Simulating modular rolling guides elastic properties

Abstract

Due to high performance characteristics of the modular rolling guides, they are widely used in the contemporary CNC machine designs by major manufacturers. The wrong choice of the guide characteristics can result in excessive cost of guides or maintenance, as well as insufficient rigidity of the machine. Various methods of modular rolling guides elastic properties studying and machine tool structure deformation analysis are known. Most of them are analytical solutions in which the cartridge body and the rail are considered non-deformable. The purpose of this study is to develop a hybrid numerical-analytical model based on the FEM and analytical solution. This approach makes it possible to take into account the joint deformation of bodies (cartridge body, rail, etc.) and contact deformation of the balls and raceways of the guides. The study was carried out in SolidWorks Simulation application. The simulation results correlate with the experimental data well. The displacements of the cartridge have lower values than the values obtained using the FEM model. To evaluate the significance of the model nonlinearity and the possibility of its linearization, a series of calculations of the gear hobbing machine structure elements were performed. The hybrid numerical-analytical model created improves the adequacy of the simulation results.