Int. J. Machining and Machinability of Materials, Vol. 19, No. 1, 2017 1 Copyright © 2017 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. The design, calibration and adaption of a dynamometer for fine turning Richárd Horváth and Tibor Pálinkás Donát Bánki Faculty of Mechanical and Safety Engineering, Óbuda University, 1081 Budapest, Népszínház Street 8, Hungary Email: horvath.richard@bgk.uni-obuda.hu Email: palinkas.tibor@bgk.uni-obuda.hu Gyula Mátyási Budapest University of Technology and Economics, 1111 Budapest, Egry József Street 1, Hungary Email: matyasi@manuf.bme.hu Ágota Drégelyi-Kiss* Donát Bánki Faculty of Mechanical and Safety Engineering, Óbuda University, 1081 Budapest, Népszínház Street 8, Hungary Email: dregelyi.agota@bgk.uni-obuda.hu *Corresponding author Abstract: In cutting research, the determination of the spatial force system of cutting processes is extremely important. Therefore, the forces generated need to be measured with high precision. In this paper, the development of a special three-component dynamometer system is presented for the measurement of small forces (0…100 N) in three directions during fine cutting, with a precision of 0.1 N. The designed dynamometer employs a piezo-electric cell and can easily be mounted on the tool post with only small modifications to the tool holder. The setup was calibrated for sensitivity, static load and range. By using error functions, the relative error in the measurement of force is kept below 1.5%. Keywords: cutting force measurement; precision and metrology; dynamometer design; three-component piezo-electric dynamometer; fine turning. Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Horváth, R., Pálinkás, T., Mátyási, G. and Drégelyi-Kiss, Á. (2017) ‘The design, calibration and adaption of a dynamometer for fine turning’, Int. J. Machining and Machinability of Materials, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp.1–16. Biographical notes: Richárd Horváth is an Assistant Professor at the Óbuda University Donát Bánki Faculty of Mechanical and Safety Engineering. He received his MSc in Mechanical Engineering in the field of hard turning, and his PhD in the field of fine turning of aluminum parts at Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary in 2015. His research fields are several cutting technologies, cutting theory, cutting capacity of cutting tools, and machinability of different types of raw materials.