Parametrically automated 3D design and manufacturing for spiral-type free-form models in an interactive CAD/CAM environment

For product lifecycle management reasons, research trends impose the need of automated engineering tasks, such as computer-aided design and manufacturing. This paper proposes a novel approach of automating both the design and manufacturing processes of impeller-type geometries, when CAD/CAM technology is employed. To do so, a newly developed application was built; exploiting application programming interface objects of parametric instances, in order to automate time-consuming repetitive tasks for the preparation of 3D models and their direct manufacturing process. The developed application incorporates Simpson’s method, Bezier-Bernstein equation and Non-Uniform Rational B-Spline for curve approximation describing blades of centrifugal impellers, as a representative case study. The machining technology is that of 3-axis CNC, thereby; each curve extends along a constant x-y plane. In the first step of the application, the entire 3D model of the impeller-type model is automatically generated according to variable values taken as user-defined entities from the interface. The application then carries on by automatically modeling the manufacturing process and ultimately generating the NC program from the cutter location data for a given CNC machine tool.