Analytical Solution for the Nonlinear Dynamics of Planetary Gears

Planetary gears are parametrically excited by the time-varying mesh stiffness that fluctuates as the number of gear tooth pairs in contact changes during gear rotation. At resonance, the resulting vibration causes tooth separation leading to nonlinear effects such as jump phenomena and subharmonic resonance. This work examines the nonlinear dynamics of planetary gears by numerical and analytical methods over the meaningful mesh frequency ranges. Concise, closed-form approximations for the dynamic response are obtained by perturbation analysis. The analytical solutions give insight into the nonlinear dynamics and the impact of system parameters on dynamic response. Correlation between the amplitude of response and external torque demonstrates that tooth separation occurs even under large torque. The harmonic balance method with arclength continuation confirms the perturbation solutions. The accuracy of the analytical and harmonic balance solutions is evaluated by parallel finite element and numerical integration simulations. [DOI: 10.1115/1.4002392]