Detecting milling deformation in 7075 aluminum alloy aeronautical monolithic components using the quasi-symmetric machining method

The deformation of aeronautical monolithic components due to CNC machining is a bottle-neck issue in the aviation industry. The residual stress releases and redistributes in the process of material removal, and the distortion of the monolithic component is generated. The traditional one-side machining method will produce oversize deformation. Based on the three-stage CNC machining method, the quasi-symmetric machining method is developed in this study to reduce deformation by symmetry material removal using the M-symmetry distribution law of residual stress. The mechanism of milling deformation due to residual stress is investigated. A deformation experiment was conducted using traditional one-side machining method and quasi-symmetric machining method to compare with finite element method (FEM). The deformation parameters are validated by comparative results. Most of the errors are within 10%. The reason for these errors is determined to improve the reliability of the method. Moreover, the maximum deformation value of using quasi-symmetric machining method is within 20% of that of using the traditional one-side machining method. This result shows the quasi-symmetric machining method is effective in reducing deformation caused by residual stress. Thus, this research introduces an effective method for reducing the deformation of monolithic thin-walled components in the CNC milling process.