Reduction of Disassembly Forces for Detaching Components with Solidified Assembly Connections

The disassembly of components with solidified assembly connections is often difficult to plan. A typical example can be found in the aviation industry, where turbine blades solidify in the turbine disc due to operational loads. The solidification of the joining partners has several causes such as thermal stress or high centrifugal forces so that the disassembly forces cannot be estimated exactly. The forces in manual disassembly, e.g when striking the assembled part with a hammer, are often too high and thus difficult to control. An automated approach is investigated, in which a piezo stack actuator induces vibrations to the joined components and force amplitudes are reduced based on a simplified model of the solidification. For this purpose, simulations are presented to determine forms of excitation for the piezo actuator and to control the disassembly process. (C) 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V.