TOPOLOGY OPTIMIZATION BASED DESIGN OF LIGHTWEIGHT AND LOW VIBRATION GEAR BODIES

This article presents a new approach aiming to reduce gear vibration and weight by modifying its body structure. The primary objective was to reduce vibration and noise emission of spur gears. For this purpose, a solid gear body was replaced by a lattice structure, which was expected to raise the torsional compliance of the body. The lattice structure was configured and optimized by a FE-based topology optimization software. For experimental purposes, the optimized gear was produced from Titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4V ELI using Selective Laser Melting technique. In the tests, the sound pressure of various running gear pairs was measured in order to estimate and compare the properties of a solid gear, of a lattice gear, and of a lattice gear, filled with polymer to increase the structural damping. It was experimentally confirmed that the cellular lattice structure of a gear body and addition of a polymer matrix may significantly reduce the vibration.