Patterns of Regenerative Milling Chatter Under Joint Influences of Cutting Parameters, Tool Geometries, and Runout

Abstract

The regenerative milling chatter is usually regarded as some kind of bifurcation or chaos behaviors of the machining system. Although several chatter patterns such as the secondary Hopf, the period doubling, and the cyclic fold bifurcations were once reported, their relationships with cutting conditions remain undiscovered. This paper aims to uncover the dynamic mechanism of distinct chatter behaviors in general milling scenarios. First, two complementary methods, i.e., the generalized Runge–Kutta method and the time-domain simulation technique, are presented to jointly study the distribution rule of chatter patterns in stability lobe diagrams for milling processes with general flute-spacing tools considering runout. The theoretical predictions are validated by one published example and two cutting experiments under three different cutting conditions. Furthermore, the cutting signal characteristics and cutting surface topography of distinct chatter patterns are analyzed and compared in detail. On this basis, this paper studies the joint influences of cutting parameters, tool geometries, and runout on regenerative chatter behaviors with the proposed methods.