Theoretical Investigation of Transient Lubrication in Spur Gear

Abstract

This paper presents performance characteristics of transient thermo-elastohydrodynamic lubrication (TEHL) in line contact with Newtonian fluids. The time-dependent modified Reynolds equation, energy equation and elasticity equation with initial conditions were solved numerically using finite different method, Newton-Raphson method and multigrid multilevel method for an involutes spur gear to obtain the film pressure profiles, film thickness profiles, film temperature and friction coefficient in the contact region. In this analysis, the load is applied on either two pairs or one pair of gear teeth. The simulation results show that at approach point, the film thickness is minimized and film temperature rapidly increases. Film temperature and friction coefficient were suddenly increase when the transition from two pairs to one pair and vice versa are modeled as a step variation of load. The friction coefficient and film temperature were occurrence at pitch point. Film temperature and friction coefficient increase but film thickness decreases when applied load increases. For increasing of speeds, film thickness and film temperature increase but friction coefficient decreses.