Automotive Transmission Design Using Full Potential of Powder Metal
The design of Powder Metal (PM) gears can not be copied from the steel gear that it may be replacing in an automotive transmission. This paper deals with the implications of copying the micro geometry of the steel gear when rebuilding a 6 speed manual transmission for an Opel Insignia 4 cylinder turbocharged 2 litre engine delivering 220hp/320Nm. It will be showed that a different micro geometry of the PM gear teeth coupled with the lower Young’s modulus can theoretically enhance performance compared to the solid steel design. A thorough reverse engineering and redesign has been required in order to understand and map the performance of the Solid steel versus the PM gears and the findings from that work will be discussed in this paper. Weight reductions and inertia reductions will be demonstrated with maintained performance levels to put light on some of the advantages with PM technology.