Gear Shaving: Simulation and Technological Studies

Due to its high economical efficiency, the gear shaving process is a widely-used process for soft finishing of gears in the gear manufacturing industry. The wear of the gear shaving tools in industrial practice is determined by the quality of the workpiece which can be achieved with a tool. After the tolerance limits of the gear quality are exceeded, the tool is considered to be worn and must be reground. So far, it has not been studied, what exactly causes the decrease in gear quality and what a worn shaving wheel looks like. Due to the technological peculiarities of the gear shaving process, the tool wear can be expected to appear in a very different way as in conventional machining processes with geometrically defined cutting edges. The knowledge of this tool wear is essential in order to find ways to increase the efficiency as well as the process reliability in gear shaving even further. Therefore, this paper explains the technological peculiarities of the gear shaving process by using a numerical process simulation. Furthermore, it shows examples of worn cutting edges in gear shaving and explains the effects of this tool wear on the quality of the shaved gears.