The dynamics of hypoid or spiral bevel gears like most high-speed precision gears employed in the powertrains of automobiles, commercial trucks, and off highway vehicles are significantly influenced by the design of the shafts. The finite element modeling approach is one of the useful methodologies applied to perform gear dynamic analysis. One of the major advantages of the finite element modeling approach is that it can account for the gear-shaft-bearing assembly design more accurately than other modeling approaches, for example, the lumped parameter modeling approach. In this paper, the finite element formulation, which can generally represent more complete characteristics of the gear-shaft-bearing assembly design, is employed to investigate how the temperature change, shaft material type and shaft size influence the dynamics of spiral bevel gear system.
