Analysis of a Planetary Gear Train Using

ADAMS
Eric Baumgarten
March 14, 2015
ME 518
Winter 2015
Professor Wu

Eric Baumgarten

ME 518 Final Project

Abstract

Objective

In order to save both money and time it is

often useful to take advantage of software
application to model realistic systems before
actually building and testing the models in
real life. The objective of this project is to
build a realistic differential planetary gear
train system using Matlab code and Solidworks that can be imported into ADAMS
to model the interactions between the gears.
ADAMS allows a realistic modeling of a gear
train by modeling the forces between the individual gear teeth instead of using a ideal
Vin /Vout model. This allows gear mesh frequency analysis to be performed as well as
other non-ideal aspects that occur in real
gear trains.

A Planetary differential gear train was analyzed using the ADAMS/View software. Realistic gears were produced in Matlab, modeled in Solidworks, and input into ADAMS as
a gear train. Proper constraints were set in
ADAMS to properly simulate the motion of
the gear. The motion of the gears were validated using 5 different speed input cases and
compared to theoretical calculations. The
ADAMS model was further analyzed through
a FFT analysis of gear contact forces and
compared to the theoretical gear mesh frequencies for both a undamaged and damaged
tooth gear train. Lastly a study was performed to attempt to simulate the motion of
the gear train using a more realistic DC motor model input to the system.

4
4.1

Winter 2015

SolidWorks Modeling
Gear Modeling

In order to model the realistic interactions

between gears, solid models of gears needed
to be created. The geometry of a real gear
is a fairly complex shape. To create realistic solids of gear shapes a Matlab script was
used to produce the gear shapes. The Matlab
script allGprofiles.m written by Nicholas D.
Luzuriaga takes the number of teeth, module,
backlash and pressure angle as inputs and
produces a number of x,y,z point that can
be imported into Solidworks and converted
into a solid. Details of the gears that were
modeled can be found in Table 1

Introduction

Many machines utilize complicated gear

trains in order to transmit power between
various components. The planetary gear
train is very useful for translating high speed
rotational motion into lower speed higher
torque motion. In the project a differential
planetary gear train system was modeled in
Solidworks and the imported into ADAMS
in order to simulate realistic operating conditions of the gear train. A exploded view of
the gear train that was analyzed can be seen
in Figure 1

Table 1: Details for gears that were used in

gear train, all = 20 degree and module =
2mm
Gear
Type
Teeth
Za
Sun Gear
20
Zb
Ring Gear
94
Zc
Planet Gear
37
Z1
Gear
98
Z2
Pinion
28

4.2

Model Assembly

The gears that were produced using the Matlab code were imported into solidworks and
2
Figure 1: Solid model of the gear train that
was tested and modeled

Eric Baumgarten

ME 518 Final Project

extruded into full 3D solids. The 98 teeth

gear and the 94 teeth ring gear were merged
into one solid. A gear carrier was also modeled. The solids were then assembled into the
gear train that can be seen in Figure 2.

Winter 2015

ADAMS Modeling and

Validation

5.1

Import Model

The solidworks model was imported into

ADAMS as a parasolid. Once the model was
successfully imported it needs to be setup to
operate in the ADAMS environment.

5.2

Create Joints

In order for the gears to properly rotate as

you would expect them to do you need to apply the correct joints. All of the joints that
need to be applied are revolute joints. In
ADAMS to define a revolute joint you need
to select the two points that will be revolving relative to each other and the point that
they will be revolving around. The input
gears and carrier will be revolving relative to
ground. All of the gears should be set to revolve around their center axes. There should
be 7 total revolute joints.
Figure 2: Assembled solid model of gear
train

4.3

5.3

Create Contacts Forces

In order to model the realistic interactions

between the meshing gears contact forces
were created between each of the meshing
gears. In ADAMS to create the contact forces
you need to select the two bodies that will be
contacting and input the contact parameters.
The parameters used in the simulations can
be found in Table 2. These are the default
contact inputs, the suggest inputs from Professor Wu were first attempted but increased
the run time of the model by a large amount
thus the default values were used to run the
simulations.

Damaged Gear

In order to asses the effect of a chipped gear

tooth on the performance of the gear box,
two assemblies were created. One assembly
contained no damaged gear, the other assembly contained a sun gear with a chipped
tooth. A detail of the chipped tooth can be
seen in Figure 3.

Table 2: Inputs of ADAMS model for

contact forces
Stiffness
1E5
Force Exponent
2.2
Damping
10
Penetration Depth 0.1

5.4

Material Properties

In order for ADAMS to actually solve the

model the gears need material properties.
3
Figure 3: Chipped tooth on sun gear

Eric Baumgarten

ME 518 Final Project

All of the gears were assigned the default

steel material properties that come default
in ADAMS.

5.5

to validate the operation of the differential

planetary gear train. A summary of the motor 1 and motor 2 inputs for each case can
be seen in Table 4. The ADAMS model
was run at each of these input cases and
the output angular velocities of the carrier
were compared to calculated outputs of the
carrier. Figures 5,6,7,8 show the outputs of
each case.The carrier speed is labeled as Carrier.cm.angular velocity.mag in each of the
plots. In all of the cases the carrier matched
the speed of the theoretical calculations. A
list of theoretical carrier output speeds can
be seen in Table 5, which you can reference
when viewing the output speed plots.

Resistive Torques

Resistive torques were placed on the carrier and ring gear in order to more correctly model the forces that the gear assembly will experience. A summary of the resistive torques can be found in Table 3
Table 3: Inputs of ADAMS model for
resistive torques
Part
Torque value (N-mm)
Carrier
-5000
Ring Gear
-10000

5.6

Winter 2015

Table 4: Motor inputs for each test case ran

Case Motor 1(rad/s) Motor 2 (rad/s)
1
102.6
Braked
2
Braked
78.53
3
-102.6
78.53
4
102.6
78.53

Motion Inputs

To input motion into the model you need to

apply motions to the at the location of the
input motors. The input motors were actually just a constant angular velocity rotational joint motion. The location of the input
velocities can be seen in Figure 4.

Table 5: Theoretical carrier speed outputs

for each case
Case Carrier Speed (rad/s)
1
17.9
2
18.49
3
36.5
4
-4.73

Figure 4: Location of motor 1 and 2 inputs

to the gear train

5.7

Run the Model

Once all of the ADAMS parameters are setup

correctly the model was run using a time of
1s and a step size of 10,000.

6
6.1

Figure 5: Angular velocities of gears case 1

ADAMS Simulation
Model Validation

To validate that the model was operating correctly a series of test cases were performed
4
Figure 6: Angular velocities of gears case 2

Eric Baumgarten

ME 518 Final Project

Figure 9: Angular velocities of gears case 5

Figure 7: Angular velocities of gears case 3

6.3

Verification
case 5

of

alternate

In order to further verify the model a 5th

case was ran. The input speed of motor 1
was 10.2 rad/s and the input speed of motor
2 was 78.5 rad/s. Below I will go through the
theoretical output of the carrier as shown in
Equations 1,2,3. The output of the ADAMS
simulation verified the calculations and can
be seen in Figure 9

GM F = |(sc ss )| Ns

(4)

nx =

na
nb
a
ibax
ibx

nx =

2
na
i1

ibax
iabx

(2)

GM F = |17.9(r/s)| 102.2(r/s)| 20t (5)

10.2 22.4

= 16.7rad/s
5.7
1.21

(3)

GM F = 1686(r/s)

(1)

nx =

FFT analysis

After the model has been verified further

analysis can be performed on the ADAMS
model. A real gear train will experience a
gear mesh frequency that depends on the
speed of the gears and the number of teeth
per gear. A FFT analysis was performed on
the undamaged and damaged gear train in
order to determine if ADAMS can pick up the
effect of the damaged tooth on the gear mesh
frequency. The FFT analysis was performed
on the Case 1 inputs on the forces between
the sun and planet gears. Equations 4,5,6
show the calculation of the theoretical gear
mesh frequencies for case 1. Figure 10 shows
the FFT output from the undamaged simulation, you can see spikes at the calculated gear
mesh frequencies and its harmonics, thus it
matches the mathematical models. Figure
11 shows the FFT plot for the chipped tooth
gear train, the gear mesh frequencies are very
similar to the undamaged gear train.

Figure 8: Angular velocities of gears case 4

6.2

Winter 2015

rot
= 267.9Hz (6)
2

Eric Baumgarten

ME 518 Final Project

Winter 2015

ADAMS. With more time this DC motor input could be explored further.

Figure 10: FFT plot of undamaged gear

train of forces between sun and planet gear
for case 1 input

Figure 12: Speed of gears with simulated

DC motor input at motor 1

Overall the ADAMS model correctly simulated the motion of the planetary gear train
for each of the cases that were introduced into
the model. This verifies the equations used
to calculated the speeds of various gears in
a planetary gear train. The FFT analysis
validated the equations for the Gear mesh
frequencies in a planetary gear train, showing force spikes at the calculated gear mesh
frequencies and its harmonics. The chipped
tooth model FFT analysis was lacking in the
detection in the effect of the chipped tooth in
the force spikes. A chipped tooth is supposed
to accentuate the sidebands of the gear mesh
frequency as well as the frequency at which
the gear is rotating. There was a lot of noise
below the spikes so the addition of sideband
intensity and gear rotation frequencies were
not seen in the chipped tooth model. A more
refined model with lower penetration depth
might be able to pick up the changes between
the undamaged and damaged gear train. The
DC motor model was acting strange by oscillating the input speed. This might be due to
the simulation being setup incorrectly. More
time would allow the further exploration of a
more refined DC motor model that you could
validate.

Figure 11: FFT plot of damaged gear train

of forces between sun and planet gear for
case 1 input

6.4

Conclusion

Motor Input

For each of the 5 cases run above the inputs

were constant velocity inputs. In order to
more accurately model a realistic system the
input velocity was modeled as a torque that
is dependant on speed. This type of input is
akin to a DC motor which would be a common input to a gear train. The case 1 setup
was run with a torque source at the motor 1
input shaft instead of a constant angular velocity source. The torque input was a function of speed. The desired speed was 5 rad/s.
The plot of the gear speed can be seen in Figure 12. The speed of the gears oscillates in
a cyclic fashion peaking around 3.8 rad/s on
the input sun gear. Im not sure why the
speeds were oscillating around zero, this is
probably an issue with the motor setup in