining surfaces and cutting motions. In the feature recognition process, the machining surfaces of a part are first mapped to cutting modes, and these cutting modes are further mapped to available cutting tools. Among all the created candidate machining processes, heuristic rules are employed to identify the optimal solution that requires the minimum number of setups. When a number of machining surfaces are associated with a cutting tool in the same setup, these surfaces are grouped as a machining feature. Therefore the interacting features are recognised by the different cutting tools to produce these features. A database of available cutting tools is used to avoid the identification of features which cannot be machined in a machine shop. Three mechanical parts with interacting features are selected in the case studies to demonstrate the effectiveness of the developed approach.