Effects of Ball’s Rolling, Gyroscopic, and Spin Slide in a Ball Bearing on Raceway’s Stress and Fatigue Life

Abstract

The motions between the ball and raceway in a ball bearing involve rolling, gyroscopic, and spin slide. These complex motions result in the serious distribution of the friction force. Based on the contact mechanics in tribology, the friction force greatly affects stress and fatigue life. Thus, it is necessary to figure out the effects of the motions and its friction force of ball–raceway contact on the fatigue life of a ball bearing. In this paper, first, the equivalent model of ball–raceway contact was studied and established for the convenience of finite element calculation. Second, the contact mechanics considering the friction force with the friction coefficient from 0 to 0.3 was computed. The influences of the motions and its friction forces of ball–raceway contact on the raceway’s stress were analyzed. Third, based on different structure fatigue life algorithms, the raceway’s fatigue life of the cases with the friction coefficient 0, 0.05, 0.1, and 0.3 were studied. The raceway’s fatigue life based on ISO 281-2007 bearing life theory is studied. Results show that the friction force on the contact surface has some influence on the stress and fatigue life to a certain extent. Especially, the ball’s spin has the greatest influence on the stress distribution and fatigue life of the raceway. Thus, for the cases of heavy load and high friction coefficient, the effect of the friction force of ball–raceway contacts cannot be neglected.