Influence of Tooth Modifications on Load Distribution in Face-Hobbed Spiral Bevel Gears

Abstract

In this study a novel method for load distribution calculation is applied to investigate the influence of tooth modifications on loaded tooth contact in face-hobbed spiral bevel gears. As a result of these modifications introduced to the teeth of the pinion, the gear pair becomes mismatched, and a point contact replaces the theoretical line contact. In the applied load distribution calculation it is assumed that the point contact under load is spreading over a surface along the whole or part of the “potential” contact line, which line is made up of the points of the mating tooth surfaces in which the separations of these surfaces are minimal. The separations of contacting tooth surfaces are calculated by applying the full theory of tooth surface generation in face-hobbed spiral bevel gears. A computer program was developed to implement the formulation provided above. By using this program the influence of tooth modifications introduced by the variation in machine tool settings and in head cutter profile on load and pressure distributions, transmission errors, and fillet stresses is investigated and discussed.