Contact Analysis for Taper Roller Bearing by using FEA Simulation

Bearing plays crucial role in machinery. Sudden failure can cause serious problem to safety and halt in production. Failure analysis is mostly carried out by Thermal Analysis, Oil Debris Analysis, Vibration Analysis, Acoustic Emission analysis. Contact stresses reduce the service life of a rolling bearing and very less investigated. In roller bearings, the outer ring is usually fixed and the inner ring has the rolling motion. Concerning TRB (tapered roller bearings); this motion generates forces that are transmitted to the outer ring by the tapered rollers. Thus, contact stresses occur and the number of rollers plays a major role with respect to the load distribution. This influence is analyzed in this study by the FEM (finite element method). In this paper, FEA model is used to calculate the structural deformation and contact stresses. Harmonic response analysis in ANSYS is carried out to obtain steady-state response of a model subjected to a load that changes harmonically (sinusoidally). Such load has specific amplitude and frequency at which it acts. This type of loading cause forced vibrations. The calculated response is a function of frequency. The dynamic characteristics of the bearing are analyzed using FEA software ANSYS. The influence of varying the harmonic load and the dynamic characteristics of the roller bearing are analyzed by mechanical APDL using GUI interface. Result indicates that the increase in harmonic force will result in increase in contact stresses and displacement.