Abstract: In this paper, the effect of four sequential cuts in side milling of Ti6Al4V on chip formation and residual stresses (RS) are investigated using finite element method (FEM). While the open literature is limited mainly to the studies of orthogonal sequential cutting with the constant uncut chip thickness greater than 0.01 mm, it is suggested herein to investigate not only the variable uncut chip thickness which characterises the down milling process, but also the uncut chip thickness in the sub-micron range using a finite cutting edge radius. For the resulting ductile machining regime, the characteristics of the chip morphology, the force profiles, the plastic deformation and temperature distributions have been analyzed. Furthermore, this study revealed that the RS should be extracted toward the area where the insert exits the workpiece in the FE simulation of the down-milling process. The simulation of a number of sequential cuts due to the consecutive engagements of the insert is required in order to capture the gradual accumulation of the RS before reaching an asymptotic convergence of the RS profile. The predicted RS are in reasonable agreement with the experimental results.

Key words: Finite element method (FEM), Down milling, Sequential cuts, Ductile machining regime, Chip formation, Residual stresses (RS)