A Finite Element Approach to Bending, Contact and Fatigue Stress Distribution in Helical Gear Systems

摘要

In the face of extensive research into the theoretical basis and performance characteristics of helical gear design, a complete mathematical description of the relationship between the design parameters and the performance matrices is still to be clearly understood because of the great complexity in their interrelationship. The objective of this work is to conduct a comparative study on helical gear design and its performance based on various performance metrics through finite element as well as analytical approaches. The theoretical analysis for a single helical gear system based on American Gear Manufacturing Association (AGMA) standards has been assessed in Matlab. The effect of major performance metrics of different helical gear tooth systems such as single, herringbone and crossed helical gear are studied through finite element approach (FEA) in ANSYS and compared with theoretical analysis of helical gear pair. Structural, contact and fatigue analysis are also performed in order to investigate the performance metrics of different helical gear systems. The benefit of such a comparison is quickly estimating the stress distribution for a new design variant without carrying out complex theoretical analysis as well as the FEA analysis gives less scope for manual errors while calculating complex formulas related to theoretical analysis of gears. It will significantly reduce processing time as well as enhanced flexibility in the design performance.