Loaded and unloaded tooth contact analysis of spiral bevel gears in consideration of misalignments

Bevel gear pairs are employed extensively in transmission systems, such as vehicle transmissions (rear axle drive), aircraft engines/turbines and helicopter gears, to transfer power between non-parallel shafts at high speed or high torque. The most complex form of bevel gear is the spiral bevel gear (SBG). SBG pairs are commonly used in applications that require high load capacity at higher operating speeds than are typically possible with other types of bevel gear. When manufactured in a metal-cutting process, spiral bevel gears can either be produced using single indexing (a face-milling method, which is considered in this study) or continuous indexing (a face-hobbing method). Due to manufacturing imperfections and the flexibility of components, the system might experience misalignments that intensify or exert a destructive effect on the gear vibration, which causes disruption in the stress distribution, thereby decreasing the lifetime of the gearbox. The main purpose of this study is to carry out loaded tooth contact analysis (LTCA) and unloaded tooth contact analysis (UTCA) for an SBG pair in the presence of two types of misalignment, axial and radial misalignment, and represent their effects on the mesh stiffness (MS). To calculate the MS, it is essential to determine the geometrical mismatch between two mating tooth profiles by means of UTCA. To conduct LTCA, three main approaches can be utilised: the finite element method (FEM) and experimental and analytical approaches. Due to the development of software packages during the last decade, Transmission3D-Calyx, an FEM-based software, is used in this study to carry out LTCA and UTCA. Finally, the MS for different misalignment cases is compared to represent the effect of misalignment on the SBG pair.