Design of Composite Drive Shaft and its Coupling for Automotive Application

This paper presents design method and vibration analysis of a carbon/epoxy composite drive shaft. Designing of the composite drive shaft is divided into two main sections: design of the composite shaft and design of its coupling. Some parameters such as critical speed, static torque, fiber orientation and adhesive joints are studied. Tsai-Hill failure criterion is implemented to control the rupture resistance of the composite shaft and then its critical speed analysis and modal analysis are carried out using ANSYS. The behavior of materials is considered nonlinear isotropic for adhesive, linear isotropic for metal and orthotropic for composite shaft. The results show significant points about the optimum design of composite drive shafts. The substitution of composite shaft has resulted in considerable weight reduction about 72% compared to conventional steel shaft. Furthermore, results reveal that the orientation of fibers has great influence on the dynamic characteristics of the composite shaft.

Keywords:

Adhesive joint , Composite material , Drive shaft , Modal analysis , Natural frequency