Three-dimensional modeling for predicting the vibration modes of twin ball screw driving table

As a redundant drive mechanism, twin ball screw feed system has the advantage of high stiffness and little yaw vibration in the feeding process, while leads to increased difficulty with vibration characteristics analysis and structure optimization. Only low-dimensional structure and dynamics parameters are considered in the existing research, the complete and effective model for predicting the table’s vibrations is lacked. A three-dimensional(3D) mechanical model of twin ball screw driving table is proposed. In order to predict the vibration modes of the table quantitatively, an analytical formulation following a comprehensive approach is developed, where the drive system is modeled as a lumped mass-spring system, and the Lagrangian method is used to obtain the table’s independent and coupled axial, yaw, and pitch vibration modes. The frequency variation of each mode is studied for different heights of the center of gravity, nut positions and table masses by numerical simulations. Modal experiment is carried out on the Z-axis feed table of the horizontal machining center MCH63. The results show that for each mode, the error between the estimated and the measured frequencies is less than 13%. The independent and coupled vibration modes are in accordance with the experimental results, respectively. The proposed work can serve a better understanding of the table’s dynamics and be beneficial for optimizing the structure parameters of twin ball screw drive system in the design stage.