Introduction

Introduction to
NC systems
T. L. Nguyen

November 2, 2014

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Introduction

Outline

Introduction

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Introduction

Introduction

NC machines, being typical mechatronics products, comprise machine

tools that have a mechanical component and a numerical control system
The machine tool is called mother machine in the sense that it is a machine
that makes machines.
NC machine tools can be classified as cutting machines and non-cutting
ma- chines. A cutting machine means a machine that performs a removal
process to make a finished part; milling machines, Non-cutting machine
tools change the shape of the blank material by applying force.

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When NC machines were developed, the purpose of the NC machine was

to machine parts with complex shape in a precise manner. The numerical
controller was primarily applied to milling machines and boring machines.
However, recently it has become popular to apply NC for increased productivity and the kinds of machine with NC have been varied.
The application of NC has extended to non-conventional machine tools
NC machine technology has also progressed to allow construction of Flexible Automation or Flexible Manufacturing Systems by connecting machines with production equipment such as robots, Autonomous Guided
Vehicles, automated warehouses and computers.
NC systems are used not only for machine tools but also all machines that
need motion controlled by servo systems.

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Figure 1 : The architecture of NC machine tools and machining operation flow

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Offline tasks are the tasks that are needed to generate a part program for
control- ling an NC machine. In the offline stage, after the shape of a
part has been decided, a geometry model of this part is created by 2D or
3D CAD.
After finishing geometric modeling, Computer Aided Process Planning,
CAPP, is carried out where necessary information for machining is generated. In this stage, the selection of machine tools, tools, jig and fixture,
decisions about cutting conditions, scheduling and machining sequences
are created.
CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing) is executed in the final stage for
generating a part program. In this stage, tool paths are generated based on
geometry information from CAD and machining information from CAPP.
During tool path generation, interferences between tool and workpiece,
minimization of machining time and tool change, and machine performance are considered. In particular, CAM is an essential tool to generate
2.5D or 3D toolpaths for machine tools with more than three axes.

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Online tasks are those that are needed to machine parts using NC machines.
In this stage, the NC system reads and interprets part programs from memory
and controls the movement of axes. The NC system generates instructions for
position and velocity control based on the part program and servo motors are
controlled based on the instructions generated.
The construction of the machine and the machine components should also
be designed to be insensitive to vibration and temperature. In addition, the
performance of the encoder and sensors that are included in the NC system
and the control mechanism influences the machining accuracy.
The status of the machine and machining process may be monitored during machining. Actually, tool-breakage detection, compensation of thermal
deformation, adaptive control, and compensation of tool deflection based on
monitoring of cutting force, heat, and electric current are applied during machining.

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The post-line task is to carry out CAI (Computer Aided Inspection), inspecting the finished part. In this stage, inspection using a CMM (Coordinate
Measurement Machine) is used to make a comparison between the result and
the geometry model in order to perform compensation.
The compensation is executed by modifying tool compensation or by doing
post-operations such as re-machining and grinding.
Reverse engineering, meaning that the shape of the part is measured and a
geometric model based on the measured data is generated, is included in this
stage.

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The History of NC and NC Machine Tools

NC means a control device that machines a target part by activating the servo
motor according to commands. The NC combined with computer technology
is called computerized NC or CNC (Computer Numerical Control).
An NC machine which consists of vacuum tubes, transistors, circuits, logic
elements such as large-scale integrated circuits (LSI) is called Hardwired NC,
and performs NC functions through connecting elements by electrical wiring.
Instead of elements and circuits, NC functions are implemented based on
software in CNC. Such CNC is called Softwired NC.
The concept of NC was actually applied to machine tools after World War II
and in 1947. The servo laboratory in MIT and in March 1952, a 3-axis milling
machine, being the first NC machine tool, was developed.
In this era, because there was not the circuitry such as transistors and ICs, a
vacuum tube was used and the size of NC was bigger than that of the machine
tools.The concept of NC, which was introduced in scientific journals from the
United States, was also introduced into Japan and, in 1957, an NC turning
machine was developed.
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The servo, the word originates from servue in Latin, is the device that carries
out faithfully the given command.

Figure 2 : Driving mechanisms of machine tools

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Driving motor and Sensor

The fundamental characteristics required for servo motors of machine tools

are the following:
1 To be able to get adequate output of power according to work load.
2 To be able to respond quickly to an instruction.
3 To have good acceleration and deceleration properties.
4 To have a broad velocity range.
5 To be able to control velocity safely in all velocity ranges.
6 To be able to be continuously operated for a long time.

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7 To be able to provide frequent acceleration and deceleration.

8 To have high resolution in order to generate adequate torque in the case of
as mall block.
9 To be easy to rotate and have high rotation accuracy.
10 To generate adequate torque for stopping.
11 To have high reliability and long length of life.
12 To be easy to maintain.

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Figure 3 : Driving mechanisms of machine tools

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Encoder

The device that detects the current position for position control is called an
encoder and, generally, is built into the end of the power-transmission shaft.
In order to control velocity, the velocity is detected by a sensor or is calculated
by position control data detected from the encoder.
The method for detecting velocity uses the encoder, a way of counting pulses
generated in unit time and a means of detecting the interval between pulses
together. An encoder can be classified as an optical type or a magnetic type.

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Linear Movement Guide

Figure 4 : Linear-movement guides

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An LM guide consists of an M-shaped guide rail and a transferring part. The

bearing exists between the guide rail and the transferring part and lubricant
is supplied to the surface of the LM guide rail to decrease friction while the
transferring part is moving.
As the ball is in contact with a screw and a nut, it plays the role of reducing
the sliding friction of the lead screw that occurs due to rotation. Applying
rolling contact to the contact surface between metals in contact minimizes the
friction force when movement starts and prevents sticking when moving at low
speed. In addition, reduction of backlash is possible by using an enlarged ball
bearing or double nut.
The lead of a ball screw is related to the displacement unit of the machine
tool table. In CNC, the displacement length per one pulse output from NC
is defined as a BLU (Basic Length Unit). For example, if one pulse makes
a servo motor rotate by one degree and the servo motor moves the table by
0.0001mm, one BLU will be 0.0001mm.

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Coupling

Figure 5 : Flexible coupling and power transmission belt

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A flexible coupling is mainly used as the machine component that connects

a servo motor shaft with a ball screw. When a ball screw and servo motor are
joined, the center of their shafts should be identical. However, in practice, this
is very difficult. For this reason, a coupling should be designed to be insensitive
to misaligned rotation centers.
In general, belts and gears are used as the mechanical components as the link
be- tween a spindle motor and a spindle body. In the case when a servo motor
and a spin- dle body are separated, a belt is used for transmitting power. In
the case when high torque is needed at low speed, gears are used as speed
reducers
Using a belt is not suited to high-speed machining and has problems about
noise and wear. To overcome these drawbacks, the direct driving method
(direct drive) is used. In the direct driving method, the shaft of a spindle
motor is directly connected with a spindle body or a spindle motor itself is
built into a spindle body.

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CNC control loop

Figure 6 : Three kinds of control loop in CNC

In general, the position-control loop is located in the NC and the others are
located in a servo driving device. However, there is no absolute standard
about the location of control loops and the locations can be varied based on
the intention of the designer.
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Semi Closed Loop

Figure 7 : Semi closed loop

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The semi-closed loop is the most popular control mechanism. In this type,
a position detector is attached to the shaft of a servo motor and detects the
rotation angle. The position accuracy of the axis has a great influence on the
accuracy of the ball screw.
If necessary, pitch-error compensation and backlash compensation can be used
in NC in order to increase the positional accuracy.
The pitch-error compensation method is that, at the specific pitch, the
instructions to the servo driver system are modified in order to remove the
accumulation of positional error. The backlash compensation method is that,
whenever the moving direction is changed, additional pulses corresponding to
the amount of backlash are sent to the servo driver system.

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Closed Loop

Figure 8 : Closed loop

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In the closed loop, the position detector is attached to the machine table and
the actual position error is fed back to the control system.
Closed loop and semi-closed loop are very similar except in the location of
the position detector, and the position accuracy of closed loop is very high.
However, the resonance frequency of the machine body, stick slip, and lost
motion have an influence on the servo characteristics because the machine
body is included in the position control loop.

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Hybrid Loop

Figure 9 : Closed loop

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In closed loop, it is necessary to lower the gain in the case when it is difficult
to increase the rigidity in proportion to the weight of the moving element or
decrease lost motion as in a heavy machine. If the gain is very low, though,
the performance becomes poor with respect to positioning time and accuracy.
In this case, the hybrid loop is used.
In the hybrid loop, there are two kinds of control loop; semi-closed loop, where
the position is detected from the shaft of a motor, and closed loop, which is
based on a linear scale. In the semi-closed loop, it is possible to control with
high gain because the machine is not included in the control system. The
closed loop increases accuracy by compensating the error that the semi-closed
loop cannot control. Because the closed loop is used for compensating only
positional error, it is well behaved in spite of low gain.
By combining the closed loop and the semi-closed loop, it is possible to
obtain high accuracy with high gain in an ill- conditioned machine.

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Open Loop

Unlike the above-mentioned control loops, open loop has no feedback. Open
loop can be applied in the case where the accuracy of control is not high and
a stepping motor is used. Because open loop does not need a detector and a
feedback circuit, the structure is very simple. Also, the accuracy of the
driving system is directly influenced by the accuracy of the stepping motor,
ball screw, and transmission.

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The components of the CNC system

Figure 10 : The construction of CNC

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The MMI (Man Machine Interface) unit offers the interface between NC and
the user, executes the machine operation command, displays machine status,
and offers functions for editing the part program and communication.
The NCK (Numerical Control Kernel) unit, being the core of the CNC system,
interprets the part program and executes interpolation, position control, and
error compensation based on the interpreted part program. Finally, this controls
the servo system and causes the workpiece to be machined.
The PLC (Programmable Logic Control) sequentially controls tool change,
spindle speed, workpiece change, and in/out signal processing and plays the
role of controlling the machines behavior with the exception of servo control.

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Figure 11 : The components of a CNC system

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MMI Function

1 Operation functions: These functions are used very frequently and support
oper- ation of the machine and the display that shows the machine status, the
position, distance-to-go, and feed of each axis, spindle speed, the block that
is being executed, and override status are examples. In addition, functions to
help machine operation such as jog, program search, program editor, and tool
management are provided.
2 Parameter-setting functions: In the CNC system there are various parameters
for internal use and these are categorized into three kinds: Machine parameters
that are used for setting machine regulation, servo/spindle driving system, tool
offset, work coordinate, and safety boundary; program parameters that should
be set during editing of the part program; and customization parameters that
are used to adapt the machine to user requirements. These functions provide
the interface for setting, storing, and searching parameters.

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3 Program-editing functions: These functions are able to edit and modify the
part program, which is G-code based on the EIA/ISO standard.
4 Monitoring and alarm functions: the CNC system always informs a user of
the machine status by monitoring and, if need be, these functions execute the
neces- sary tasks and inform the user of the result.
5 Service/utility functions: Besides the other four essential functions, many
useful functions are provided to assist users

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NCK Function

Figure 12 : NCK functional blocks

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1 An interpreter plays the role of reading a part program, interpreting the ASCII
blocks in the part program, and storing interpreted data in internal memory
for the interpolator.
2 An interpolator plays the role of sequentially reading the data from the internal
data buffer, calculating the position and velocity per unit time of each axis, and
storing the result in a FIFO buffer for the acceleration/deceleration controller.
3 If position control is executed by using the data generated from the interpolator, large mechanical vibration and shock occur whenever part movement starts
and stops. In order to prevent mechanical vibration and shock, the filtering for
acceleration/deceleration control is executed before interpolated data is sent
to the position controller.
4 The data from an acceleration/deceleration controller is sent to a position
controller and position control is carried out based on the transmitted data in
a constant time interval. A position control typically means a PID controller.

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PLC Function

The PLC unit of a CNC system is similar to the general PLC system but
there is an auxiliary controller that assists with part of the functions of the
NCK unit. Therefore, the following functions are necessary:
Circuit dedicated to communicating with NCK.
Dual-port RAM for supporting high-speed communication.
Memory for the exchanged data during high-speed communication with NCK.
High-speed input module for high-speed control such as turret control.

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In an NC system, the NCK unit, the PLC unit, and the MMI unit should be
executed in constant time intervals. Because of this property, the NC system
is a complex real-time system.For the NC system design, the modularization
of tasks and the system design such as the allocation of priority for each task,
the selection of scheduling method and the synchronization and
communication mechanism among tasks are required.

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