STRESS REDUCTION IN A GEAR TOOTH USING PHOTOELASTICITY AND FINITE ELEMENT ANALYSIS

This paper presents a method for reducing the stresses in a gear tooth. By introducing a circular hole in the tooth, stress redistribution in the highly stressed region (root of the tooth) will result, which significantly reduces the stress concentration. Three parameters associated with the hole were optimized in order to achieve an optimum stress distribution. These parameters are the location of the hole (x and y coordinates of its center) and its size (diameter). The optimization was carried out using I-DEAS Master Series 7, a modeling and analysis software. Two different types of optimization techniques were used: a parameter study, and a mathematical redesign study. Once the optimum solution was determined, stereolithography models of the gear tooth with and without the hole were created. Photoelastic analysis was conducted on these physical models and experimental results were compared with the numerical results.