BRAKES and CLUTCHES

References: Norton, Shigley & Orlov Andrei Lozzi

1 Designs. Brakes and clutches are similar in their appearance and designs because they are used
for similar functions. The major difference between them arises because brakes are principally
used to dissipate energy, by creating heat from prolonged sliding. Whereas clutches largely
operate with its input and output rotating clamped together, and generally allow limited sliding.

Rotation of drum
Fig 2-External Shoe Brake
Centre pivot shoes external
to drum, balanced forces on shaft
Applied force rotates but not on wall of drum
shoes outwards

Applied force
clamps shoes
together

Fig 1-Internal Shoe Brake

A leading and a trailing hinged
shoe shown inside drum

Fig 4 - Disk Brake

Opposing non rotating shoes
covering ~60°of disk face.
Fig 3 - Crown Brake Balanced forces on disk & shaft
External and internal
opposing shoes. Balanced
forces on wall of drum
and on shaft

rotating disk

Fig 5 - Band Brake – flexible external band

covering ~270° of drum. Unbalanced forces,
F1 much larger than F2

Fig 6 - Multi disk Brake

shoes covering ~360°

of disks faces. Disks
sandwiched between
pads of friction
material

F1
F2 Band brake

1
application force

2
 Fig 7 - Cone brake
The drum and cone rotate and slide
axially relative to each other. The force
at the friction face is the applied force
amplified by the inverse of sin of the cone angle.

Rotating drum Sliding cone

Applied force

2 Principle features of brakes: The usual analysis of brakes (we will drop any reference to
clutches wherever practical) relies on one being able to make a number of unique simplifications:

1. Common friction material has a much lower compressive strength than what it usually
makes contact with, ie steel or cast iron, by a factor of almost 100. We therefore assume
that the friction pad is the only component that wears.

2. Due to the geometric properties of brake mechanisms the contact pressure on the friction
face is generally not uniform (eg shoe and band brakes). Nor in some case will the sliding
velocity at the friction face be uniform (eg disk and cone brakes).

3. The maximum force that can be applied to a brake shoe will be reached when the
maximum pressure ( pa ), somewhere on the brake shoe, is equal to the highest safe stress
that can be applied to the friction material. Everywhere else p < pa.

4. We will assume that the wear rate of the friction material is proportional to the product of
the contact pressure and sliding velocity:   Vp eq 1
The wear rate may be more complex than that, but the wear δ is always measured
perpendicularly to the friction surface

A preview of brake analysis

Because the face of the pad in drum brakes cannot be kept parallel to the friction surface as they
move, the wear will be not uniform. As a consequence that implies that the pressure, which
causes the wear, will be equally not uniform. The force that can be applied to the shoe cannot be
increased beyond the point when the safe maximum compressive stress is reached somewhere on
the face of the brake pad. It is then desirable to design brakes that have as uniform a pressure
distribution as practical.

In disk and cone brakes the relative sliding velocity cannot be the same over the whole face of the
pad. Areas of the pad closer to the centre of rotation will have lower sliding velocities than areas
further away. Consequently from eq1 we can expect non uniform pressure, non uniform wear or
something in between.

3
In general the analysis of different styles of brakes begins with determining the wear distribution
from the geometry of the mechanism that controls the movement. From eq1 the wear distribution
reveals the pressure distribution. Integrating the pressure over the face of the pad gives us the
forces and reactions. Integrating the product of the pressure and the coefficient of friction gives
us the drag or torque that the brake generates.

3 A small leading shoe brake

The figure below shows a ‘small’ hinged brake shoe pushed into contact by the external force F
onto a flat friction surface. Assuming that F is applied at the centre of pressure of the pad, a and b
are the locations of the hinge centre, V is the sliding velocity, N is the resulting normal force
between the surfaces and μN is the frictional or braking force. We can arrive at the forces acting
on the shoe by taking moments about hinge centre O:

b
O
Na  Fb  Nb eq 2 F
N ( a  b)   Fb
 b  a
 N  F   eq 3
 b  a 
µN

V
N

Fig 8 A small flat hinged leading shoe brake

Note that from eq 3 the externally applied force F is amplified by the factor: b/(µa-b). If µa→b
this factor tends to infinity and for any initiating force F the brake will come on with increasing
clamping force N, that is it will lock. The arrangement shown on Fig 8 is called a leading shoe
brake, for obvious reasons. It is usually designed so that the amplifying factor is moderate and
such a brake is referred to as self-energising. This principle has been relied upon to provide
braking for heavy or high performance machinery and may be seen as a passive mechanism that
lead to modern power-assisted brakes. The fact that the proportions of a and b can be chosen such
that the brake will self-lock is a feature of these brakes that can and is put to good use, but can
also generate unexpected results should μ, the coefficient of friction, become suddenly large. The
sort of embarrassing results that small boys experience, when they run about holding a stick in
front of them, sliding the bottom end of the stick on ground. The above brake is referred to as
‘small’ because it can be assumed that the centre of pressure is very nearly also the centre of area.

4
4 Trailing shoe brake

If in Fig 8 the direction of sliding V is reversed, the frictional force μN would also be reversed,
and the this type of brake would will then be called a trailing shoe brake. Taking moments about
O would give different results from eq3 above:

5
 Fb  Nb  Na eq 4
 N  F  b  eq 5
 a  b 

Note that for any real values of a, b & μ the factor b/(µa+b) will always be less than 1. For a
trailing shoe brake the clamping force will always be less than the externally applied force. Such
brakes are safe in so far that we can be confident that they self-release, they cannot possibly lock.
On the other hand they may require a great deal
of force or power-assistance to generate a
sufficient braking force. The internal shoe brake
drum on Fig 1 has a trailing and a leading shoe.
This is done for cheapness; typically a single
hydraulic cylinder is used to push the two shoes
apart at their top end. The leading shoe will do
most of the braking and suffer most of the wear.
In some installations 3 and 4 leading shoes have
been used to provide powerful self-energising
braking without expensive boosters. This was
very effective for sporting cars being driven
around with gusto and alacrity, but risky when
used on trucks, in so far that such trucks would
have significantly reduced braking when
travelling in reverse. Imagine the embarrassment
Fig 9 A 3 leading shoe drum brake backing down an incline to a big hole in the
ground, with a heavy load to be dumped, but
being unable to stop using such a smashingly
good brake as that shown on Fig 9.

6
5 Wear and pressure distributions

As we said above, the mechanism determines the pads movement. If the pads are displaced
unevenly, uneven wear will result and the wear distribution will be indicative of the pressure
distribution. Figure 8 is redrawn below with a small rotation of the shoe imposed on it. You can
show for yourself that the vertical displacement of the shoe, perpendicular to the friction face,
increases with increasing θ, being the least directly below the pivot, at θ = 0, and a max at θa.
  sin  eq 6
The pressure at the interface has to be proportional to this wear
 p  sin  eq 7
The highest press pa take place at θa,
therefore by ratio & proportions:
sin 
p  pa eq 8
sin  a

Fig 10

Where pa has to be the maxim pressure at A that you can allow according to the material used.

Consequently the pressure falls from A to B. The greater the angle covered by the shoe, ie θa- θ1,
the greater will be the difference between the braking effect between points A and B. This is a
property of all hinged shoes brakes, increasing the size of the shoe does not proportionally
increase the braking effect. This suggests the use of multiple short shoes to make better use of the
space available.

For more predictable neutral performance accompanied by more uniform wear, centre pivot shoes
are used. They may be inside or outside of a brake drum. The crown brake shown on Fig 4 has
centre pivot shoes opposite each other, on the inside and outside of a drum. The crown brake is a
most compact design, it was expected to be used on small vehicles with comparable wheels,
Those cars have not as yet been adopted by the market, but maybe all we have to do is to wait.
We will see later that the pads clamping force F can be very large, often considerably larger than
the force due to gravity on the axles of a vehicle. Therefore to reduce the unbalanced forces on
shafts, nearly always designers use opposing shoes, as on Fig1 & 2. To also reduce the stresses
and therefore the mass of the drum or disk designs like the crown and disk brake are used.

There are examples of what may appear to be the opposite of good design, but which turn out to
have very useful applications. In a modern brake design for freight trains, single unbalanced
external centre pivot shoes are used. Single shoes contacting the rim of the wheels reduce the
number of parts, reducing the total costs, maintenance and hopefully breakdowns. These designs
are heavier and generate less braking force but on the balance could be more cost effective.

e
6 External centre pivot shoe brakes
p=p cosθ
Figure 11 shows schematically an external centre pivot brake shoe. The displacement of the shoe
face nearest the pin, that is the wear δ at θ=0, is e . At some angle θ the displacement
perpendicular to the friction surface, in the same direction as the compressive stresses, is reduced
to e cosθ . δ=e cosθ
  cos 
θ pa e
δ=e
7
The pressure at the interface has
to be proportional to this wear

p  cos

Since the highest press must take place at

at θ=0 and cos 0 = 1, by ratio & proportions:

p  p 0 cos eq 9

Fig 11

Fig11 and 12 presents the geometric details required to arrive at the major loads on a centre pivot
external shoe brake. Fig 12 also serves as an example of the methods by which a brake design can
be analysed. The infinitesimal elements of the normal force and frictional force are:

dN = pw · rdθ eq 10

µdN = µpw · rdθ eq 10b

where w is the brake pad’s width and r the radius of the drum. We will separate these into X & Y
components, integrate them over the arc of the symmetric shoe, allow for some necessary
boundary conditions and finally arrive at the reaction forces RX & RY and brake torque. An
additional and useful boundary condition that can be imposed is to locate the shoe pivot, at some
particular x value, x = a, where the sum of the moments due to friction about a is 0. There the
shoe will neither be a leading nor trailing shoe. From Fig 12
using d to be the perpendicular distance between the
Infinitesimal frictional force µdN and the pivot at a.
Setting the integral of the moment about a to 0
gives:
1

M  2    dN  d  0 , eq 11
01

d  a cos  r eq 11b
giving:
a  4r sin  1 (2 1  sin 2 1 ) eq 12

From symmetry we can state that the

integrals of the Y component of the
normal force dN and the integral
of the X component of frictional
force are zero, ie:

1

 dN  sin   d  0
1
eq 13

8
 1


 dN  sin   d  0 eq 14 Fig 12
1

The integral of the X component of the normal force dN will always point in the same direction,
will not add to 0, and will give us the X component of the reaction at the pivot pin RX.
1
p0 wr
R X  2  dN  cos  d  (2 1  2 sin  1 )   N eq 15
0
2

The integral of the Y component of dN gives us the Y component of the reaction RY:

1
p0 wr
RY  2  dN  cos  d  (2 1  2 sin  1 )   N eq 16
0
2

The vertical reaction Ry multiplied by the arm length a gives us the torque generated by this brake
Using also eqs 12 and 16 gives us the torque in terms of θ, µ, r and w :

T  aN  2r 2 sin p o w eq 17

7 External hinged shoe brake

Figure 13 shows an external leading shoe brake. Shoes internal to the drum can be described by
similar variables to these, a major difference is that the normal force dN on the shoe would point
inwards and X & Y its components change sign.

To make overall decisions on brake selection we will probably want to extract the application
force F and the torque generated by this brake. To do this we equate the moments about the
hinge pin at A to 0. These moments are due to the external force F and the pressure on the
friction material:

sin 
p  pa eq 18
sin  a
c = (r-a cosθ), eq 19a
e = a sinθ eq 19b

M   dNc eq 20

9
MN   dNe eq 21

Fig13

The application force F must create a moment equal

and opposite to the sum of these:
MN  M
F eq 22
b
And the torque must be equal to :
T   r  dN eq 23

(cos  1  cos  2 )
T  p a wr 2 eq 24
sin  a

For a trailing shoe, the frictional force changes direction and sign. If your brake is made up of one
of each of these shoes then the total application force and braking torque has to be the sum of the
contribution of each shoe.

10
 8 Band Brakes

Assuming a completely flexible band, as we did

for belts in belt drives, we arrive at the tension
in the band increasing exponentially from the
low tension side of the band, ie F2, to the high
tension side F1.

The torque generated by the brake is:

D
T  ( F1  F2 ) eq 25
2
In fig15 below the radial and tangential forces
are balanced, on a section of the band rdθ wide:

dF = μdN eq 26
Fig 14
dN = Fdθ eq 27

substituting dN out of eqs 26 & 27

and integrating for dF gives:

F1 = F2 eμθ eq 28

We can also say that:

dN=pwr dθ eq 29

which together with eq 27 gives:

p = F/wr eq 30 Fig 15

eq 30 will give us the maximum and minimum pressure under the band at F1 and F2 , given the
torque required from the brake eq 25, and the relationship between F1 and F2 by eq 28.

The above tells us that the pressure under the band being proportional to the tension in the band
varies exponentially from F2 to F1. Exponential functions being what they are this indicates that
band brakes can have the highest variation in brake pad pressure of any brake, making them the
most inefficient user of the friction area.

On the positive side band brakes can be made to generate very large torque for a relatively
modest applied force F2, although they do require large surface areas, relatively large diameters
and face widths. Notwithstanding their disadvantages band brakes can be made good use of
where for example drums of large diameters has to be made to satisfy other requirements.

11
9 Disk brakes.

Fig 16 shows schematically a new brake pad

on the left of the disk and a worn-in pad on the right.
The new pad when subjected to a force through its
centre of area (CofA) generates uniform pressure over
the face of the pad. This uniform pressure has a limited
life expectancy. Because as the sliding velocity increases
with radius so will the wear rate increase from the
centre out. After a relatively short period of time a
state of uniform wear will be established, where
the pressure on the pads will decrease inversely with
the radius, to maintain uniform wear over the face.

p 1/r eq 31 Fig 16

p = pa r i / r eq 32

The highest pressure will then take place at the inner radius ri

10 Uniform pressure.

12
Assuming we have uniform pressure on the face of the brake pad, we can easily arrive at the total
force on the face on the disk,
ro

under uniform pressure condition, F   p a 2r  dr  p a (ro2  ri 2 ) eq 33

ri
ro
2
given that the pressure has to be T   p a r 2r  dr  p a  (ro3  ri3 ) eq 34
ri
3
the highest permissible pa. The integral is over annular bands dr high 2πr long, from the inner radius
ri to the outer one ro. The torque (eq 34) generated by such a disk is just the integral of the pressure
multiplied by the infinitesimal friction moment

12 Uniform wear
ro
p a ri
For uniform wear we cannot use pa everywhere F  ( )2r  dr  2p a ri (ro  ri ) eq 35
ri
r
we, have to use the expression eq 32 for p
ro
p a ri
to assure uniform wear. Torque is likewise T  ( )r 2r  dr  p a ri (ro2  ri 2 ) eq 36
ri
r

calculated using eq31 in equation eq 33, for the pressure. An interesting feature of disk brakes is that
within a given outside diameter- 2ro the pressure at the max diameter will drop with decreasing
inside diameter, (eq 31): po = pa ri/ro. To maximise torque for a given outer diameter, the inner
diameter should be: ri = ro/√3. To show this you may find the max value of T with respect to ri.
Nevertheless this may not be the last word in disk brake proportions, possibly to dissipate heat, the
front wheel of some motorcycles use disks of very large inner and outer diameters, which are clearly
not to these proportions. Do you think you can detect the difference between new and bedded-in
clutch plates, or disk brake pads in your vehicle?

12 Conical clutches at uniform wear.

Cone clutches have many and tricky features but many an advantage. Seen on the right on fig 17, we
may see that the front projection of a cone clutch is the same as a disk brake, but on the left side we
see that an annular band dr becomes dw = dr/sinα. The force F becomes N = F/sinα perpendicular
to the friction face. To calculate for the axial for F, under condition of uniform wear we get the same
value as for a plane disk:

13
 Fig 17

ro
p a ri 2r  dr
F  ( ) sin   2p a ri (ro  ri ) eq 37
ri
r sin 

To integrate for torque the result is quite different because the effect of the larger normal force N comes
into play:

ro
p a ri p a
T  ( )r 2r  dr  ri (ro2  ri 2 ) eq 38
ri
sin r 2 sin 

The denominator in eq 38 is an indication why cone brakes have a particular advantage. This amplifying
effect can also be also a trap for the unwary. For small values of α a cone can become jammed into place
requiring large forces to extract a non slipping cone. They have been used where a skilled operator would
for example engage a cone brake and maintain the engagement as long as the torque remained high. As
the torque fell off the operator would progressively disengage the brake. Otherwise it would take special
effort to extract the cone when the components came to a halt.

14
14 Heat dissipation from disk brake
refs: R Limpert SAE and Shigley & Miscke ‘Standard Handbook of Machine Design’.

Calculating, or more appropriately estimating, heat loss from a component to the environment is affected by many
variables with messy interrelationships. These relationships are functions of air velocity, surface finish, surface
optical properties and temperature differences, and apply to the component of interest as well as all other
components that can have a thermal influence on that part. It is not surprising that ‘calculation’ of temperatures and
heat flux is ‘fine tuned’ using experimental results.

With more effective materials and improved oils the operating temperatures of brakes is continuously increasing.
Heat can be lost from the friction surfaces by all the usual methods: conduction, convection and radiation. For heavy
slow moving machinery metal to metal conduction may be most significant. The thermal capacity of heavy
components like brake drums can be used to modulate the temperature rises from large energy absorption,
interspersed by periods of limited operation and low convective losses. Next, conduction and convection to air is
most significant. Here the rate of loss is highly dependent with air velocity. At high speed the air is turbulent and the
heat transport coefficient may be 50 times larger than that at low velocity with laminar flow. A brake may operate
very effectively at high speed but overheat, at low speeds cause such overheating that they blow out tires and boil
the hydraulic fluid. Finally radiation plays a more significant part with increasing temperatures, being a function of
the fourth power of absolute temperature. Radiation of heat is double edged, is so far as the brake components
radiate to the surrounds but the surrounds radiates back to the brake, as the surrounds gets hotter this heat loss
mechanism becomes less effective. A method of estimation is as follows:

Hdiss= hA(Tb-Te) Hdiss heat dissipation rate J sec-1

h total heat transfer coefficient
A area of brake
Tb brake temperature
Te environment temperature

h = hr+fvhc hr radiative transfer coefficient

hc conductive transfer coefficient
fv air velocity multiplying factor

15
 Calculating the drop in the temperature of a disk during a cruise or stationary period.

To begin to calculate the temperature drop in a disk that has been heated during a braking period to a
temperature td above its environment’s temperature, we need to have an estimate of the total heat
transfer rate from the disk to its environment. We can use either linear or non linear estimates for the heat
transfer rate, that takes into account both radiative and convective effects. Linear estimates will
underestimate the transfer rate at high and low temperatures but exaggerate at mid temperatures. Below
we have the heat transfer Htot as a quadratic function of temperature :

Htot  (a1  td 2  a 2  td  a3)  f (b1  td 2  b2  td  b3)

The first term above represents the radiative component, the second the conductive one. Here f is a
multiplicative factor that increases with air velocity, reflecting the greater heat transportation capacity of
turbulent over laminar air flow. Note that this rate in the units of J/mm2 ∆C⁰ sec is a very small number
as shown by the graph at bottom.

For a disk of mass Mb specific heat cp and surface area of Ad, which has reached a temperature of
td1 above ambient, subjected to a total heat transfer rate of Htot(td1) during a period of s seconds, we
can first calculate the heat energy loss ∆E from the disk:

E  Htot  Ad  td 1  s
Then we calculate the temp drop: temp  E
Mb  cp
Hence the new disk temperature: td 2  td1  temp at time s

Provided that the estimated new temperature td2 is well above ambient temperature and the time
interval s is a fraction of the total time available we can repeat the above calculation with Htot(Td2) for
the next temperature at time 2s giving a smaller ∆E and a smaller ∆temp because:

Htot(Td2) < Htot(td1)

10-6

Degrees C above ambient

16