Asymmetric Curved Turning Insert for Low-Wear Lens Machining
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing turning tools for lathes used in metal-cutting technology face issues with rapid wear and high production costs due to small tool radii and limited machining efficiency, particularly in producing eyeglass lenses with complex surface structures, leading to low productivity and high prices.
Innovation Solution
A turning tool with a cutting element featuring a tool blade that has a curvature with a constant change in radius, allowing a greater arc range of contact with the workpiece, reducing wear and increasing machining efficiency, and can be configured as an ellipsis, hyperbola, or parabolic section, with asymmetrical design to increase tool radius and reduce revolutions required for machining.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a small tool radius (approximately 2 mm) is used for turning, then the tool can access complex surface structures, but the number of revolutions increases and production speed decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent transitions from conventional small-radius circular tools to a large-radius tool blade (8 mm diameter) with a specific curvature profile. This dimensional change in tool geometry allows the tool to cover complex surface structures in fewer revolutions, resolving the contradiction between adaptability and productivity by changing the tool's spatial configuration rather than its size.
2Productivity
If a large tool radius (8 mm diameter circular insert) is used, then production speed increases, but the tool cannot produce prism angles and gradients on surfaces
Solution Approach 1:
The tool blade features a non-uniform curvature profile where different sections of the blade have different radii of curvature. This local variation in geometric properties allows the single large-radius tool to create both prism angles and gradient surfaces by engaging different portions of the blade during machining, resolving the contradiction between productivity and adaptability.
3Device complexity
If a cutting element with constant radius curvature is used, then the tool geometry is simple, but the tool wears out quickly due to contact over only a small area
Solution Approach 1:
The cutting element employs a curvature profile where the radius of curvature varies along the blade length. This creates different contact conditions at different locations on the tool blade during machining, distributing wear across a larger surface area and extending tool life, while maintaining relatively simple overall tool geometry.
Data Source
AI summary
A turning tool has a cutting element for a lathe that uses metal-cutting technology, wherein the cutting element has a tool blade, wherein the tool blade of the cutting element has a curvature, in a top view, in which the tool blade intersects a tool axis of the cutting element at a perpendicular angle, in which the cutting element has an opening angle with reference to a center point, wherein the cutting element has asymmetry, in such a manner that the tool axis intersects the opening angle outside the center, and in which, in a top view of the cutting element, the curvature of the tool blade has a constant change in radius.