Aim
To study and prepare report on the construction details, working principles and operation of the following automotive drive lines and differential.
a) Rear wheel drive lines
b) Front wheel drive lines
c) Differentials, drive axles and four wheel drive lines
Theory
Labeled diagram, construction details, working principle and operation of the following drive lines and differential.
PROPELLER SHAFT
This is the shaft which transmits the drive from the transmission to the bevel pinion or worm of final drive in front engine, rear drive vehicles. It is also called drive shaft. It consists mainly of three parts.
(a) Shaft – As this has to withstand mainly torsional loads, it is usually made of tubular cross section. It also has to be well balanced to avoid whirling at high speeds.
(b) One or two universal joints, depending upon the type of rear axle drive used/ the universal joints account for the up and down movements of the rear axle when the vehicle is running
(c) Slip Joint – Depending upon the type of drive, one slip joint may be there in shaft. This serves to adjust the length of the propeller shaft when demanded by the rear axle movements.
Universal Joints
A universal joint is a particular type of connection between two shafts whose axes are inclined to each other. The most simple type of universal joint is the Hooke’s joint (fig. ) which is most widely used because of the fact that it is simple and compact in construction and reasonably efficient at small angles of propeller shaft movement up and downm say upto 18 deg The axes of shafts A and B are intersecting. Each of these shafts contains a yoke. The cross C has four arms. The two opposite arms of the cross are supported in bushes in the yoke of shaft B. Thus shaft A can have angular rotation about axis XX and the shaft B, about the axis YY. It is thus seen that it will be possible with the Hookes joint for the shafts A and B to have positive drive while allowing angular movement between them.
An improved form of hooke’s joint uses needle roller bearing to support the cross in the yokes. This result in increase of joint efficiency.
DIFFERENTIAL
When the car is taking a turn, the outer wheels will have to travel greater distance as compared to the inner wheels in the same time (fig ) if therefore, the car has a solid rear axle only and no other device, there will be tendency for the wheels to skid. Hence if the wheel skidding is to be avoided, some mechanism must be incorporated in the rear axle, which should reduce the speed of the inner wheels and increase the speed f the outer wheels when taking turns; it should at the same time keep the speeds of all the wheels same when going straight ahead. Such a device which serves the above function is called a differential.
In case of the non-driving wheels, however, the difference in speeds of the inner and the outer wheels poses no problem since such wheels are independent of each other and as such they can adjust their speeds according to the requirements.
To understand the principle on which differential works, consider fig. To the crown wheel of the final drive is attached a cage, which carries a cross pin (in case two planet pinions are employed) or a spider (in case four planet pinions are used in the differential). Two sun gears mesh with the two or four planet pinions. Axle half shafts are splined to each of these sun gears. The crown wheel is free to rotate on the half shaft as shown. When the vehicle is going straight the cage and the inner gears rotate as a single unit and the two half shafts revolve at the same speed. In this situation, there is no relative movement among the various differential gears. To understand what happens when the vehicle is taking a turn, assume that the cage is stationary. Then turn one sun gear will cause the other to rotate in the opposite direction. That means that if left sun gear rotates, n times in a particular time, the right sun gear will also rotate n times in the same period but of course in the opposite direction. This rotation is super imposed on the normal wheel speed when the vehicle is taking a turn. Thus, for example, consider a vehicle with wheel speed N r.p.m. going straight, when it takes a turn toward right. At this time, there will be a resistance to the motion of the right wheel and as a result of differential action if the right wheel rotates back at n rpm then the left wheel will rotate forward at n rpm. This will give the resultant speed of the left wheel as (N + n) and that of the right wheel as (N-n) rpm.
The torque from the final drive is also divided between the two half shafts. As the planet pinions are free to rotate on the cross pin or the spider arm they cannot apply different torque to the teeth on one side from the one on the other side. Therefore, they act as a balance and divide the torque equally between the two wheels on the axle, even when their speeds are different.
Reference Books
1 Automotive Mechanics – Crouse / Anglin
2 Automobile Engg – Dr Kirpal Singh
Viva Questions
1 What are the main components of an automobile? Describe all of them briefly.
2 What advantages are there in case of front wheel drive?
3 What is transfer box?
4 State various considerations on the basis of which automobiles are classified?
5 What is the main advantage of for wheel drive vehicle?
6 What is the function of hook’s joint?
7 How is the length of Propeller shaft varied automatically?
8 Define the whirling of the shafts?
9 What is the need for constant velocity universal joint when the cheaper Hook’s joint is available?
10 What is the material used for Propeller shaft?
11 How is the drive from propeller shaft turned at right angles.
12 Explain the functioning of differential.
13 Explain the function of a universal joint.
14 How many universal joints are used with a torque tube drive and a hotch kiss drive and why?