Study on Machining Distortion of Titanium Alloy Aircraft Monolithic Component by Finite Element Method and Experiment

A physics-based material process simulation is approached to investigate the distortion law of titanium alloy aircraft monolithic component during machining process by finite element method (FEM). To improve finite element calculation efficiency, a material removal methodology of machining process is presented. With a single tool-tooth milling process finite element simulation, cutting loads during material removing are obtained and applied to the machining model of the part. Restart-calculation is put forward to complete the whole simulation of machining process. Key factors influencing distortion such as initial residual stress, cutting sequence and cutting path are considered during machining process simulation. To validate the simulation result, experiment is carried out. The distortion law of aircraft monolithic component resulting from simulation show a good agreement with the experiment result, which indicates that the key technologies presented in this paper are practicable and can be used to simulate machining process of aircraft monolithic component to predict its distortion, so lengthy and expensive trial and error experiment process can be avoided.