Experimental Analysis of Spur Gear Pair with Geometrical and Operating Parameters

Abstract This study presents experimental work to analyze spur gear pair with geometrical and operating parameters. The spur gear pair accommodates the correction in tooth addendum, gear backlash, and linear tip-relief profile modification with three levels. As per Taguchi L9 orthogonal array, nine test spur gear pairs are precisely manufactured to analyze the gear dynamics. Other basic gear design parameters and operating parameters were held at a constant level. Root-mean-square (RMS) acceleration in the vertical direction is used to quantify the dynamic response of test gear pairs. Experimental data are analyzed by using the Taguchi method to investigate the rank of influencing parameters and the optimum level of parameters to minimize vibration response. Gear backlash, compared to tooth addendum and linear tip-relief tooth profile modification, emerges as the most influential parameter. The optimal combination is addendum 3.3 mm, backlash 0.05–0.075 mm, and linear tip-relief tooth profile modification, yielding the lowest vibration generation. Finally, the confirmation test was performed by using a simulation study to validate the experimental results. The RMS acceleration value of the simulation study is 0.070 g, which is approximately the lowest of the experimental response values. Similarly, 20 experiments were conducted with different speed and load combinations to check the effect of operating conditions on gear dynamics. From these experimental studies, it is observed that the rank of influencing parameters and optimum level of geometrical are varied with respect to operating conditions. It may be concluded that operating speed and loading conditions play very important roles in the design of a quiet gear system. The optimized performance of spur gear pairs may vary across different operating conditions. It indicates that typically optimized spur gear pair operated at one particular combination of load and speed may not show good performance at other operating conditions. Therefore, this study suggests that the realistic range of operating conditions should be considered while selecting suitable levels of geometrical parameters.