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Automotive Engineering ›› 2019, Vol. 41 ›› Issue (9): 1073-1079.doi: 10.19562/j.chinasae.qcgc.2019.09.013

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Rigid-flexible Coupling Modelling and Experimental Study of Drive Axle Assembly

Shi Hui1, Shi Wenku1, Liu Guozheng2, Zhang Henghai1,3 & Chen Zhiyong1   

  1. 1.College of Automotive Engineering, Jilin University, State Key Laboratory of Automotive Simulation and Control, Changchun 130022;
    2.SAIC Volkswagen Automotive Co., Ltd., Shanghai 201805;
    3.College of Automotive Engineering, Shandong Jiaotong University, Jinan 250357
  • Received:2019-01-14 Revised:2019-04-27 Online:2019-09-25 Published:2019-10-12

Abstract: In order to more accurately analyze the dynamics characteristics of the gear transmission system of a drive axle for guiding the design of drive axle for vibration and noise reduction, the rigid-flexible coupling modelling and experimental study on drive axle assembly are conducted in this paper. Firstly, the models for the gears, axle housing and final drive housing are established by finite element method. Then, combined with the bearing, spline and the intermediate support of propeller shaft, which are simulated by multi-body connection elements, a complete rigid-flexible coupling model of drive axle is constructed. Finally, modal tests of drive axle in both free state and vehicle installation state are carried out. The results show that the vibration modes of drive axle in free state cannot reflect its actual vibration modes under constraints. Therefore, drive axle cannot be taken alone as the research object, and it is essential to perform modal test of drive axle in vehicle installation state with components such as propeller shaft and leaf springs connected. And using multi-body connection elements to simulate components like bearings and splines can significantly increase computation speed while ensuring the calculation accuracy of model with the relative error of modal simulation against modal test is less than 7%, which demonstrates the reasonableness of the rigid-flexible coupling model for drive axle, having a certain practical engineering significance for studying the vibration and noise characteristics of drive axle.

Key words: drive axle, rigid-flexible coupling model, modal test