Decomposition of forging die for high speed machining

Today's forging die manufacturing process must be adapted to several evolutions in machining process generation: CAD/CAM models, CAM software solutions and High Speed Machining (HSM). In this context, the adequacy between die shape and HSM process is in the core of machining preparation and process planning approaches. This paper deals with an original approach of machining preparation integrating this adequacy in the main tasks carried out. In this approach, the design of the machining process is based on two levels of decomposition of the geometrical model of a given die with respect to HSM cutting conditions (cutting speed and feed rate) and technological constrains (tool selection, features accessibility). This decomposition assists machining assistant to generate an HSM process. The result of this decomposition is the identification of machining features.