Abstract: A new method called face five-point method for the measurements of the axial and tilt motion errors of a lathe spindle is proposed, in which five probes are set perpendicular to the spindle face and all located along a circle which is concentric with the spindle axis and the positions of the probes are optimized based on error analysis, which can get the axial and tilt motion error of a spindle in one revolution of the spindle rotary, the measurements error caused by the reading errors and misalignments of the probes are minimized. Experiments show that the proposed method can be used for real-time spindle motion error measurement with submicron accuracy.

Key words: Axial and tilt motion errors, Five-point method, Measurement Spindle