Elimination of thermal drift in measuring the positioning accuracy of a three axis milling machine

The aim of this paper is to draw attention to more reliable verification method of positioning accuracy. The improvement lies in mathematical elimination of thermal impact during the measurement process. This thermal impact, always present during the motion of movable parts, is of a special systemic character. It increases the indefiniteness of measurement of the classic measurement method. This measurement uncertainty can be reduced by implementing the procedure introduced in this paper. The reduction can be achieved by separating the temperature impact from other sources of inaccuracy. Such separation is a very new solution. The methodology relies on mathematical processing and does not depend on the manner of accuracy measurement. The evaluation method also yields diagnostic information on the machine’s condition. The experiments were performed with the use of laser interferometer.