The modified pitch cone design of the hypoid gear: Manufacture, stress analysis and experimental tests

In order to improve the strength and endurance of hypoid gear, and extend the lifetime of hypoid gear, the modified pitch cone method is firstly introduced. On the condition of the invariant mean working tooth depth, invariant outer diameter of gear and the gear addendum coefficient f_a ≤ 0, the new pitch cone parameters are derived. The new pitch cone is coincident to face cone or out of the gear solid. The meshing behavior, tooth surface contact stress, maximum tensile bending stress and maximum compressive bending stress are researched by using tooth contact analysis, loaded tooth contact analysis and finite element method. The computer simulation results show that the tooth surface contact stress, the maximum tensile bending stress and the maximum compressive bending stress of the pinion to hypoid gear pair designed by new method are markedly reduced. From the experiment, the new type hypoid gear pair can be processed by the general cutter, and the other special tool is unnecessary. In this paper, the approach of derivation for the pinion rough-machining machine tool settings designed by the modified pitch cone method is presented, and has been verified in the gear research center of Dong Feng Vehicle-bridge Co., Ltd.