With the aim of increasing the efficiency of maintenance and fuel usage in airplanes, structural health monitoring (SHM) of critical composite structures is increasingly expected and required. The optimized usage of this concept is subject of intensive work in the framework of the EU COST Action CA18203 “Optimising Design for Inspection” (ODIN). In this context, a thorough review of a broad range of energy harvesting (EH) technologies to be potentially used as power sources for the acoustic emission and guided wave propagation sensors of the considered SHM systems, as well as for the respective data elaboration and wireless communication modules, is provided in this work. EH devices based on the usage of kinetic energy, thermal gradients, solar radiation, airflow, and other viable energy sources, proposed so far in the literature, are thus described with a critical review of the respective specific power levels, of their potential placement on airplanes, as well as the consequently necessary power management architectures. The guidelines provided for the selection of the most appropriate EH and power management technologies create the preconditions to develop a new class of autonomous sensor nodes for the in-process, non-destructive SHM of airplane components.

This paper deals with the effects of linear tip profile modification on the stress of tooth root and tooth flank of involute spur gears. An increase in the tooth flank stress due to the tip profile modification is potentially hazardous...

The subject of this paper is a two-carrier planetary gear train (PGT) which was developed for a specific purpose. This PGT may be used for applications in which a negative transmission ratio in the range -3…-143 is required. In this case, the mechanical and dimensional properties of the PGT have been analyzed for nominal negative transmission ratios of -30 and -40. All possible combinations of simple component PGT ideal torque ratios providing those transmission ratios were obtained. Only the combinations providing the minimum radial dimensions of the PGT assembly were selected. Subsequent analysis has shown that the PGT radial dimensions will be minimized when the ratio of the reference diameters of the planetary unit ring gears is close to unity, meaning that the PGT casing will be cylindrical rather than stepped. This paper also provides an overview of the DVOBRZ software package used to synthesize the different gearbox layouts for the required transmission ratio, combined with a basic introduction to single speed two-carrier PGTs for better understanding. The DVOBRZ software was used to select all the acceptable gearboxes were selected from the set of generated PGTs according to the criteria of minimum dimensions and acceptable efficiency range. This set of PGTs was checked for kinematic feasibility and construction concepts were created for feasible layouts.

The ever-increasing demands for vehicle emission control have resulted in an expansion of planetary gearbox applications in road vehicles, due to their possibility to change the transmission ratio under load in synchronism with engine operation. Modern boxes are designed to extract the maximum number of transmission ratios as possible from the least possible number of simple component planetary gear trains (PGTs). The application demands dictate whether the box will be built with the maximum number of transmission ratios, or built for ruggedness and reliability. Component interconnections are designed to avoid power circulation, hollow shafts, or complex planet carrier arrangements when possible. The subject of this paper are multi-speed complex planetary gearboxes having at least two interconnected simple component PGTs controlled by brakes and clutches. Several variants of complex PGTs are examined together with the placement of brakes and clutches on their external shafts, and their transmission ratio functions are derived. The kinematics of multi speed gear trains are analysed as combinations of two or more two-speed gear trains. Several gearbox layouts are analysed, and their transmission ratio functions provided. Finally, an overview of the procedure for the calculation of creation of multi-speed gear trains is provided.

The mechanical multiplier gearbox is one of the most important parts for wind power generation efficiency. Modern epicyclic gearboxes are compact, lightweight builds capable of high power ratings with coaxial input and output shafts. To achieve this, it is very important to select the proper internal gearbox layout and other relevant parameters in the early design stages as the wrong choices will result in a suboptimal solution. Parametric optimization was applied to select the optimal gearbox solution for a wind turbine application, while taking into account both two-carrier and three-carrier solutions. The large number of possible solutions has resulted in the development of the 2-SPEED software to conduct systematic analysis and comparison. The best five two-carrier solutions and the one best three-carrier solution have been selected from the solution pool, with the selection being based on the criteria of maximum efficiency, minimum weight, and minimal greater-ring diameter size. One optimal two-carrier solution was then selected from the five and compared to the three-carrier solution. Recommendations for the selection of either two-carrier and three-carrier gear train solutions according to the application demands have been deducted and provided. This will result in lighter, more efficient designs with smaller radial dimensions.