Parametric design of straight bevel gears based on a new tooth contact analysis model

In cross-axis gears (bevel gears), the calculation of the meshing tooth profiles is a complicated and demanding procedure requiring heavy geometrical models with many degrees of freedom, which are solved using numerical iterative procedures with poor and not guaranteed convergence depending on the initial ‘guess’ value considered for the solution. In this paper, a new unconditionally convergent tooth contact analysis is used, that employs a substantially more lightweight parameter set to describe the problem provided that the tooth surfaces are smooth and C ¹ continuous in the spherical coordinate system. The contact and engagement characteristics of straight bevel gear teeth are considered in detail, including the point-contact meshing performance, the influence of misalignments on the contact path and the transmission error, tooth stresses on the flanks and the effect of crowning.