Development and application of i5 CNC system, the

Research and application of domestic high-end CNC system i5 CNC system

"innovation" is not a "divine thing", nor is it a "fantastic idea" from entrepreneurs or a "flash of inspiration" from some geniuses. After entering the 1990s, Shenyang No.1 Machine Tool Plant, Zoje friendship plant and Shenyang No.3 machine tool plant, the three former "18 Luohan plants", were in trouble. The reason was related to the backward product technology and the loss of market competitiveness. At the same time, as the country opens to the outside world and expands imports, it reflects that China's backward CNC technology has caused greater passivity to the entire CNC machine tool industry

in 2007, Shenyang Machine Tool Group established Shenyang Machine Tool Shanghai Research Institute in Shanghai, and the i5 team was born from then on. The starting point of establishing the i5 team is very simple, that is, to make China's own machine tool "brain", and to be more intelligent. Shenyang Machine Tool Shanghai Research Institute has become the main R & D base of Shenyang Machine Tool Group in motion control technology

in 2012, SMT Shanghai Research Institute made breakthroughs in CNC Motion Control Technology, digital servo drive technology, real-time digital bus technology and other motion control fields for five years, and the first i5 intelligent system with network intelligence function was born. In 2014, SMT Shanghai Research Institute made a breakthrough in the core technology of five axis CNC system, completed the first five axis machine tool vmc0656e equipped with i5 system, and successfully tested. The five axis machine tool was mass produced in 2015, providing an important foundation for Shenyang machine tool to enter the high-end CNC market

i5 system is a bottom-level technological breakthrough based on mastering motion control technology, which comprehensively covers various machine tool applications such as two axis, three axis, four axis and five axis. On this basis, a series of machine tool products that meet the demands of differentiation can be derived

II. Technical highlights and innovations

1 General introduction

(1) i5 adopts the full software structure based on PC, that is, using the characteristics that the software and hardware development of computer system can be separated, the core part of NC control is written on CPU and realized by software. The advantage of this structure is that the topology of the CNC core is variable, and the internal modules are all open. With the help of standardized interfaces, the exchange, transplantation or collaborative work between modules can be realized. The PC based features enable i5 to obtain natural interconnection capabilities and more advanced hardware support

(change 1 extensive plastic granulator into a combined and intelligent plastic granulator 2) selection of operating system. I5 adopts the Linux operating system, which is different from other windows systems based on PC. The Linux operating system is the product of Internet sharing development. Its advantage is that the source code is open and free, which naturally fits with the Internet. Developers can tailor and revise the operating system according to their own needs to realize the customization of the operating system

(3) selection of digital bus. I5 adopts the open EtherCAT (ECAT) bus, which can reach the chip level (providing IP authorization of FPGA logic and realizing chip level integration), and has 600000 users worldwide. Compared with the closed bus, the biggest advantage of EtherCAT bus is that it can support the future expansion and application of CNC system, and has rich open resources and third-party equipment support

making machine tools "intelligent" is the central principle of i5 CNC system. Intelligence does not have to be through sensors, but also through information interaction, even between people; Embedding sensors in machine tools not only costs a lot, but also destroys the rigidity of machine tools. Real intelligence is to bring convenience to users and make the originally difficult things simple (for example, to enable junior technicians to do the work that can only be done by senior technicians) is intelligence. I5 CNC system has continued and expanded these intelligent functions since its development

2. Make programming simpler

machine tools need different process designs when processing different parts, and behind the process design is actually the continuous precipitation of knowledge and experience. Only experienced teachers can skillfully set processing parameters, and the purpose of cycle guidance is to convert the continuous precipitation of experience into program code

loop boot programming: boot programming includes standardized loop and customized loop support. The standardized cycle supports standard turning, milling, drilling, tapping and boring cycles; Rapid programming and modification can be achieved by graphically guiding the programming page. Customized cycle can be customized and developed according to specific process requirements to achieve efficient and convenient generation, such as rough embryo cutting and grooving of lathe

Dingxiang County, Shanxi Province is known as the "hometown of flange forging". In the process of batch processing of flanges, due to the large number of flange sizes and specifications and the frequent replacement of workpieces, it is necessary to often write and modify the processing program, while the local lack of process programmers leads to the inability to meet the order requirements, affecting the delivery schedule and order quantity. Although the size of the flange itself is inconsistent, the contour is relatively regular or similar. According to this processing characteristic, the i5 team has customized and developed an automatic flange programming app for local customers. By selecting the workpiece type and filling in several key dimensions according to the drawing, the processing program can be automatically generated, which greatly reduces the technical requirements for operators and improves the overall production efficiency

3. Make operation safer

3D simulation: virtual pre-processing, users can directly see the 3D simulation results of the processing program on the control screen, that is, they can see the simulation processing results without starting the machine tool. When the machine tool is processing parts, the operator can preview the subsequent processing track from the display interface, which greatly facilitates the user to manage multiple machine tools at the same time in the workshop. At the same time, the three-dimensional graphic display is more conducive to the operation division to identify whether there are problems in the subsequent processing, so as to stop the operation of the machine tool in time and reduce losses

tool change in safe area: in order to avoid interference, the tool change point is generally set far away from the workpiece in the program. The system improves the efficiency of tool change while ensuring the safety of tool change, and develops the function of tool change in safe area. The safe area tool change function allows the user to set a safe tool change position according to the actual situation of the tool on the tool holder and the workpiece being processed

machine tool physical examination: machine tool physical examination can quickly understand the assembly status and positioning failure causes of machine tool mechanical parts without disassembling and assembling the sheet metal, which greatly reduces the difficulty and workload of equipment maintenance, and can also provide equipment manufacturers with good product delivery inspection methods to improve the consistency of mechanical assembly. The system judges the operation of the machine tool by making each axis of the machine tool operate within a certain range independently and collecting the current value during the operation

graphical diagnosis (to help users quickly troubleshoot): when a fault occurs, users can quickly and simply troubleshoot it step by step through graphical guidance, reducing the downtime of users waiting for after-sales services. The development of this function is related to the close cooperation between machine tool manufacturers and users. Through market research, the Shanghai R & D team found that 70% of the problems of machine tools are "simple problems", but users will not solve them themselves. The graphic diagnosis function can help users look at three-dimensional graphics and prompt themselves to solve some problems, which not only reduces the downtime and losses of users waiting for service, but also saves the maintenance service cost of the host plant

5. High speed and high precision function

thermal error compensation: the thermal error of machine tool is one of the most important factors that cause the machining error of parts, which seriously affects the machining accuracy. At present, there are the following problems in thermal error compensation: obtaining modeling data at a high cost; The robustness and prediction accuracy of thermal error model are poor; The compensation mode is not highly integrated with CNC. I5 thermal error compensation can realize the automatic acquisition of the thermal elongation of the spindle in the Z direction and the establishment and prediction of the thermal error model based on the working condition. CNC distributes the compensation value equally to each interpolation cycle, and there is no need for a thermal engine in the cold and shutdown recovery States, so as to maintain high dimensional consistency and machining accuracy

visual recognition: visual recognition is mainly used when the workpiece is repeatedly clamped in the manufacturing process, and the tooling fixture cannot ensure the determined position or angle of the workpiece; The fixture does not have high accuracy assurance, or cannot be positioned - in the case that the probe cannot be used for positioning (such as small features, or different colors), at the same time, the visual recognition function also has high added value. Its measurement function can be used for pre processing measurement and post processing measurement. Pre processing measurement is used to ensure that the blank has the processing conditions and avoid invalid processing; The measurement after processing is used to check whether the processing result is qualified

III. fully open structure implementation and interconnection connection

the biggest difference between i5 and other CNC systems is that it can be connected and interconnected, which stems from its completely different design ideas, that is, i5 is a fully open structure based on PC platform

(1) remote diagnosis (help users quickly get remote expert support). In addition to the fault diagnosis tool of this machine, the system also provides remote diagnosis function to reduce the maintenance cost and downtime of the machine tool. When the after-sales service personnel cannot solve the fault, they can connect the machine tool to the Internet through the portable 3G intelligent terminal, and the remote experts can connect to the CNC system to obtain the alarm information, log files, configuration files and other information, so as to help the after-sales service personnel solve the fault quickly

(2) wis workshop information management system (to help users manage workshop operations by means of interconnection). With machine tools as the center, the information systems such as operation planning, production scheduling, equipment management and cost accounting are all integrated into a set of software systems to form a machine tool centered workshop management information system, which is named Wis. The concept of workshop information management system has existed for a long time. Many factories also have their own workshop management software, such as MES (Manufacturing Execution System) and ERP (Management Information System). The former is more inclined to control the production process, and the latter is more inclined to order and financial management. So what is the difference between wis and these workshop management software? MES and ERP are actually two management software that are independent of each other and cannot communicate information. However, at the workshop level, it is necessary to master both aspects of information at the same time in order to effectively master the production process and arrange and manage the production plan. In reality, the coordination between MES and ERP is completed manually (the factory workshop usually makes a table of MES adjustment items regularly, gives them to the business department, and then the business department manually adjusts them in ERP), which brings a serious problem - staff may falsely report, omit or misstate information and data, resulting in untrue information and non real-time. Wis is a bottom-up software system for workshop management, which provides production information for managers by collecting the real data generated by each machine tool, and ensures the real-time transmission of data through interconnection

i5 system has launched the iport protocol for smart machine tool alliance specifically for interconnected applications. At present, it has been released to V3 version, which has strong information transparency ability. For example, based on the iport agreement, the i5 system cooperates with the latest leasing business model to create a leasing function. The salesperson can lock and unlock the equipment through the network. The leasing function can also provide processing timing, processing piece counting and other functions, providing technical and data support for the flexible configuration of the leasing mode

i5 system realizes "intelligent solution around the whole life cycle of machine tools" by fully integrating with network and information technology: Based on i5 intelligent machine tool technology