The Influence of Inner Ring Tilt Angle on Dynamic Characteristics of High-speed Angular Contact Ball Bearings

The tilt angle between inner rings and outer rings of high-speed angular contact ball bearings(ACBB) exist due to the inevitable error of machining and assembly. The tilt angle of the ring has a great influence on the running performance of bearing, and even causes the bearing failure under some conditions. According to the above situation, a bearing analysis and calculation model considering the tilt angle of ring and the centrifugal effect of high speed is proposed. The dynamic characteristics of high-speed ACBB are calculated by using Newton-Raphson method. The results show that the contact stress fluctuation caused by the tilt angle of inner ring becomes weaker but the spin-to-roll ratio and revolution speed fluctuation are enhanced when the rotating speed of inner ring increases. This indicates that the tilt angle of inner ring is more likely to lead to the failure mode associated with bearing heat rather than the common fatigue failure at high speed. For ACBB subjected to combined load, the appropriate tilt angle of inner ring can weaken the contact angle, revolution speed, spin-to-roll ratio fluctuation caused by radial load to some extent, and significantly increase the radial and angular stiffnesses of bearing. In the presence of inner ring tilt angle, the silicon nitride ceramic ball bearings outperform steel ball bearings in terms of contact angle, spin-to-roll ratio, revolution speed and dynamic stiffness. But the contact stress of the ring is more sensitive to the tilt angle of the inner ring than that of the steel ball bearing. © 2021, Editorial Board of Acta Armamentarii. All right reserved.