Study on the effect of force-thermal coupling error on the gear hobbing accuracy and its visualization

A force-thermal coupling error model was proposed to investigate the coupling effect of thermal error and force-induced error on the machining accuracy. Based on the developed model, numerical simulations were conducted to unveil the temperature distributions of both the assembly and the worktable, as well as corresponding displacement errors. Besides, based on the two-degrees-of-freedom hobbing locus motion, an equation to characterize the meshing relation between the hob and the workpiece was deduced with the consideration of the force-thermal coupling errors. By using this equation, an interface, which can visualize the gear hobbing process and map the force-thermal coupling error to the resultant gear profile, was developed in the MATLAB. Further comparison between experimental data and simulation results prove the credibility of our proposed method.