Constructing Free-Form Surfaces for Milling from Digitized Data

Using a three-axis miller, copies, negative moulds, etc. of a solid body shall be made. To reduce machine time, a method is presented so that the body has to be scanned only once, even if differently sized tools are used. This is accomplished by approximating the given surface with B-splines and generating the milling paths from this mathematical description. Prior to being fed into a milling machine, these control programs and several other data can also be displayed on a screen, in order to judge the quality and smoothness of the result. A small example is included.