Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667

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Reliability Engineering and System Safety

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ress

Time-variant reliability analysis of angular contact ball bearing considering

the coupled effect of rolling contact fatigue damage and wear
Bin Xie a, *, Yanzhong Wang a, *, Yunyi Zhu b, Peng Liu a, Yu Wu c, Fengxia Lu d
a
School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China
b
School of Instrumentation and Optoelectronic Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China
c
Chongqing Tiema Transmission Co., Ltd, Chongqing 400050, China
d
National Key Laboratory of Science and Technology on Helicopter Transmission, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Rolling contact fatigue (RCF) damage and wear of angular contact ball bearing (ACBB) are time-varying and
Time-variant reliability coupled, which are competing failure mechanisms affecting each other. Therefore, to more reasonably and
Angular contact ball bearing accurately evaluate the reliability of ACBB under different number of cycles, a physical model for ACBB reli­
Rolling contact fatigue
ability analysis considering the coupled effect of RCF damage and wear is proposed. First, the load distribution of
Wear
Damage mechanics
ACBB is obtained by performing force analysis on the ball and inner ring separately. The octahedral shear stress,
which is the key factor affecting RCF damage, is obtained utilizing Hertzian contact theory. Subsequently, based
on damage mechanics theory, a damage evolution equation is applied to describe RCF damage degree. The
classical Archard wear model is applied to calculate the wear amount of ACBB. To establish the coupled effect
between RCF damage and wear, a geometric constraint equation considering the wear depth of ACBB is pro­
posed. Additionally, to avoid expensive computational effort caused by excessive calls to the performance
function, the modified instantaneous response surface (t-IRS) method is used to evaluate the time-varying reli­
ability of ACBB. Eventually, a practical example of ACBB is given to verify the validity and accuracy of the
proposed model and method.

1. Introduction data-driven and physical model-based methods [4]. The data-driven

Angular contact ball bearings (ACBB) are crucial parts of rotary
machinery and are widely used in complex mechanical equipment [1].
The operating status of ACBB has a significant impact on the mechanical
system. Once the ACBB failure occurs, it can disrupt production sched­
ules and reduce production efficiency. Serious failure may lead to the
collapse of the whole mechanical system, triggering the occurrence of
safety accidents, economic losses, and even personal injuries [2].
Therefore, it is critical to investigate the reliability of ACBB during
operation, which can optimize maintenance plans to reduce costly extra
maintenance and increase the stability and safety of mechanical
equipment [3]. The conventional reliability evaluation of ACBB is based
on the life data of a large number of bearing samples, which can provide
the average reliability of a batch of bearings [1]. However, the reliability
evaluation of ACBB under specific working conditions is an individual
issue, and obtaining the average reliability is meaningless. Currently,
the reliability evaluation of ACBB can be mainly classified into
methods require obtaining sufficient datasets of the complete oper­
ating state of the bearing in advance as training data. In most cases, the
vibration signals during bearing operation are collected, and various
signal processing algorithms are utilized to establish the mapping rela­
tionship between bearing performance and vibration data to obtain
reliability information of the bearing [5]. However, collecting extensive
datasets is time-consuming and data is not always available in some
special industrial scenarios, which weakens the practicality of
data-driven methods in applications [6]. In addition, data-driven
methods focus only on state data and do not reveal the mechanism of
fault occurrence [2]. The physical model-based methods use mathe­
matical models established by physical failure mechanisms to describe
the degradation process and require a full understanding of the bearing
failure modes and mechanisms [5]. The main advantages of physical
model-based methods are that the predicted results are intuitive and
computationally more efficient than data-driven methods [7]. They can
provide accurate results when the degradation process of bearings can

* Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: xb970429@buaa.edu (B. Xie), yzwang63@126.com (Y. Wang).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ress.2023.109667
Received 8 June 2023; Received in revised form 12 September 2023; Accepted 14 September 2023
Available online 16 September 2023
0951-8320/© 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
B. Xie et al.
be accurately described using the developed model.
ACBB is accompanied by the accumulation of material rolling con­
tact fatigue (RCF) damage and wear during operation [8], which are
considered to be the two main failure modes of bearings. So far, there
have been many studies on these two typical failure modes. Due to the
periodic motion of the bearing, the bearing components are subjected to
cyclic contact stress, resulting in RCF damage and eventually fatigue
failure. RCF damage can lead to spalling and pitting failures, which are
surface-initiated and subsurface-initiated failures [9]. Surface-initiated
failures are caused by rising surface stresses due to scratches, dents,
and inadequate lubrication. However, if the surface is in good condition,
cracks develop at the location of maximum orthogonal shear stress on
the subsurface and then propagate to the surface, eventually leading to
failure [10]. To describe the RCF damage process, scholars have pro­
posed a large number of models, which can be divided into probabilistic
engineering models, deterministic research models, and computational
models. Probabilistic engineering models rely mainly on previous em­
pirics, which include parameters obtained from numerous experiments.
Such models do not consider the constitutive behavior of the material
under contact load or the calculation of strains and stresses in the con­
tact region [10]. The Lundberg-Palmgren model [11] is a widely
accepted probabilistic model and forms the basis for calculating bearing
life in industry. However, the Lundberg-Palmgren model suffers from
some limitations. It completely ignores the possibility of
surface-initiated failure. It also assumes that the load on the contact
surface is strictly normal and the contact surface is completely smooth.
Therefore, such models do not provide significant insights into the
physical mechanisms of RCF damage. Based on physical principles,
deterministic research models are subsequently developed, which
require information about the complete stress and strain behavior of the
contact material. They are used in conjunction with the actual process of
material failure to consider the mechanisms of crack initiation or crack
propagation. The computational models treat the contact area as a
nonhomogeneous microstructure consisting of grains of different sizes,
shapes, dimensions, and orientations, which provides a more complete
understanding of the influence of microstructure on RCF. Ghodrat et al.
[12] developed a three-dimensional finite element model containing
grain and grain boundary microstructures to study RCF damage caused
by rolling steel wheels on steel rails, which utilizes the crystal plasticity
of the grains and considers the fracture behavior at the grain boundaries.
Vijay and Sadeghi [13] proposed a continuum damage mechanics
(CDM) framework for modeling the effect of crystalline anisotropy on
RCF, which uses a coupled damage mechanics cohesive element method
to model crack initiation and propagation in polycrystalline aggregates
subjected to RCF loads. Loren et al. [14] proposed a continuum damage
mechanics finite element (CDM-FE) model to investigate the effects of
surface roughness on RCF life, and the results showed that the subsur­
face RCF life decreases as the roughness frequency increases. In addi­
tion, they further evaluated the RCF of common aerospace-quality
bearing steel using the CDM-FE model [15].
Friction occurs between the balls and raceway due to contact load,
which inevitably results in continuous wear of the bearing. The
modeling approaches for wear can be divided into two main types,
which are energy work models and sliding models [16]. The wear vol­
ume in the energy work model is related to the work done by two
contacting objects, while in the sliding model it is related to the normal
force, sliding distance, and material hardness. The sliding wear model
proposed by Archard has been extensively applied to study the wear
characteristics of rolling contacts and proved to provide credible results
for the evaluation of bearing wear [17,18]. Therefore, this paper utilizes
the model proposed by Archard to calculate the wear of bearings during
operation.
During the service of bearings, the profile of the raceway changes
due to wear, resulting in a redistribution of contact stresses between the
balls and raceway. The accumulation of RCF damage can lead to dete­
rioration of the material, which also causes changes in contact stresses.
2
Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667
Subsequently, the changes in contact stresses in turn affect the RCF
damage and the wear process. In addition, if the wear rate is relatively
high, the surface layer of the raceway material that has accumulated
RCF damage is removed, and RCF damage begins to accumulate in the
deeper layer below the raceway [16]. Therefore, RCF damage and wear
processes of the bearing are inseparable. The majority of current RCF
models cannot reflect the evolution process of RCF damage degree or
consider the coupled effect between RCF damage and wear. Therefore,
based on CDM theory [19], a damage evolution equation is applied to
clarify the progressive degradation of the material occurring under cy­
clic stresses. The damage-mechanics-based method has been success­
fully applied to the life prediction of several kinds of fatigue problems,
such as bolted fastener fatigue [20] and fretting fatigue [21]. In addi­
tion, to establish the coupled effect between RCF damage and wear, a
geometric constraint equation considering the wear depth is proposed in
the solution of the contact stress.
In practical engineering, the degree of RCF damage and wear on
bearings progressively accumulates as the number of cycles increases.
Due to various uncertainties in parameters such as load, material, and
geometry, there are also uncertainties in RCF damage and wear.
Therefore, time-variant reliability analysis of bearings considering these
uncertainties is significant for the safe operation of mechanical equip­
ment. Time-variant reliability methods can be classified into the first-
passage method and the extreme value method. Rice [22] first pro­
posed the first-passage method based on the upcrossing event, which is
defined as the situation where the value of the performance function
exceeds a given safety threshold. The critical step in evaluating the
time-variant reliability with the first-passage method is the computation
of the upcrossing rate. Andrieu-Renaud et al. [23] proposed the PHI2
method for time-variant reliability analysis, which utilized a parallel
system formulation to compute the upcrossing rate. However, the strong
nonlinearity of the performance function and inappropriate time step
may result in imprecise results. Sudret [24] further developed the
PHI2+ method to significantly weaken the effect of time step on
time-variant reliability calculations, making the results more accurate.
Hu and Du [25] proposed the first order simulation approach (FOSA),
which converts a stochastic process into the form of a summed sequence
of random variables to efficiently evaluate the time-variant reliability.
Generally, the first-passage method is only applicable to some specific
stochastic processes. In addition, it assumes that the upcrossing events
are rare, mutually independent, and obey a Poisson distribution, which
may lead to significant errors if the assumption is not satisfied. The
extreme value method focuses on the extreme value of the performance
function over a given time period. Once the extreme response exceeds
the safety threshold, it leads to structural failure. Wang and Wang [26]
proposed the nested extreme response surface (NERS), in which the key
process is to construct a nested response surface of time to convert the
time-variant reliability problems into time-uncorrelated ones. Hu and
Du [27] proposed the mixed efficient global optimization (m-EGO)
method, which simultaneously samples random variables and time
parameter to construct a hybrid response surface to improve computa­
tional accuracy and efficiency. Wang and Chen [28] developed the
adaptive extreme response surface (AERS) method, which reconstructs
the stochastic process at each discretized time node and then constructs
a surrogate model for each node to obtain time-variant reliability by
Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) [29]. Li et al. [30,31] further proposed
the instantaneous response surface (t-IRS) method, which significantly
enhances computational efficiency by reducing the number of surrogate
models constructed, requiring only a single instantaneous response
surrogate model. The t-IRS method has been proven to be efficient in
time-variant reliability analysis and provides credible accuracy of re­
sults. Therefore, it is applied to evaluate the time-variant reliability of
ACBB in this paper.
In conclusion, to evaluate the time-variant reliability analysis of
ACBB more reasonably and accurately, a physical model for ACBB
reliability analysis considering the coupled effect of RCF damage and
B. Xie et al. Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667

Fig. 2. The schematic diagram of ACBB under combined load.

Fig. 1. Diagram of the contact between ball and raceway.

wear is proposed. The main contributions of this research are as follows:

(1) a novel and practical physical model for ACBB reliability analysis is
proposed; (2) the coupled effect of RCF damage and wear for ACBB is
established; (3) the time-variant reliability analysis of ACBB under
different working conditions is performed; (4) the modified t-IRS
method is applied to evaluate the time-variant reliability of ACBB, which
greatly improves the computational efficiency. The rest of the paper is
organized as follows. Section 2 presents the basic theory of ACBB. Sec­
tion 3 shows the RCF damage and wear models of ACBB and proposes a
coupled model of RCF damage and wear. Section 4 describes the process
of time-varying reliability analysis for ACBB utilizing the modified t-IRS
method. Section 5 verifies the validity and accuracy of the proposed
model and method through a practical example. The last section is the
conclusion. Fig. 3. The internal geometry of ACBB.

2. Basic theory of ACBB ∫ π2 [ ( ) ]1/2

1
Y= 1− 1 − 2 sin2 λ dλ (6)
2.1. Hertz contact theory 0 κ

∫ π2 [ ( ) ]− 1/2
The contact between the ball and the raceway in ACBB belongs to the Γ= 1−
1
1 − 2 sin2 λ dλ (7)
point contact. According to Hertz contact theory [32], in the case of 0 κ
point contact, the contact area of two elastomers is approximately as an The normal stress at a point in the contact area can be formulated as:
ellipse. As shown in Fig. 1, the semi-major axis a and semi-minor axis b
[ (x )2 (y )2 ]1/2
of the ellipse and the contact deformation δcan be calculated as: 3Q
σ= 1− − (8)
( )1/3 2πab a b
6κ2 YQ
a= ∑ (1) Furthermore, it can be found that the maximum normal stress occurs
πE′ ρ
in the geometric center of the ellipse with the value as:
( )1/3
6YQ
b= ∑ (2) σ max =
3Q
(9)
πκE′ ρ 2πab
( ∑ 3 2 )1/3 The octahedral shear stress τoct differs from the Von Mises stress by a
9 ρΓ Q √̅̅̅
δ= 2
(3) constant 2/3, and Harris and McCool [33] give the following formula
2π 2 κ2 E′ Y to calculate τoct :
2 √̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
( )̅
E′ = ( )/ ( )/ (4) τoct =
1 ( )2 ( )2
σ x − σy + σ y − σz + (σx − σ z )2 + 6 τ2xy + τ2yz + τ2xz (10)
1 − ξ21 E1 + 1 − ξ22 E2 3
∑
where Q is the normal force, ρ is the sum of curvature, E is the elastic where σx ,σ y , and σ z are coordinate normal stresses, andτxy , τyz , and τxz
modulus, ξ is the Poisson’s ratio, the subscripts 1 and 2 respectively are coordinate shear stresses. For an elliptical contact surface loaded by
represent the ball and raceway, κ is the elliptic eccentricity, Y and Γ are the normal force Q, the formulas for these coordinate stresses can be
the first and second category of complete elliptic integrals, respectively. found in Ref. [34]. Furthermore, the location and magnitude of the
The parameters related to the ellipse can be calculated by the maximum τoct are approximately as follows [33]:
following formula:
z0 = 0.73b (11)
a
κ= (5)
b τoctmax = 0.28σ max (12)

3
B. Xie et al. Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667

Fig. 5. The diagram of forces acting on the ball.

( )2 ( )2
A1j − X1j + A2j − X2j = l2ij
(19)
X1j2 + X2j2 = l2oj
Fig. 4. The relative positions of the j-th ball before and after deformation.
whereX1j ,X2j ,A1j andA2j have the following relationship:
( )/
sinαij = A1j − X1j lij (20)
2.2. Mechanical analysis model of ACBB
/
sinαoj = X1j loj (21)
The schematic diagram of ACBB under the combined action of the
axial load Fa, radial load Fr and moment M is shown in Fig. 2. The in­
A1j = Oi Oo sina0 + δa + Ri θcosψ j (22)
ternal geometry of ACBB is shown in Fig. 3.
The azimuth angle ψ j of the j-th ball at time t can be expressed as:
A2j = Oi Oo cosa0 + δr cosψ j (23)
/
ψ j = ωc t + 2π(j − 1) Z (13)
whereδa ,δr andθare the axial displacement, radial displacement and
ωi angular displacement of the inner ring respectively.
ωc = (1 − Dcosα0 / Dm ) (14)
2 The forces on the j-th ball are shown in Fig. 5. It can be seen that the
ball is subjected to the normal contact forces Qij and Qoj of the inner and
where Z is the number of balls, ωc and ωi are the angular velocities of the outer raceways, the centrifugal force Fcj and the gyroscopic momentMgj .
cage and inner ring, respectively, D and Dm are the diameters of balls and According to the force balance of the ball, it can be obtained:
pitch circle, respectively, and α0 is the initial contact angle.
In the static state, the curvature centers of the inner raceway Oi and Qij sinαij − Qoj sinαoj =
Mgj (
λij cosαij − λoj cosαoj
)
outer raceway Oo are in a line with the center of the ball O, and the D
(24)
distance between Oo and Oi is expressed as: Mgj ( )
Qij cosαij − Qoj cosαoj + Fcj = λoj sinαoj − λij sinαij
D
Oi Oo = ri + ro − D (15)
whereλij andλoj are the raceway control parameters. In this paper, the
where ri and ro are the curvature radii of the inner and outer raceway, inner raceway control is adopted with λij = λoj = 1. In addition, Fcj and
respectively. The radial distance of the curvature center Oi can be Mgj can be calculated as follows:
calculated as:
( )2
1 ωm
Ri = Dm / 2+(ri − D / 2)cosα0 (16) Fcj = mDm ω2i (25)
2 ωi j
Due to the effect of the centrifugal force and gyroscopic moment
( )( )
generated by rotation, the positions of O and Oi are changed. However, ωb ωm
Mgj = J ω2 sinβj (26)
the position of Oo remains constant as the outer ring is fixed. The relative ωi j ωi j i
positions of the j-th ball before and after deformation is shown in Fig. 4.
O′and O′i represent the center of the ball and the curvature center of the where m and J are the mass and inertia moment of the ball, respectively.
inner raceway after deformation, respectively. αij and αoj are the contact ωm andωb are the revolutionary and rotational angular velocities of the
angles of the ball with the inner and outer ring after deformation, ball, respectively. βj is the helix angle of the ball. Based on the Hertz
respectively. The distance between O′i , Oo and O′ can be calculated as: contact theory, Qij andQoj can be calculated as:

lij = ri − 0.5D + δij (17) Qij = Ki δ3/2 3/2

ij Qoj = Ko δoj (27)

loj = ro − 0.5D + δoj (18) ( √̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅ )

π κE′ 2Y
Ki/o = ∑ (28)
where δij and δoj represent the normal contact deformation of the inner 3Γ Γ ρ
i/o
and outer raceway, respectively. Based on the geometric relationship, it
The inner ring is in equilibrium under the joint effect of forces, and
can be obtained:
the equilibrium equations can be obtained as follows:

4
B. Xie et al. Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667

Z (
∑ λij Mgj
) t0=t2 (0.025 N) and t = t21 (0.5 N).
Fa = Qij sinαij − cosαij (29) In continuum damage mechanics theory, damage of a material is
D
expressed as the stiffness reduction:
j=1

Z ( )
∑ λij Mgj ED = E(1 − Dt ) (35)
Fr = Qij cosαij + sinαij cosψ j (30)
D
where E and ED are the elastic moduli without and with damage,
j=1

Z ( ) respectively. As the number of load cycles increases, the damage in the

∑ λij Mgj
M= Qij sinαij − cosαij Ri cosψ j (31) material gradually accumulates. When the damage value Dt reaches the
j=1
D critical value, it is considered that fatigue failure occurs. In most cases,
the damage threshold is set at 1. In this study, the value of 0.95 is chosen
Subsequently, the contact load and contact angle of each ball with
to ensure stable numerical calculations.
the inner and outer raceway can be obtained by iteratively solving the
To determine the values of parameters q and τr , the torsional fatigue
equilibrium equations.
test data are utilized. First, the integration of Eq. (32) can be calculated
as:
3. Failure mode of ACBB
∫ Nf ∫ 1{ } ( ) ∫
τr (1 − Dt ) q τr q 1
3.1. RCF damage model of ACBB dN = dDt = (1 − Dt )q dDt
0 0 Δτoct Δτoct 0

[ ]
Vijay and Sadeghi [13] and Lorenz et al. [14,15] developed a series 1 τr q
of damage evolution equations. Harris and Yu [35] identified that Nf = (36)
q + 1 Δτoct
octahedral shear stress can serve as a critical stress criterion for the fa­
tigue life equation. In addition, the damage model with octahedral shear where Nf denotes the number of cycles experienced by the material
stress used by Li et al. [19] has been effectively applied to fatigue failure when it reaches failure. The conventional curve of the relationship be­
problem of bearings. Therefore, it is feasible to use octahedral shear tween Δτoct and Nf for a fatigue test is given by Ref. [36], and the
stress as the critical factor leading to failure in fatigue life evaluation. following equation can be obtained:
The damage evolution equation expresses the damage rate as a function
Δτoct ( )1/B
of cycles [19]: = τ f Nf (37)
2
( )q
dDt Δτoct
= (32) whereτf and B are the stress-axis intercept and slope of the curve,
dN τr (1 − Dt )
respectively.
where Dt is the damage variable, q and τr are material parameters, which Then, the expression of Nf can be obtained by Eq. (37):
can be determined from the experimental data, and Δτoct is the octa­ [ ]B
2τf
hedral shear stress amplitude, which can be calculated by the following Nf = (38)
Δτoct
equation:
[ ] By comparing Eqs. (36) and (38), the following expression can be
1 3( )( ) 1/2 obtained:
Δτoct = maxmax sij,t − sij,t0 sij,t − sij,t0 (33)
2 t t0 2 [ ] [ ]B
1 τr q 2τf
= (39)
where sij,t and sij,t0 are the components of the deviatoric stress tensor ij at q + 1 Δτoct Δτoct
different times within a loading cycle. Each cycle is evenly divided into
Accordingly, the following relationship can be derived:
several intervals, with t0 and t denoting two arbitrary time points in one
cycle. Based on the stresses at two given time points, a candidate for q = B, τr = 2τf (B + 1)1/B (40)
Δτoct can be calculated. Then, all candidates for Δτoct can be obtained
based on all combinations at different time points, resulting in the Combined with the fitted curve for bearing steel in Ref. [36], the
following matrix: values of q and τr can be easily determined:
⎛
Δτoct (t1 , t1 ) Δτoct (t1 , t2 ) ⋯ Δτoct (t1 , tL+1 )
⎞ q = 10.1, τr = 4991MPa (41)
⎜ Δτoct (t2 , t1 ) Δτoct (t2 , t2 ) ⋯ Δτoct (t2 , tL+1 ) ⎟
Y=⎜ ⎟ (34) It is impractical to adopt the cycle-by-cycle method in RCF evalua­
⎝ ⋮ ⋮ ⋱ ⋮ ⎠
tion as the life of bearings is usually measured in millions of cycles.
Δτoct (tL+1 , t1 ) Δτoct (tL+1 , t2 ) ⋯ Δτoct (tL+1 , tL+1 )
Therefore, a jump-in-cycles procedure [13,19] is used in the numerical
calculation, which assumes that the contact stresses and damage are the
where L denotes the number of intervals divided. If one cycle is divided
same in each cycle in a block containing ΔN cycles.
into three intervals, there are a total of 16 combinations of t0 and t,
which means it has 16 candidates, while four intervals have a total of 25
candidates. From Eq. (33), it can be observed that when the time points 3.2. Wear model of ACBB
of t0 and t are the same, the value of Δτoct (t0 , t) is zero. In addition, when
the time points of t0 and t are swapped, the value of Δτoct (t0 , t) remains The wear volume in the sliding model is related to the normal force,
unchanged. Thus, Yis a symmetric matrix with zero diagonal elements. sliding distance, and material hardness. The classical Archard wear
After obtaining the stress state at each time point, the values of all model, which has been shown to provide reasonable results for the
candidate points can be derived, and Δτoct is obtained by recognizing the calculation of rolling bearing wear [17], is applied to calculate the wear
maximum of these candidate values. Therefore, once the number of of ACBB.
intervals is known, the value of Δτoct is also uniquely determined. In this The Archard wear model can be described as follows:
paper, 40 intervals are chosen to compute Δτoct in order to achieve a Qn S
good compromise between computational efficiency and accuracy. V = kw (42)
H
Furthermore, in the case of the pristine material, the octahedral shear
stress amplitudesΔτoct is obtained at the critical depth (z0 =0.73b) when where V is the wear volume, kw is the wear coefficient, Qn is the normal
force, S is the sliding distance, and H is the hardness of the material.

5
B. Xie et al.
Fig. 6. The flowchart for calculating RCF damage and wear depth.
According to Ref. [17], the hardness of the ball and raceway is 8470
MPa, and wear coefficient between the ball and raceway can be taken as
5 × 10− 6. By dividing the contact region into cell elements, the wear
depth hV for each element could be calculated by Eq. (43) [16]:
σ(x, y)S(x, y)
hV = kw
H
where σ(x, y) is the contact pressure. The sliding distanceSo (x, y)for the
duration of traversing the longitudinal cell element distance Δx under
one cycle is derived from the sliding velocity vs and the running speed vr:
So (x, y) =
|vs (x, y)|
Δx
vr
Therefore, the wear depth for one cycle can be obtained:
σ(x, y)So (x, y)
wh = kw
H
The detailed calculation procedure for the wear of ACBB can be
referred to Ref. [16–18]. Wear increases the radial clearance of ACBB, so
the threshold value for the maximum wear depth is set to 0.12 mm
considering that the actual radial clearance should be less than the
permissible value [37].
3.3. Coupled model of RCF damage and wear for ACBB
According to the analysis in Sections 3.1 and 3.2, the effect on the
RCF damage and wear is mainly related to stress. RCF damage and wear
cause changes in elastic modulus and raceway geometry, respectively,
resulting in a redistribution of contact stress between the ball and
raceway. The change in contact stress further alters RCF damage and
wear processes, which in turn affect the magnitude of the stress.
Therefore, the RCF damage and wear processes of ACBB are inseparable.
To more realistically represent the failure process of ACBB, a coupled
model considering RCF damage and wear is proposed.
Based on Eq. (19), taking the wear depth into account in the
Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667
geometric constraint relationship, the following formula can be
obtained:
( )2 ( )2
A1j − X1j + A2j − X2j = l2ij
( )2 (46)
X1j2 + X2j2 = loj + hV
Wear depth hV is progressively increases with the number of cycles.
At the initial moment, the wear depth of ACBB is zero. Therefore, Eq.
(19) can be considered a special case of Eq. (46) at the initial moment.
The flow of utilizing the coupled model to calculate RCF damage and
wear depth is shown in Fig. 6.
Accordingly, the coupled effect between RCF damage and wear of
ACBB is established by considering the variation of elastic modulus and
raceway geometry.
4. Time-variant reliability analysis of ACBB
4.1. Reliability model of ACBB
A failure event is defined as if the value of the performance function
G(X,Y(t),t) is less than zero at any moment t within the specified time
period [0, T]:
Ef = {G(X, Y(t), t) < 0, ∃t ∈ [0, T]} (47)
where X is the vector of random variables and Y(t) is the vector of
random processes.
Subsequently, the time-variant failure probability Pf (0, T) over the
time period [0, T] can be expressed as:
Pf (0, T) = P(G(X, Y(t), t) < 0, ∃t ∈ [0, T]) (48)
As the operating time of ACBB increases, RCF damage accumulates
and wear depth deepens. When RCF damage or wear exceeds the spec­
ified failure threshold, ACBB is considered to have failed. Therefore, the
performance functions for ACBB reliability analysis of RCF damage and
wear can be defined as:
(43) GW (X, Y(t), t) = hd − hV (49)
GD (X, Y(t), t) = Dd − Dt (50)
whereDd and hd denote the failure thresholds of RCF damage and wear
depth, respectively.
(44) Accordingly, the failure probabilities considering a single failure
mode and the coupled effect of these two failure modes can be respec­
tively expressed as follows:
PfW (0, T) = P(GW (X, Y(t), t) < 0) (51)
(45)
PfD (0, T) = P(GD (X, Y(t), t) < 0) (52)
PfC (0, T) = P(GW (X, Y(t), t) < 0 ∪ GD (X, Y(t), t) < 0) (53)
4.2. Overview of the t-IRS method
The t-IRS method only needs to construct and update a single Kriging
model to evaluate time-variant reliability instead of separately con­
structing a surrogate model at each discrete time point, which signifi­
cantly improves the computational efficiency. The time parameter is
considered as a uniformly distributed random variable over a given time
interval when generating MCS samples. In addition, the random process
is reconstructed as a deterministic function with a set of mutually in­
dependent normal random variables and time. The steps of the t-IRS
method are as follows:
1. The time interval [0, T] is discretized into s time nodestk (k = 1,2,⋯,
s)and, the stochastic process Y(t) is transformed into a vector of
6
B. Xie et al. Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667

Fig. 7. The flowchart of time-variant reliability analysis for ACBB reliability analysis is showed in Fig. 7, which consists of 8 steps.

random variables Z using the expansion optimal linear estimation ̂ i , tk ) denotes the predicted response value of the performance
where G(U
(EOLE) method [38]. L
function at time node tk , and UL is obtained by removing the time var­
2. Generate L MCS samplesWL = {W1L , W2L , ⋯, WLL }in design space.
iable from WL .
3. Generate an initial design of experiment (DoE) with l samples wl =
{w1l , w2l , ⋯, wll } utilizing Latin hypercube sampling method [39].
4. Evaluate the true response value G(wl ) of the performance function 4.3. Time-variant reliability analysis flow of ACBB
for l samples. The Kriging model is built based on {wl , G(wl )}.
5. Find the optimal sample w* among WL . The Kriging model is updated The reliability analysis of ACBB consists of three main components:
using {w* , G(w* )} until the stopping condition min(U(WL )) ≥ 2 is the solution of contact stress, the calculation of RCF damage and wear,
satisfied [40]. and the time-varying reliability assessment. Since no random process is
6. Apply the updated kriging model to time-variant reliability involved in this research and the current RCF damage and wear affect
evaluation. the next moment, the t-IRS method needs to be modified. In addition, the
operating time T is replaced by the number of cycles N experienced by
The time-variant failure probability Pf (0, T) over the time period [0, ACBB. The detailed process of ACBB
T] can be computed as:
1. The MCS samples and the initial DOE are generated by the method
1∑ described in Section 4.2, where the MCS samples contain the cycle
L
Pf (0, T) = Ii | (54)
L i=1 [0,T] parameter while the samples in DOE do not.
2. The initial stress distribution for each sample in DOE is calculated
where Ii |[0,T] is an indicator function that can be expressed as: utilizing the process presented in Section 2.
⎧ 3. The cumulative amount of RCF damage and wear for each sample in
( )〈
⎨ 1, min G ̂ Ui , tk 0 DOE is calculated using the methods described in Sections 3.1 and
(55)
L
Ii |[0,T] = 3.2.
1≤k≤s
⎩ 0, otherwise
4. If all samples in DOE reach the failure state of RCF damage or wear,
the process moves to step 5, otherwise the stress distribution is

7
B. Xie et al. Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667

Fig. 9. The analytical results of contact stress on the outer raceway.

Fig. 8. The structural schematic of the 7016AC bearing.

Table 1
The statistical properties and distributions of random variables.
Variable Distribution Mean Standard deviation

Fa(N) Normal 2000 (Case 1) 25

3500 (Case 2)
5000 (Case 3)
Fr(N) Normal 1000 10
D(mm) Normal 13.494 0.10
ri(mm) Normal 7.101 0.07
ro(mm) Normal 6.966 0.05
E(GPa) Normal 207 1

recalculated for the unfailed samples. The cumulative amount of RCF

damage and wear is then updated until all samples reach the failure
state.
5. The amount of RCF damage and wear for the samples in DOE at
different cycle numbers is used to construct Kriging models for RCF
damage and wear of ACBB, respectively.
6. The constructed Kriging models are used to predict the values of RCF
damage and wear for the MCS samples, respectively. Subsequently,
the U values are calculated for each sample based on the predicted
mean and variance.
7. If the stopping condition for updating the Kriging models is satisfied,
the process moves to step 8, otherwise the optimal sample is found in
the MCS samples and added to DOE to update the Kriging models.
8. The updated Kriging models are applied to estimate the time-varying
failure probability of ACBB.
5. Results and discussion
In this paper, the ACBB of type 7016AC is selected for time-varying
reliability evaluation, and its structural schematic is shown in Fig. 8. In
the engineering field, it is widely accepted that random variables follow
the normal distribution. Accordingly, the variables involved in reli­
ability evaluation of 7016AC bearing all obey normal distributions. The
statistical properties of these random variables are shown in Table 1.
The mean of the parameters is consistent with the ideal values. However,
due to manufacturing, processing, and other factors, the actual and ideal
values of 7016AC bearing parameters are inconsistent. The variance of
the parameters is obtained by fitting the measured parameter values of a
Fig. 10. The finite element model of 7016AC bearing.
batch of 7016AC bearings. The force data comes from the radial and
axial force values collected in bearing experiments, and the dimensional
and material data are obtained by a coordinate measuring machine and
an elastic modulus measuring machine. To investigate the variation law
of the time-varying reliability for 7016AC bearing under different
working conditions, three cases of axial loads with different mean values
are analyzed. The other working conditions of 7016AC bearing are the
rotational speed n = 4000r/min and moment M = 2N⋅m.
Generally, the outer ring of a bearing is more susceptible to failure in
the form of RCF damage and wear. This is because the outer ring is fixed,
and the number of contact cycles between the ball and outer ring is
much higher than that with the inner ring [19]. Therefore, the RCF
damage and wear failure of the outer ring are considered.
The results of contact stress between each ball and the outer raceway
for 7016AC bearing can be obtained using the process described in
Section 2. Fig. 9 shows the contact stress distribution for 7016AC
bearing in the second case when each variable takes the mean value. The
direction indicated by the radial load is the position of the ball
numbered 1, and the other balls are numbered in clockwise order up to

8
B. Xie et al.
Fig. 11. The simulation results of contact stress on the outer raceway.
20. It can be seen that the ball in each orientation produces contact with
the outer raceway, and the contact stress shows an approximate W shape
variation, with the maximum contact stress in the radial load direction.
To verify the accuracy of the obtained contact stress, the finite
element simulation of 7016AC bearing is carried out using Abaqus under
the same working conditions. Fig. 10 presents the finite element model
of 7016AC bearing. In order to save computational effort, it can be seen
that the mesh of the outer ring and the balls is densely divided since only
the contact stress of the outer ring is concerned. Fig. 11 shows the
simulation results. It can be seen that the maximum contact stress on the
outer raceway obtained from the simulation is 1235 MPa. The error
between the Hertz contact result and simulation result is only 0.522%,
which verifies that the process of solving the contact stress in this paper
is accurate and feasible.
Fig. 12 shows that the maximum contact stress on the outer ring
tends to decrease as the number of cycles increases in the second case
when each variable takes the mean value, which is consistent with the
results presented in Ref. [19]. This phenomenon is attributed to the
9
Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667
progressive increase in the wear amount and the material deterioration
caused by the accumulation of RCF damage.
Fig. 13 shows the variation curves of RCF damage and wear amount
of 7016AC bearing as the number of cycles increases when each variable
takes the mean value for the three cases. It can be seen that the accu­
mulation of RCF damage and wear increases with the number of cycles
in all three cases. The wear rate progressively decreases, while the RCF
damage rate gradually increases. In Case 1, 7016AC bearing reaches RCF
damage failure first, at which point the wear amount is still far from the
failure threshold. In Case 2, 7016AC bearing also fails first with RCF
damage, but the wear amount at this point is very close to the threshold
of wear failure. In Case 3, wear becomes the reason for the failure of
7016AC bearing, while the RCF damage amount at failure is much
smaller than the previous two cases. Therefore, it can be concluded that
the failure of 7016AC bearing under low axial load is primarily attrib­
uted to RCF damage, while in the case of high axial load, it is mainly
caused by wear. Further investigation shows that both failure modes
occur almost simultaneously at a cycle number of 3.5 × 109 when the
B. Xie et al.
Fig. 12. Variation of maximum contact stress with the number of cycles.
axial load is about 3700 N.
The curves between the failure probability and the number of cycles
for 7016AC bearing obtained using the modified t-IRS method in each
Fig. 13. The RCF damage and wear curves for each case.
10
Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667
case are shown in Fig. 14. Since the couple relationship of the two failure
modes is considered, it can be seen that the coupled failure probability is
larger than the failure probability considering only a single RCF damage
or wear at any same number of cycles. It can be seen from Fig. 14(a) and
(c) that when the RCF damage and wear failure probability curves differ
significantly from each other, the coupled failure probability curve is
similar to that of the dominant failure mode, which indicates that when
one failure mode dominates, the other failure mode contributes little to
the failure probability of 7016AC bearing. From Fig. 14 (b), it is
observed that when the RCF damage and wear failure probability curves
are located close to each other, the deviation between the coupled
failure probability and the result under a single failure mode is signifi­
cant due to the interaction of the two failure modes. Therefore, in this
case, the reliability results considering the coupled effects of RCF
damage and wear are more realistic than the results under a single
failure mode.
The Weibull life plot for the second case is shown in Fig. 15. The
Weibull slope is derived from a three-parameter Weibull fit based on the
evaluated life data from 50 randomly selected samples of 7016AC
bearings. The Weibull results show a slope of 12.01 for the crack initi­
ation life. Therefore, it is feasible to consider the randomness of RCF by
introducing statistical distributions into the uncertainties of the bearing
material, dimension, and load parameters. The L10 life from the Weibull
analysis of the simulation results is found to be 3.47 × 109 cycles.
To verify the accuracy and efficiency of the modified t-IRS method,
B. Xie et al. Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667

Fig. 14. The failure probability curves for each case.

the classical MCS method and other validated time-varying reliability

methods, including m-EGO and AERS, are also applied. The results of
these methods are presented in Table 2, including the number of calls to
the performance function Ncall, the coupled failure probability Pfc, and
the corresponding error. The failure probability of MCS can be used as a
benchmark for comparing accuracy, and the number of Ncall can deter­
mine the efficiency of a method. It can be seen that t-IRS, m-EGO, and
AERS are all capable of accurately evaluating the failure probability for
each interval. The maximum error of t-IRS for the three cases is only
0.650%, which verifies its accuracy. In addition, t-IRS in three cases only
requires at most 224 calls to the performance function to complete the
construction and update of the Kriging model, while m-EGO and AERS
require much more Ncall. Accordingly, t-IRS shows a significant advan­
tage over m-EGO and AERS in terms of computational efficiency. t-IRS
requires an average of only 1 hour to evaluate the failure probability of
7016AC bearing at any number of cycles, while MCS needs about 446 h.
The above analysis confirms that the modified t-IRS method can esti­
mate the time-varying failure probability of ACBB efficiently and
accurately.

6. Conclusions
Fig. 15. The Weibull life plot for the second case.
In this paper, to more reasonably and accurately evaluate the reli­
ability of ACBB under different number of cycles, a physical model for
ACBB reliability analysis considering the coupled effect of RCF damage

11
B. Xie et al. Reliability Engineering and System Safety 241 (2024) 109667

Table 2
Results of different methods for each case.
Case Method Ncall Coupled failure probability Error (%)

1 Pfc (0,1.8 × Pfc (0,1.9 × Pfc (0,2.1 × Pfc (0,2.2 × (0,1.8 × (0,1.9 × (0,2.1 × (0,2.2 ×
1010) 1010) 1010) 1010) 1010) 1010) 1010) 1010)
2 1 1 1
MCS 1× 6.621 × 10− 1.613 × 10− 6.431 × 10− 9.042 × 10− — — — —
105
m-EGO 483 6.613 × 10− 2 1.624 × 10− 1 6.446 × 10− 1 9.061 × 10− 1 0.121 0.682 0.233 0.210
AERS 3054 6.628 × 10− 2 1.605 × 10− 1 6.419 × 10− 1 9.058 × 10− 1 0.106 0.496 0.187 0.177
t-IRS 165 6.633 × 10− 2 1.622 × 10− 1 6.417 × 10− 1 9.024 × 10− 1 0.181 0.558 0.218 0.199
2 Pfc (0,3.5 × 109) Pfc (0,3.6 × 109) Pfc (0,4 × 109) Pfc (0,4.1 × 109) (0,3.5 × 109) (0,3.6 × 109) (0,4 × 109) (0,4.1 × 109)
MCS 1× 1.077 × 10− 2 2.156 × 10− 1 6.278 × 10− 1 8.528 × 10− 1 — — — —
105
m-EGO 583 1.085 × 10− 2 2.168 × 10− 1 6.291 × 10− 1 8.513 × 10− 1 0.743 0.557 0.207 0.176
AERS 3354 1.071 × 10− 2 2.147 × 10− 1 6.267 × 10− 1 8.539 × 10− 1 0.557 0.417 0.175 0.129
t-IRS 224 1.084 × 10− 2 2.169 × 10− 1 6.294 × 10− 1 8.510 × 10− 1 0.650 0.603 0.255 0.211
3 Pfc (0,1.1 × 109) Pfc (0,1.2 × 109) Pfc (0,1.4 × 109) Pfc (0,1.5 × 109) (0,1.1 × 109) (0,1.2 × 109) (0,1.4 × 109) (0,1.5 × 109)
MCS 1× 2. 821 × 10− 1 5.934 × 10− 1 9.309 × 10− 1 9.751 × 10− 1 — — — —
105
1 1 1 1
m-EGO 427 2. 835 × 10− 5.919 × 10− 9.291 × 10− 9.735 × 10− 0.496 0.253 0.193 0.164
1 1 1 1
AERS 2854 2. 813 × 10− 5.941 × 10− 9.318 × 10− 9.768 × 10− 0.284 0.118 0.097 0.174
1 1 1 1
t-IRS 154 2. 806 × 10− 5.955 × 10− 9.325 × 10− 9.777 × 10− 0.532 0.371 0.172 0.267

and wear is proposed. In addition, to avoid expensive computational the work reported in this paper.
effort caused by excessive calls to the performance function, the modi­
fied t-IRS method is used to evaluate the time-varying reliability. A Data availability
practical example of 7016AC bearing is given to verify the validity and
accuracy of the proposed model and method. Based on the obtained Data will be made available on request.
results, the following conclusions can be drawn.

1. The distribution of the contact stress on the outer raceway shows an
approximate W shape variation, with the maximum contact stress in
the radial load direction. The error of the maximum contact stress
between the Hertz contact result and simulation result is only
0.522%. Therefore, the process of solving the contact stress of ACBB
in this paper is accurate and feasible.
2. The failure of 7016AC bearing under low axial load condition is
primarily attributed to RCF damage, while in the case of high axial
load is mainly caused by wear. Further investigation shows that both
failure modes occur almost simultaneously at a cycle number of 3.5 ×
109 when the axial load is about 3700 N.
3. When one failure mode dominates, the other failure mode contrib­
utes little to the failure probability. However, when RCF damage and
wear failure probability curves are located close to each other, the
reliability analysis results for 7016AC bearing considering the
coupled effects of RCF damage and wear are more realistic than the
results under a single failure mode.
4. The maximum failure probability error obtained by the modified t-
IRS method for the three cases is only 0.650%, which verifies its
accuracy. In addition, t-IRS shows a significant advantage over the
compared method in terms of computational efficiency since it re­
quires at most 224 calls to the performance function to complete the
evaluation of the failure probability for any number of cycles.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Bin Xie: Data curation, Methodology, Software, Visualization,
Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. Yanzhong Wang:
Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition. Yunyi Zhu:
Investigation, Resources, Validation. Peng Liu: Investigation, Supervi­
sion. Yu Wu: Formal analysis, Project administration. Fengxia Lu:
Funding acquisition, Resources.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge the support from the National
Defense Basic Scientific Research Program of China (Grant No.
JCKY2021601B006) and the National Key Laboratory of Science and
Technology on Helicopter Transmission (Grant No. HTL-O-21K02).
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