Hysteresis model of reducer and its application

A reducer is a typical hysteresis system, and the hysteresis affects its transmission performance. The existing hysteresis models of reducers usually ignore the hysteresis characteristics of geometric errors and treat them as constants, which results in the inability of these models to fully reflect the hysteresis characteristics of reducers. In order to better understand the mechanism behind gear reducer hysteresis, this paper theoretically analyzes the effects of friction, elastic deformation, and geometric errors on the phenomenon. Additionally, it develops a new model for gear reducer hysteresis that takes geometric error hysteresis characteristics into account. The model's practical application reveals the dynamic characteristics of the lost motion in the reducer, and a dynamic lost motion formula is deduced. Experimental research verifies the influence of geometric errors on the reducer hysteresis and confirms the effectiveness of the hysteresis model. By changing the loading rate during the lost motion test, the dynamic characteristics of the lost motion are verified. It was found that different materials have different effects on the loading rate. For every 0.05 (N·m)/s increase in the loading rate, the lost motion test results of the small metal gear reducer and the small plastic gear reducer with a modulus of 0.22 mm decrease by about 3′ and 10′, respectively.