Date of Defense

4-19-2022

Date of Graduation

4-2022

Department

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

First Advisor

Claudia Fajardo-Hansford

Second Advisor

John Bair

Abstract

The aim of this project was to design and build a test stand to validate a thermal model of a high-speed gearbox developed by Western Michigan University’s (WMU) Center for Advanced Vehicle Design and Simulation (CAViDS) consortium. At the completion of this project, the experimental results measured from tests will be compared to those from a Siemens Amesim model of the same gearbox. For these tests, an electric inverter/motor/gearbox package was connected to an intermediate transmission for the purpose of output speed matching to an electric dynamometer. This dynamometer applied a load to the motor/gearbox to replicate its designed running conditions. To develop the test stand, mounting plates and rotating connections for the motor and gearbox were custom designed, evaluated with finite element analysis (FEA), and fabricated; cooling systems were designed and constructed to maintain and monitor the temperature in each system component; and electric motor/inverter speed controls were procured and adapted for this specific application. To measure the system’s input power and thermal output, a combination of digital and analog tools were used. The data signals were connected to LabVIEW for data acquisition.

Comments

Co-authored with:

Austin Owen

Noah Schultz

Access Setting

Honors Thesis-Open Access

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