Thermal field modeling algorithm based on flexible space division for high-power, high-precision mechatronic systems

This paper presents a new thermal-field modeling method, referred to here as a flexible space division algorithm (FSDA), for design and real-time manufacturing applications of high-power, high-precision mechatronic systems where thermal fields play an important role in the performance and reliability of the final products. This algorithm, which takes advantages of the flexible division of three-dimensional space to deal with the spatial distribution of the thermal field, is built upon physical laws to derive the governing equations in state-space representation that facilitates the reconstruction and control of the thermal field being analyzed. Two numerical examples (involving both Cartesian and cylindrical coordinates) are illustrated to highlight the effectiveness and usefulness of the FSDA for real-time modeling and computing. In the context of a thin-walled component machining application, the FSDA is evaluated numerically, which consistently agrees well with results computed using commercial finite-element analysis software, confirming its ability to obtain accurate results with significantly less computation time and the complementary role to FEA that the FSDA can play when real-time computing of a physical field is required.