Springs

Design of Springs
Spring
An elastic machine element that stores energy and when released will
recover to its basic form or position
Design of Springs
Functions of Spring Elements
1. Cushioning , absorbing , or controlling of energy due to shock and vibration.
Car springs or railway buffers To control energy, springs-supports and vibration dampers.
2. Control of motion Maintaining contact between two elements (cam and its follower)
In a cam and a follower arrangement, widely used in numerous applications, a spring
maintains contact between the two elements. It primarily controls the motion.
Creation of the necessary pressure in a friction device (a brake or a clutch) A person
driving a car uses a brake or a clutch for controlling the car motion. A spring system keep
the brake in disengaged position until applied to stop the car. The clutch has also got a
spring system (single springs or multiple springs) which engages and disengages the
engine with the transmission system.
Restoration of a machine part to its normal position when the applied force is
withdrawn (a governor or valve) A typical example is a governor for turbine speed control.
A governor system uses a spring controlled valve to regulate flow of fluid through the
turbine, thereby controlling the turbine speed.
Design of Springs
Functions of Spring Elements
3. Measuring forces Spring balances, gages

4. Storing of energy In clocks or starters The clock has spiral type of

spring which is wound to coil and then the stored energy helps gradual
recoil of the spring when in operation. Nowadays we do not find much
use of the winding clocks. Before considering the design aspects of
springs we will have a quick look at the spring materials and
manufacturing methods.
Design of Springs
Design of Springs
Design of Springs
Stresses in Helical Springs
• Torsional shear and direct shear
• Additive (maximum) on inside fiber of cross-
section
Design of Springs
Stresses in Helical Springs
Design of Springs
Stresses in Helical Springs
Factor out torsional stress

Define Spring Index:

Define shear stress correction factor:

 Design of Springs
Stresses in Helical Springs
Maximum shear stress for helical spring

Stress concentration type of effect on inner fiber due

to curvature
Can be ignored for static, ductile conditions due to
localized cold-working
Can account for effect by replacing Ks with Wahl factor,
KW or Bergsträsser factor, KB which account for both
direct shear and curvature effect
Design of Springs
Wahl Factor,Kw=this the term accounts for the wire curvature and direct
shear

Bergsträsser factor:

The results from using these two methods usually differ by less than 1%.
Deflection of helical spring:
where N= effective number of coils
Design of Springs
Design of Springs
Type of Spring Ends

Tern Plain Plain and Squared or Square and

Ground Closed Ground
End Coils, Ne 0 1 2 2
Total Coils, Nt N N+ 1 N+2 N+2

Free Length, Lo pN + d p(N+1) pN + 3d pN + 2d

Solid Length, Lt d(Nt + 1) dNt d(Nt+1) dNt

Pitch,p (Lo-d)/N Lo/(N+1) (Lo-3d)/N (Lo-2d)/N

Design of Springs
Design of Springs
Design of Springs
Check for Buckling in Helical Springs
Design of Springs
A high alloy spring having squared and ground ends and has total of 16
coils and modulus of elasticity in shear of 85 GPa. The spring outside
diameter is 9.66 cm and wire diameter is 0.65cm. Compute for the
Wahl Factor
Design of Springs
A helical spring of wire diameter 6mm and spring index 6 is acted by an
initial load of 800N.
After compressing it further by 10mm the stress in the wire is 500MPa.
Find the number of active coils. G = 84000MPa.
Design of Springs
Compute for the maximum deflection of a 20 coil helical spring having
a load of 75 kgs. The spring is a squared and ground ends with modulus
of elasticity in shear of 79.84 Gpa, outside diameter of 101.6mm and
wire diameter of 9.525mm
Design of Springs
A spring made from music wire ASTM 228 steel has the following data:
Free length=1.75” Outside diameter=0.561”
Wire diameter=0.055” Applied load= 14 lb
Ends=square and ground both ends hinged
Number of coils=10
G=11.85 x 106psi E= 30 Mpsi

Find
Mean diameter, spring index, deflection, spring rate, force at solid length,
check for buckling,coil clearance and hole diameter