With the ongoing push towards electric vehicles (EVs), there is likely to be increasing focus on the noise impact of the gearing required for the transmission of power from the (high-speed) electric motor to the road. Understanding automotive noise, vibration and harshness (NVH) and methodologies for total in-vehicle noise presupposes relatively large, internal combustion (IC) contributions, compared to gear noise. Further, it may be advantageous to run the electric motors at significantly higher rotational speed than conventional automotive IC engines, sending geartrains into yet higher speed ranges. Thus the move to EV or hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) places greater or different demands on geartrain noise. This work combines both a traditional NVH approach (in-vehicle and rig noise, waterfall plots, Campbell diagrams and Fourier analysis) - with highly detailed transmission error measurement and simulation of the complete drivetrain - to fully understand noise sources within an EV hub drive. A detailed methodology is presented, combining both a full series of tests and advanced simulation to troubleshoot and optimize an EV hub drive for noise reduction.

Plastic gears are everywhere today - throughout your car, at the oceans' lowest depths, in deep space. The question, when is a metal gear a candidate for plastic conversion, can be addressed in three words, i.e. what's the application?

A popular cable car customizing show recently featured a segment on using 3-D printing to produce a prototype part. There wasn’t anything original ...

“Highway vehicles release about 1.7 billion tons of greenhouse gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere each year — mostly in the form of carbon dioxide (CO2) — contributing to global climate change. The CO2 emissions of a car are directly proportional to the quantity of fuel consumed by an engine. In 2013, U.S. greenhouse gas emissions from transportation were second only to the electricity sector — an increase of about 16% since 1990.” (EPA.GOV).

We hear a lot of chatter about the “crisis in education” — as if this was a completely new and unexpected situation. My home state, long proud of i...

News from Around the Gear Industry

Cadillac once proclaimed itself the “Standard of the World” and did its level best to back that claim up with high levels of product quality and cu...

At the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, so-called mechanics were tasked with devising the precise methods that would make mass production possible. The result was the first generation of machine tools, which in turn required improved tooling and production methods.

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