Proceedings of the ASME 2013 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and

Computers and Information in Engineering Conference

IDETC/CIE 2013
August 4-7, 2013, Portland, Oregon, USA

DETC2013-12538

NUMERICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS OF FLEXIBLE PIN MECHANISMS

FOR LOAD BALANCING IN PLANETARY GEAR DRIVES

Hsiang-Yu Yeh Shyi-Jeng Tsai* Yuan-Yi Yu

Department of Mechanical Department of Mechanical Department of Mechanical
Engineering Engineering Engineering
National Central University National Central University National Central University
Jhong-Li, 320 Taiwan Jhong-Li, 320 Taiwan Jhong-Li, 320 Taiwan
Email: sjtsai@cc.ncu.edu.tw

ABSTRACT*
Load balancing mechanism is an important design for
planetary gear drives. Among the well-known designs the
flexible pin mechanism has advantage for even load sharing
among more than three planet gears. However, there is no
sufficient information about how to design such mechanisms.
The goal of the paper is to propose an analysis approach of
flexible pin mechanisms for planetary gear drives numerically
and experimentally. Two types of flexible pin mechanisms are
analyzed in the study, a conventional design and a novel
design. Numerical analysis is carried out by software KISSsoft
and FEM to evaluate the influence of the design parameters of
flexible pin mechanism on the deformation performance. An
experiment was finally conducted to verify the analysis results.
NOMENCLATURE
c length of the fixing;
di minimum diameter of the stress relief groove on the pin;
din inner diameter of the sleeve;
dO outer diameter of the sleeve;
dP diameter of the pin;
e minimum sleeve thickness;
lP length of the pin;
lS length of the sleeve;
Di maximum diameter of the stress relief groove on the
sleeve.
*
Corresponding author
INTRODUCTION
With the advantages of compact design, higher power
density and the coaxial arrangement of the input and output
shaft, planetary gear drives play a very important role for
power transmission. In the practice, however, the load sharing
among the planets and load distribution on the flanks of the
gears will not be even due to the presence of assembly and
manufacturing errors as well as deformation of the components.
In order to solve the problem of uneven load sharing, many
load balancing mechanisms are proposed by using flexible
elements or floating gears to increase the degrees of freedom of
the gear train.
Among various types of planetary gearboxes, flexible pin
mechanisms have been used in planetary gear drives for many
years [1]. The planet gears of such a planetary gear drive are
flexibly supported. Such the planetary gear drives are recently
applied in wind industry, especially under consideration of the
advantages of more planets for application, shock absorption,
uniform load sharing, high bearing life and lower weight of the
gear train [2]. The performances of flexible pin mechanism
have been also improved by applying new design. For example,
the company Timken combines the components gear, bearing
and pin as an integrated new component for planetary gear
drive [3]. Montestruc [4] has proposed a new design of planet
pin with a low spring constant that can be used on straddle type
carriers in stead of cantilever type. He has also used FEM to
analyze a whole planetary gear set with 8 planets. In recent
years, most of the works on analysis of the flexible pin are
conducted obviously by FEM. For example, Industrial
Technology Research Institute in Taiwan has developed a 2
MW gearbox with flexible pins for wind turbines, and some
numerical analysis works haven approved its performance [5-
7]. However how to design the flexible pin mechanisms for

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 planetary gear drives fulfilling the requirements of even load
sharing and uniform load distribution has not been proposed.
The aim of the paper is thus to propose a systematical analysis
of the flexible pin mechanisms of planetary gear drives by
using numerical and experimental methods. The numerical
analysis is carried out to evaluate the influences of the design
parameters of flexible pin on the tilt angle of planet gear and
the stiffness of the flexible pin mechanism. An experiment is
conducted to verify the numerical analysis of individual
flexible pin mechanism.
both the models with corresponding design parameters,
respectively.
Three different software are applied in the study for
influence analysis of the design parameters: machine design
software KISSsoft [9], Autodesk Inventor® and FEM software
MSC.Marc. the software is selected according to the
complexity of the model and the efficiency of analysis

THE FLEXIBLE PIN MECHANISM DESIGN

Flexible pin mechanisms in various designs include at least
three significant components: pin, sleeve and gear. The pin is
assembled into the pin-hole of the carrier, the sleeve is mounted
on the other side of the pin, and the gear is attached to the
sleeve with a bearing, either rolling or sliding bearing, Figure
1. To achieve the goal of even load sharing among the planets, (a) Conventional design (b) Novel design
the flexible pin mechanism provides additional degree of
Figure 1. FLEXIBLE PIN MECHANISMS
freedom by deformation of the components under loading.
In contrast to a conventional design of the flexible pin
mechanism, as shown in Figure 1(a), the authors propose a
novel design which has stress relief grooves on the outer and
inner surface of the pin and the sleeve, respectively, as shown
in Figure 1(b). The advantages of the novel design are that the
deflection of the pin and the sleeve perform a good linearity
and the concentrated stress can be reduced due to the compliant
design with grooves.
Figure 2 show the section view of both the convention and
the novel flexible pin mechanism, respectively, which are
analyzed and compared in this study. As the figure shows, the
bearings are not considered in the models to simplify the
analysis.
There are two important research issues in the analysis of
planetary gear mechanism: load sharing among the planets and
load distribution on the flanks. Load sharing among the planet
gears is affected strongly by the stiffness of the flexible pin
mechanism, and the load distribution on the flanks between
sun-planet gear pairs and annulus-planet gear pairs are Figure 2. SECTION VIEW OF CONVENTIONAL AND NOVEL
influenced mainly by the relevant deformation of the FLEXIBLE PIN MECHANISM
components. In the following sections we will discuss the
influences of the design parameters on the deformation
performance of individual flexible pin mechanisms with focus
on the tilt angle of the gear blank and the stiffness. And, on the
other hand, a complete planetary gear set is also analyzed with
aid of FEM to evaluate the performance of flexible pin
mechanisms on the load distribution.

ANALYSIS OF THE INDIVIDUAL FLEXIBLE PIN

MECHANISM
Simplified models of conventional and novel design are Figure 3. DESIGN PARAMETERS OF CONVENTIONAL
introduced for numerical analysis. Figure 3 and Figure 4 show FLEXIBLE PIN

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 the actual loading condition of the planet gear, two forces with
the same value are applied on pitch circle with the same
pressure angle 20° to the tangential direction, as shown in
Figure 7.

Figure 4. Symbols for geometry of novel flexible pin

Analysis Methods
The basic design parameters of the flexible pins are listed
in Table 1. In the influence analysis, some parameters will be
varied beyond the values listed in the table and the other remain
as listed.

Analysis by Using Machine Design Software

KISSsoft. The machine design software KISSsoft offers not Figure 5. CALCULATION MODEL AND RESULT OF THE
only the calculation of important components according to the SOFTWARE KISSSOFT
various standards, but also gives the designers possibilities to
calculate complicated machine modules, for example the
flexible pin mechanism [9]. Figure 5 shows the calculation
model of a flexible pin mechanism and the calculated
deflection (displacement) of each component. It is thus very
convenient to use the software KISSsoft not only to analyze the
influences of the design parameters of the conventional flexible
pin both on the bending stress and the deflection for the
equivalent stiffness, but also to evaluate the tilting deformation
of the gear body under such a load.

Analysis by Using CAD Software Inventor. Because Conventional design Novel design
the software KISSsoft can not analyze the novel design having
Figure 6. SECTION VIEWS OF BOTH THE DESIGNS
complicated profiles of the stress relief grooves, the stress
analysis module of the CAD software Autodesk Inventor is
applied for analysis. It is also advantageous that the analysis
can be easy by utilizing the parameterization feature of the
CAD software. From the calculated results, a suitable relation
can be obtained.

Finite Element Analysis. The FEM software MSC.

Patran/Marc is applied in the study to compare the performance
of the two flexible pin mechanisms. Because of intensive works
in setup of FE-models, only the final designs of the proposed Fixed displacement Applied force
mechanisms are considered. Figure 6 illustrates the FE-models Figure 7. BOUNDARY IN FLEXIBLE PIN
of the two flexible pin mechanisms, each having about 56,700
elements and 62,900 nodes. The element type is hexagon with
8 nodes. The gear body is simplified as a hollow cylinder with
outer diameter equals to the pitch diameter of the planet gear.
The boundary conditions of the models are defined that the end
face of the pin to the carrier side are fixed. In order to simulate

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 Influence Analysis of Design Parameters only the stiffness of the pin (or the sleeve) itself, and not the
stiffness of another one.
The performance of the flexible pin mechanism is affected
by the stiffness of the pin and the sleeve simultaneously. It is Table 1. DESIGN PARAMETERS OF THE FLEXIBLE PINS IN
valuable to realize the influences of the design parameters. CONVENTIONAL DESIGN
Among the design parameters listed in Table 1 and Table 2,
some parameters are considered for analysis, namely, Parameter unit Value
 for the conventional design: the length lp, the outer lP mm 388
diameter dO and the inner diameter din of the sleeve, as well
lP/dP -- 2.852
as the length and the diameter of the flexible pin; and
 for the novel design parameters: the outer diameter dO, the dP mm 136
inner diameter din and the minimum diameter Di of the lS mm 271
sleeve, and the minimum diameter di and the diameter dp of lS/dO -- 1.00
the pin.
din mm 160
In order to analyze their influences on the deformation of the
flexible pin mechanism, the parameters are further defined as din/dO -- 0.59
dimensionless variables; i.e., for the pin, lP/dP and di/dp, and for dO mm 272
the sleeve lS/dO, din/dO and e/t. With aid of the software c mm 117
KISSsoft and Inventor, the relations of these variables to the
deformation can be obtained.
0.004
0.003
Influence Analysis of the Conventional Design. 0.002
Tilt Angle [degree]
Figure 8 shows the linear relation of the variables din/do and 0.001
ls/do of the convention design on the title angle of the gear. It 0.000
can be also recognized that the gear will be more inclined -0.001 d_in/d_o=0.514
towards the direction of the applied force with a increased ratio -0.002 d_in/d_o=0.588
lS/dO and upwards with decreased one. With comparison of the -0.003 d_in/d_o=0.735
diameter ratio din/dO, the length ratio ls/dO of the sleeve has -0.004
larger influence on the tilt angle.
0.98 0.99 1 1.01 1.02 1.03
The same trend can be found in the influences of the
variables lP/dP and din/dO, as shown in Figure 9. It is very clear ls/ do
that the change of the length of the pin is more sensitive to the
tilt angle of the gear than the change of the diameter of the Figure 8. INFLUENCE OF VARIABLE lS/dO AND din/dO
sleeve.

0.003
Influence Analysis of the Novel Design. On the 0.002
Tilt Angle [degree]

other hand, Figure 10 and Figure 11 show the analysis results 0.001
for the novel design. The influence of the grooves on the pin, 0.000
i.e. the variable di/dp on the tilt angle of the pin and sleeve, -0.001
respectively, are at first shown in Figure 10. As expected, i.e. a -0.002 d_in/d_o=0.514
compliant pin having a deeper groove, the deformation of the -0.003 d_in/d_o=0.588
pin is increased with a smaller ratio of di/dp. However, the tilt
-0.004 d_in/d_o=0.735
angle of the sleeve remains nearly constant as the variable di/dp
-0.005
changing.
Figure 11 shows how the deformation the pin and the 2.84 2.86 2.88 2.9 2.92
sleeve is influenced by the thickness on the groove of the l P/d p
sleeve. The results can be observed that the dimension of the
groove on the sleeve has slight influence on the deformation of Figure 9. INFLUENCE OF VARIABLE lP/dP AND din/dO
the sleeve, and almost no influence on the deformation of the
pin.
From the results of the above analysis, it is obvious that the
dimension of the groove on the pin (or on the sleeve) affects

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 Table 2. DESIGN PARAMETERS OF THE FLEXIBLE PINS IN FEM Analysis of the Individual Flexible Pin
NOVEL DESIGN Mechanism
Parameter unit Value In order to compare the deformation of both the proposed
di mm 20 flexible pin mechanisms, the FEM software MSC.Marc is used.
The parameters of the two flexible pin mechanisms are
di/dp -- 1
determined based on the deformation condition of the gear
dP mm 20 body without tilting, as listed in Table 3. The acting load and
e mm 5 the gear body both on the mechanisms are the same. The results
e/t -- 1 in Figure 12 show that the deformations of the sleeves of the
two cases are different, while the trends of the deformation of
t mm 5
the gear bodies are almost the same, i.e. no tilting exists. The
Di mm 28 maximal stress is concentrated in the fixed and connected
dO mm 35 location of the flexible pin. The comparison of FEM results are
lP mm 65 listed in Table 4. It can find that the novel design has the
smallest tilt angle of gear body, but has the largest stress 241
MPa on the pin. The comparison of the deformation of the gear
0.30
Tilt angle of the sleeve  body, as shown in Figure 13, the slop of conventional design
0.15 are slightly large than the novel design and the novel one has
larger stiffness for the deformation are relatively small.
Tilt angle [deg]

0.00

-0.15 Conventional Design Novel Design

-0.30
Tilt angle of the pin 
Displacement
-0.45

-0.60
-0.75
0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2
d i /d p
First principal stress

Figure 10. INFLUENCE OF VARIABLE di/dp

0.25
Tilt angle of the sleeve
0.15
Tilt angle [deg]

Figure 12. FEM RESULTS OF TWO FLEXIBLE PIN DESIGN

0.05
(DEFORMATION SCALE RATIO: 4)

-0.05 -0.03
Tilt angle of the pin 
-0.15
Displacement [mm]

-0.04

-0.25 -0.05
0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 Novel Design
e/t -0.06
Figure 11. INFLUENCE OF VARIABLE e/t
-0.07
Conventional Design

-0.08
A B
Location
Figure 13. TILT ANGLE OF TWO FLEXIBLE PIN DESIGN

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 Table 3. PARAMETERS OF TWO FLEXIBLE PIN MECHANISM Table 5. GEARING DATA OF PLANETARY GEAR SET
USED IN FEM
Items Sun Planets Ring
Conventional design Novel design
Number of teeth 27 32 93
Parameters unit Value Parameters unit Values
Normal module [mm] 2.5
lp mm 61 di mm 18.5
o
dp mm 18 dp mm 21 Pressure angle [deg] 20 20o 20o
ls mm 42.5 Di mm 29 Profile shifting coefficient x 0.3302 0.2 0
do mm 35 do mm 35 Face width [mm] 45 42 48
din mm 22 t mm 4.5 E-modulus [GPa] 206 206 206
C mm 17.5 e mm 3 Poison’s ratio 0.3 0.3 0.3
F N 6306 F N 6306 Centre Distance [mm] 75
b mm 30 b mm 30 Number of planets 5
Input speed [rpm] 1200
Table 4. COMPARISON OF FEM RESULT WITH THE
CONVENTIONAL AND THE NOVEL DESIGN
Torque Rating [Nm] 500 (sun)

Conventional Design Novel Design Table 6. QUANTITIES OF FE MODEL

Max. stress [Mpa] 170 241 Without Carrier With Carrier

Displacement [mm] 0.0693 0.0645 Elements 120,901 321,838
Tilt angle of gear [º] -0.003056 -0.002292 Nodes 95,296 277,376

FINITE ELEMENT ANALYSIS OF A COMPLETE

PLANETARY GEAR SET
In order to analyze the influence of the deformation of the
carrier on the load distribution along the face-width of the
planet gear, four different complete planetary gear sets in
combination with or without a carrier and with one of the two
flexible pin mechanisms are considered for FEM analysis. The
main dimensions of the two flexible pin mechanisms are taken
from the data listed in Table 3. The gearing data of the
planetary gear set are listed in Table 5. Figure 14. FE MODEL OF PLANETARY GEAR SET WITH AND
WITHOUT CARRIER

FEM Setting
In order to reduce the impact of meshing variation in FE
model on the analysis results, only one planet is considered in
the model. The torque is applied on the sun gear, while the
annulus is fixed and the output shaft of carrier is also regarded
as fixed for static analysis. Figure 14 shows two FE models of
planetary gear sets, each with and without carrier, respectively.
The section view of the FE-model of the conventional and the
novel flexible pin mechanism are additionally represented in
Figure 15. Most of the elements are constructed in the type of
hexagon with 8 nodes. The quantities of elements and nodes
are listed in Table 6.
Conventional design Novel design
Figure 15. TWO FE MODEL OF FLEXIBLE PIN MECHANISM
FOR ANALYSIS

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 FEM Results 250
Figure 16 shows the deformation of the planetary gear sets,

Contact Normal Stress [Mpa]

each with and without a carrier respectively. The gear set with a
carrier has smaller stress and larger displacement of the pin 200
than that without carrier, as listed in Table 7, because of Conventional Design
presence of the deformation of the carrier under loading. The 150
contact normal stress along the face-width are shown in Figure
17 and Figure 18. It is obvious that the contact normal stresses
of the two cases distribute quite differently. In the case of the 100
planetary gear set with a carrier, the contact normal stress of
both the designs is larger on the output side; while in the case Novel Design
50
of without a carrier, the contact normal stress along the face-
width are more even as expected from the results of the
analysis case of individual flexible pin mechanism. The results 0
show that the stiffness of the carrier has a strong influence on 0 10 20 30 40
the deformations as well as the contact pattern of tooth-pair, Output Face-width [mm]
thus it cannot be ignored during analysis.
Figure 18. CONTACT NORMAL STRESS DISTRIBUTION: THE
CASE WITHOUT CARRIER

Table 7. THE COMPARISON OF FEM RESULTS OF

PLANETARY GEAR SET

Without carrier With carrier

Design case
Convent. Novel Convent. Novel
design design design design
Max. stress of
(a) Without carrier (b) With carrier 137 133 131 147
pin [Mpa]
Figure 16. DISPLACEMENT DISTRIBUTION OF PLANETARY Displacement
0.041 0.034 0.082 0.074
GEAR SET of pin [mm]

250
Contact Normal Stress [Mpa]

EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS
Conventional Design A static load experiment is conducted to verify the
200
numerical analysis of the individual flexible pin mechanisms.
The deformation and the stress of the flexible pin mechanism
150
can be thus measured and compared with the results from
numerical analysis. the test flexible pin mechanisms are
100 ` designed according to the dimensions in Table 3.
Novel Design
50
Experiment Setup
Figure 19 illustrates the layout of the experiment, Figure
0 20 shows the final experiment appearance. The frame of the
0 10 20 30 40 fixture is designed according to the principle of force close-
Output Face-width [mm] loop, so that there is no force transmitted to the ground. The
test force is generated by a manual pump and a cylinder, and
Figure 17. CONTACT NORMAL STRESS DISTRIBUTION: THE measured by a load cell for controlling the magnitude of the
CASE WITH CARRIER
pressure. The generated force is transmitted from a moving
plate and screw bars to a pair of claw. The inclined planes of
the claws contact the tooth flanks of a test gear just like
engagement of a spur gear with a rack. The test gear is

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 connected to the sleeve via a combined needle bearing to have
ability of rotation with less friction, Figure 21.
The deformation of flexible pin mechanism is indirectly
determined by measuring the strains of five steel sheets that are
acquired with HBM DAQ system, Figure 22 and Figure 23.
The range of the test loads are from 0 N to 6300 N with an
interval of 500 N. The following deformation and stress of the
loaded flexible pin mechanism either in conventional or in
novel design are measured:
 displacement of the pin,
 stress of the pin,
 tilt of the gear,
 tilt of the carrier. Figure 21. TEST GEAR AND BEARING
The corresponding locations of measuring point are shown in
Figure 23.

Figure 22. VIEW OF THE FLEXIBLE PIN MECHANISM IN TEST

1. Flexible pin mechanism 2. Frame

3. Linear guide 4. Load cells
5. Hydraulic cylinder 6. Data acquisition system
Figure 19. EXPERIMENTAL LAYOUT

Figure 23. LOCATION OF MEASUREMENT POINTS

Experiment Results
The experimental results for deformation of the gear body
on the flexible pin mechanism under different loads are
represented in Figure 24. In the diagram only 3 loading
conditions from 13 test loads are considered. The original
measured data are compensated for the tilt of the deformed
carrier (support plate) to obtain the actual deformation of the
gear body as much as possible. As expected, the tilt angle and
Figure 20. EXPERIMENT APPEARANCE the displacement of the gear body are increased with increased

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 loads. A good similarity of the deformation under the various
loading can be also clearly recognized. Table 8 and Table 9
-0.02
represent the comparison of the results from the experimental
and FEM analysis for flexible pin mechanisms in conventional
and in novel design, respectively. The experimental results of

Displacement [mm]
-0.06
both the designs are quite different from those of the numerical
results. The main reason of such deviation might be that the FEM k=20,000 N/mm
stiffness of the rolling bearing is not considered in the FE- -0.10
model. This assumption can be verified by the diagram in
Figure 25 and Figure 26, where the displacements of the gear Expt. (conventional design)
body obtained from experiment indicate the tilting of the gear -0.14

body, while the results from FEM on location A and B are FEM k=6,000 N/mm
nearly parallel. The conventional results are closer to the FEM
-0.18
result with stiffness of 6000 (N/mm); however, the novel A B
Location
design are closer to the stiffness 20000 (N/mm). It is also near carrier
recognized that the bearing stiffness has less influence on the Figure 25. COMPARISON OF EXPERIMENTAL AND FEM
deformation of the novel flexible pin mechanism. From the RESULTS OF THE DISPLACEMENT OF THE GEAR BODY
experiment results it can be also found that the stress of the pin (CONVENTIONAL DESIGN)
might be reduced about 1/3 due to the stiffness of the bearing.

(a) Conventional Design

0 -0.02

0.02
Displacement [mm]

0.04 Load=2.08 [kN] Compensated Data

Displacement [mm]

-0.06
0.06
Original Data FEM k=20,000 N/mm
0.08
4.06 [kN] Compensated Data
0.1 -0.10

0.12 Original Data Expt. (novel design)

Compensated Data
0.14 6.35 [kN]
-0.14
FEM k=6,000 N/mm
0.16
Original Data
0.18
0.2 -0.18
A B
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 near carrier Location
Face-width [mm] near carrier
Figure 26. COMPARISON OF EXPERIMENTAL AND FEM
(b) Novel Design RESULTS OF THE DISPLACEMENT OF THE GEAR BODY
0
(NOVEL DESIGN)

0.02
Table 8. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS (CONVENTIONAL
Displacement [mm]

Load=2. 09 [kN] Compensated Data

0.04 DESIGN)
Original Data
0.06 4.1 [kN]
Compensated Data
Experiment FEM Difference
0.08 Original Data
6.31 [kN] Compensated Data Stress [MPa] 125 170 36 %
0.1
0.069/ -57.7%/
Displacement of the
Original Data 0.163 0.185/ 13.5%/
0.12 pin*) [mm]
0.095 -41.7%
0.14
Tilt angle of the gear -0.0065º -0.0031º -52.3%
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Face-width [mm] near carrier Stiffness [N/mm] 42,632 88,311 107.2%
*)
Figure 24. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS FOR DEFORMATION the value of FEM result listed in the order represented in
OF THE GEAR BODY UNDER DIFFERENT LOADS the case of the bearing stiffness: same as the steel,
6,000N/mm, 20,000 N/mm.

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 Table 9. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS (NOVEL DESIGN) [3] Fox, G. and Jallat, E., “Use of the integrated flexpin
bearing for improving the performance of epicyclical
Experiment FEM Difference gear systems”. Proceedings of the ASME Design
Engineering Technical Conference, 9th International
Stress [MPa] 161.33 241 49.4 %
Power Transmission and Gearing Conference, v 4 B, p
0.0645/ -45.3%/ 1003-1011, 2003
Displacement of the pin
0.1178 0.158/ 34.1%/ [4] Montestruc, A. N., 2011. “Influence of Planet Pin
[mm] *)
0.09 -23.6% Stiffness on Load Sharing in Planetary Gear Drives”.
Tilt angle of the gear -0.0098º -0.0023º -76.5% Transactions of the ASME, Journal of Mechanical
Design 133(1), pp.014501-1 to 7.
Stiffness [N/mm] 63,108 97,919 55.2% [5] Tseng, J.-T., Chang, Y.-Y., and Tsai, F.-Y., “The
*)
the value of FEM result listed in the order represented in Deformation Analysis of Load Balance Mechanism with
the case of the bearing stiffness: same as the steel, Flexible Pin”, 2008 Taiwan Wind Energy Conference
6,000N/mm, 20,000 N/mm. 2008, 2008/12/13
[6] Xie, K.-R., Tseng, J.-T., Chang, Y.-Y., and Tsai, F.-Y.,
“The Deformation Analysis of Planetary Gear Set with
5. CONCLUSIONS Load Balance Mechanism”, 2009 Taiwan Wind Energy
The numerical and experimental results enable us to draw Conference, 2009/12/11
the following conclusions: [7] Tsai, S.-J., Ye, S.-Y., Yu, Y.-Y, and Tseng, J.-T.
(1) A novel type of flexible pin mechanism, constructed with “Design and Analysis of the Planetary Gear Drive with
a stress relief groove on the pin and sleeve, has been Flexible Pins for Wind Turbines”. Proceedings of the
proposed and analyzed numerically and experimentally. EWEA 2012, 16-19. April, 2012, Copenhagen, Denmark.
(2) From the numerical influence analysis of the parameters [8] KISSsoft, http://www.kisssoft.ch/
of flexible pin mechanism, the length of the pin is more [9] KissSoft AG. Modelling and analysis of flexible pin
sensitive to the tilt angle than the inner diameter of the systems in KISSsoft. 2008
sleeve.
(3) In the case of the novel design, the stiffness of the pin or
the sleeve can be determined based on the dimensions of
the stress relief groove independently.
(4) The FEM results of the complete planetary gear sets show
that the stiffness of the carrier has a strong influence on
the deformations as well as the contact pattern of tooth-
pair, thus it cannot be ignored during analysis.
(5) The experimental results indicate the same trend as the
numerical analysis. But the stress and the displacement of
the flexible pin are quite different from the numerical
analysis due to the deformation of bearing and the
manufacturing errors of components.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The authors would like to thank the National Science
Council, Taiwan (R.O.C) for their financial support under
contract # NSC100-2221-E-008-026-MY2-10021054.

REFERENCES
[1] Thuswaldner, A., “Turbo planetary gear units: State of
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