Measurement, modeling and compensation of thermal error for machine tools

Thermal error accounts for a large proportion in the error sources of the machine tool. In this paper, the thermal error of a boring and milling machine tool is modeled with the output error model of timing analysis. In order to improve the prediction accuracy, Firefly algorithm is used to optimize the number of groups and the orders of output error model. A compensation system is developed based on the proposed model. In the compensation experiment, the thermal error of the machine tool has been reduced dramatically.