Measurement of the thermal contact parameters at a workpiece – tool interface in a HSM process

In high speed machining process, the workpiece-tool thermal contact is not well known. We propose an experimental approach founded on an original measurement principle that allows accurate estimation of the thermal contact parameters. These latter are three: the thermal contact resistance, the generated heat flux density and the partition coefficient of this latter. In this paper we present the principle of measurement of these parameters considering the global theoretical model and its difficult and propose a simpler alternative model. This latter consider separately both sub domains to estimate the thermal superficial conditions. That allows determining the three parameters of contact allowing a precise formulation of the boundary condition at the workpiece-tool interface. The purpose of this simplified model is to uncorrelate the estimates of generated heat flux and the partition coefficient.