Design And Analysis Of Composite Drive Shaft

Abstract

Drive shafts find their extensive use in automotives, locomotives, air crafts and ships. In recent years, composite drive shafts are getting popular because of their reduced weight and extraordinary strength and stiffness. Torque carrying drive shafts experience torsion, shear stress, buckling and vibration loads, depending upon the input force and the load applied. While designing the drive shaft, it is considered that shaft must be strong enough to bear all types of loads, while its weight should be as low as possible so it has negligible inertial effects. A number of parameters dictate the mechanical properties of a composite drive shaft such as fiber orientation, stacking sequence and ply thickness. Non-linear buckling analysis, modal analysis and structural analysis were carried out simultaneously to find optimum thicknesses of plies. A Hybrid structure which is a combination of Aluminum lining and Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic (CFRP) is then analyzed on optimized ply thicknesses. drive shaft. Hybrid drive shaft provides benefit of better connection with other metallic engine parts. Hybrid structure also enhances the buckling behavior of drive shaft. Therefore overall safety of drive shaft is achieved.