Available online at www.sciencedirect.

com

ScienceDirect
Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12
www.elsevier.com/locate/procedia

5th CIRP CSI 2020

Surface integrity aspects in gear manufacturing

B. Karpuschewskia,b*, M. Beutnerc, J. Eckebrechta,b, J. Heinzela,b, T. Hüsemanna,b
a) Leibniz Institute for Materials Engineering IWT, Badgasteiner Str. 3, D-28359 Bremen, Germany
b) University of Bremen, Badgasteiner Str. 1, D-28359 Bremen, Germany
c) Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg, Universitaetsplatz 2, D-39106 Magdeburg, Germany
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +49 421-218 51100; fax: +49 421-218 51102. E-mail address: [email protected]

Abstract

Gears are highly loaded components in many different application areas such as automotive, aircraft turbines, ships or wind energy systems.
The demand on gears can be summarized by ever rising load capacity on the one hand side and significant noise reduction on the other hand.
Both demands can only be fulfilled by adapted gear finishing processes generating the best possible macro- and micro geometry as well as the
desired surface integrity state. The paper presents research work on analyzing the thermal load on gears during gear hobbing, surface integrity
states by different hard gear finishing operations and possibilities to avoid thermal damage in gear manufacturing by adapted process
monitoring and fast non-destructive analyzing techniques.
© 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of
the 5th CIRP CSI 2020
Keywords: gear grinding; surface integrity; gear honing; gear hobbing; skive hobbing; residual stresses

1. Introduction away from combustion engines to battery driven concepts.

However even here gears are still necessary, but a significantly
Gears belong to the most used machine elements of lower number of gears per car will be needed. At the same
mankind and have been utilized in different applications since time gears find fast rising use in aircraft turbines due to lower
more than 2000 years [1]. They are still the best choice to noise generation and reduced fuel consumption [4].
convert torque and speed in a wide range of applications from However modern high-performance transmissions are
the micro world to large scale installations. While in ancient steadily faced with torque increase and downsizing of the
times the gears were basically used to transport water from the gearbox space and mass. How hard finishing processes are
spring to agricultural application, they are nowadays used in affected by these requirements and which strategies face the
all kinds of basic human needs. Gear boxes are applied to corresponding demands is focus of this paper. The only gear
create any kind of mobility (on land, on water, in the air), to material considered here is steel due to its dominating
generate electricity (wind power plants), in medical importance in the afore-mentioned areas. However different
applications (drug delivery), in metrology (clocks and other gear materials such as plastics also have a huge market
watches) and in numerous industrial applications. The impact [5], but will not be discussed here because of very
worldwide demand for gears is currently in the range of 230 limited research regarding surface integrity aspects.
Billion $ [2], but there is quite some uncertainty about the
future of gear boxes in automotive applications. Although the
2. Process chains for gear manufacturing
electrification of cars has taken years to be accepted and is
today on a market share of just 3% of all sold cars [3],
An extract of the most common process chains to produce
forecasts see the share in a range of 50% for the year 2040.
high performance gears is shown in Fig. 1 [6]. The whole
The environmental necessity supported by political measures
field of green, i.e. soft machining will not be covered here,
seems to move individual mobility of people
there are

2212-8271 © 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.

This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 5th CIRP CSI 2020
10.1016/j.procir.2020.05.112
4 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12

many different chip removal and non-cutting technologies Fig. 3 [7]. Thus the induced residual stresses by cleaning with
available [7]. The succeeding heat treatment is an essential shot peening are more or less totally removed by the
part in the process chain, determining the micro structure, succeeding gear finishing operation. Any attempt to modify
hardness and residual stress state of the gear prior to the final the residual stress state of a gear flank towards high
machining step. Depending on the type of heat treatment compressive stresses has to take these effects into account.
different levels of geometrical distortion of the gear can Additionally if shot peening is applied for the purpose of
prevail. compressive residual stress generation the gear should be pre-
finished [12]. Shot peening alters the surface of the flank, an
“orange-peel” like appearance of the top layer can be
observed and needs succeeding removal. This final finishing
step should remove as little material as possible (< 30 µm)
just to maintain the induced compressive residual stresses.

Fig. 1. Gear manufacturing process chain

One of the most prominent heat treatment processes is

conventional case-hardening after carburizing of suitable
steels like 16MnCr5 (1.7131), 25MoCr4 (1.7325) or
18CrNiMo7-6
(1.6587) and 42CrMo4 (1.7225), the two latter materials Fig. 3. Material allowance on gear flanks for hard finishing depending on
modulus [6]
especially suitable for larger modulus gears. Recently also
modified processes, where carburizing is replaced by
3. Hard finishing of gears
carbonitriding are further explored [8, 9]. This widely used
process generates compressive residual stresses in the
Due to the still unpredictable distortion behavior of heat-
subsurface of the material with variable micro structure,
treated soft machined gears and the uneven surface material
surface hardness, case-hardening depth (CHD) and retained
composition (e.g. oxidation layers) gear hard machining is the
austenite content depending on the individual time–
necessary final process step to achieve the two most important
temperature curves used during heat treatment. Fig. 2 shows a
goals, maximum load capacity and minimum running noise,
representative residual stress profile for a case- hardened gear
Fig. 4 [5, 11].
made of 25MoCr4. A constant compressive residual stress level
of approx. -200 MPa is visible throughout the whole analyzed
depth of 200 µm and progresses even further into the material
[10, 11].

Fig. 4. Purpose of gear hard finishing [6, 13]

The related measures like flank modifications and

reduction of form errors have thus to be achieved with the
Fig. 2. Residual stress profiles after case hardening and cleaning by shot
peening [10, 11] most suitable manufacturing processes. As shown in Fig. 1
hard fine machining can be done utilizing processes with
Depending on the type of heat treatment and especially on geometrically well-defined cutting edges as well as with non-
the way of quenching and tempering a succeeding cleaning defined cutting edges [6]. In the following sections the impact
operation might be applied to the gear to remove surface of different finishing processes based on abrasive processes
carbon and oxidation layers. This cleaning often done by shot (section 3.1.), on cutting processes (section 3.2), and on
peening has a significant impact on the resulting residual rolling processes (section 4.) on surface integrity of the gear
stress profile, Fig. 2. High compressive residual stresses up to will be discussed. Some aspects of monitoring the surface
-1000 MPa can be found in the near subsurface area, the integrity state in the production environment will be addressed
initial stress state after heat treatment is reached in depths in section 5. The paper ends with some conclusions and a
beyond 150 µm. For this chosen gear example with a modulus brief outlook towards the future of gears.
mn = 4.32 mm usually 150 µm of material is removed per
flank during hard finishing,
 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12 5

3.1 Finishing by abrasive processes described length might lead to locally increased material
removal rates and thus to the danger of grinding burn [13].
The grinding processes of gears can be distinguished in Furthermore especially in case of dedendum grinding the
generating grinding and profile grinding though another whole width of the grinding wheel is in contact with the
classification of continuous and discontinuous processes has workpiece which limits the access for coolant into the zone of
to be made, Fig. 5. contact, thus further enhancing the probability of thermal
In this paper only the most important variants, namely damage. As a consequence in many industrial applications
continuous generating grinding, discontinuous profile discontinuous profile grinding is done in at least two steps.
grinding and gear honing will be discussed. While continuous First roughing is used to remove most of the material with
generating grinding is by far the most productive finishing sometimes locally different material allowances. If the
process for large batch production in automotive and general geometrical distortion after heat treatment is expected to be
transmission applications up to a modulus of mn,max = 10 mm, high, either moderate grinding conditions (low feed speed,
discontinuous profile grinding is the most flexible process low depth of cut) are chosen to avoid any thermal overload.
from single part production up to medium and large sized Or more productive parameters are applied in order to
batches with a modulus range from mn < 1mm up to mn > 35 increase productivity, by taking the risk of local burn into
mm [6]. account. In any case finish profile grinding is following to
achieve the desired surface roughness and surface integrity
state.
In case of continuous generating gear grinding there are
multiple contacts of the grinding worm with the workpiece,
see Fig. 6 right. These individual lengths of engaged profile
are significantly smaller compared to profile grinding.
Furthermore there is sufficient space for applying coolant to
the contact zone. Thus in direct comparison the overall
grinding burn risk is much smaller for continuous generating
gear grinding. In the following specific research results of the
above mentioned processes for hard finishing of gears by
grinding are presented.
Fig. 5. Abrasive processes for hard gear finishing [5, 11]
3.1.1 Discontinuous profile gear grinding
Honing has gained substantial importance for two main
reasons. On the one hand, it was shown that the generated Many research activities have been conducted to determine
surfaces on the gears generate a much lower running noise the influence of different parameters on the surface integrity
compared to conventionally ground surfaces [6, 10, 14]. In state of ground gears. In case of discontinuous profile gear
addition the process of gear honing does not need large grinding the resulting residual stress profiles and full width at
overtravel of the tool. It is possible to machine a running half maximum (FWHM) values for rising material removal
gearing close to any other geometrical design element like, are shown in Fig. 7. The results show that the first ground
e.g. a clutch gearing. By this it is possible to machine different tooth gaps show no hints of thermal overload with desired
gears on one shaft, avoiding the necessity of mounting compressive residual stresses at the surface.
separate machined gears after finishing.
With regard to surface integrity aspects the following
general comparison of the contact conditions of gear grinding
have to be discussed, Fig. 6.

Fig. 6. Comparison of gear grinding contact conditions

As can be seen on Fig. 6 left, discontinuous profile gear

grinding can be applied to even grind the dedendum of the
gear. However with or without this feature the length of the
engaged profile of the grinding wheel to the workpiece is Fig. 7. X-ray measurements after discontinuous gear profile grinding
extremely large. This creates the necessity for a high quality
soft machining and heat treatment, because any distortion
along the
6 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12

With increasing specific material removal V’w the residual 3.1.2 Continuous generating gear grinding
stress state is shifted towards low compressive stresses at the
surface and high tensile residual stresses up to 550 MPa in The influence of continuous generating gear grinding on
subsurface areas. For V’w = 800 mm³/mm the progressing surface integrity is shown in Fig. 9 [17]. In the presented case
clogging and wear of the corundum grinding wheel leads to a dressable corundum grinding worm was used. The results
the shown surface integrity state with severe thermal damage show that even for this less thermally critical process it is
due to tensile residual stresses and reduced FWHM values possible to shift the residual stress state to tensile residual
indicating structural changes and hardness loss. In this case it stresses at the surface, if the parameters are chosen in a
is impossible to grind the whole gear (47 teeth) without progressive way.
intermediate dressing. At least after half of the gear is ground
(23 teeth) a dressing operation must be applied in order to
remove clogging and wear and to offer a sharp grinding wheel
to continue the process without risk of thermal damage.
Fig. 8 shows the influence of increasing material removal
rates Q’w on the resulting gear properties [16]. As expected the
normalized spindle power is rising with higher Q’w, whereas
the residual stress state at the surface is shifted towards lower
compressive residual stresses. The increased load on the
corundum grinding wheel results in slightly better surface
roughness values. All these results are still in a fully
acceptable range. The chosen material removal rates are quite
moderate, in industrial practice local specific material removal
rates Q’w might be much higher exceeding values of 20
mm³/mms. These high values very likely lead to local thermal
overload with resulting tensile residual stresses and structural
changes towards re-hardening layers appearing like white
etching areas (WEA) in micro-structural investigations.

Fig. 9. Residual stress state after continuous generating gear grinding;

corundum grinding worm [17]

Essential influencing parameters are the number of threads,

feed and material removal rate, while the increase of the
material removal Vw does not show a significant effect. This is
due to the fact that the individual load on contact areas of the
grinding worm is substantially smaller compared to
discontinuous profile grinding wheels [18]. In addition the
grinding worm is shifted during grinding of numerous gears to
fresh tool areas along the width similar to a gear hob, which is
further reducing the load on individual grinding worm parts.
The high demand for productive cycle times in large batch
gear grinding of the automotive industry has also encouraged
to use expensive CBN grinding worms in two different
application variants. Either non-dressable electroplated single
layer worms or dressable CBN worms with a ceramic bond
have been applied. Fig. 10 shows results of continuous
generating gear grinding with a dressable CBN grinding
worm. The results reveal that the desired compressive residual
stresses at the surface of the gear flank can still be achieved
even with high feed speeds [19]. The increasing feed speed
leads to clearly reduced compressive residual stress states,
while the influence of the cutting speed vc is not that
prominent, fig. 10 lower part. The higher feed speed generates
also slightly rougher surfaces, Fig. 10 upper part.
In any case it is clear that both most popular gear grinding
Fig. 8. Influence of material removal rate on surface roughness and residual
stresses during discontinuous profile gear grinding [16]
variants are suitable to produce high quality gears with a
sufficient surface integrity state. Still thermal damage is likely
 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12 7

to occur in case of uncontrolled geometrical distortion of the the tooth flank basically lead to desired compressive residual
gear or because of too aggressive process parameters. stresses at the surface with sufficient penetration into the steel
material, no matter which tool concept (dressable corundum
or electroplated diamond) is used.

Fig. 11. Residual stress state after gear honing with diamond abrasives [10]

3.2 Finishing by cutting processes

3.2.1 Gear hobbing

Gear hobbing is the dominating technique to produce

external gears in a wide range regarding modulus, outer
diameter and helix angle for applications in automobile
industry and also for wind turbines. But all of this takes place
in the green manufacturing state of the process chain. For hard
Fig. 10. Residual stress state after continuous generating gear grinding [19]
gear finishing gear hobbing is mostly used for large ring gears
when the quality requirements (IT10-12) of grinding are not
3.1.3 Gear honing
necessary. In that case the workpiece material is mostly a
quenched and tempered steel.
The last abrasive process to be discussed here is gear
As environmentally challenges increase dry hobbing is
honing. The above mentioned advantages of low noise
widely used in soft machining. To unlock the ecological and
generation and excellent accessibility to different gear
economic potential of dry finish hobbing the thermal effects
geometries on shafts have continuously increased the
have to be considered. Compared to automobile gears the ratio
application of gear honing. The process kinematics have been
between inner and outer diameter for large ring gears (ø > 1
discussed in [5, 6]. Dressable honing rings made of corundum
m) is close to one. That is why thermal effects become more
as well as single layer electroplated non-dressable tools are in
important.
use.
Beutner has investigated the thermal impact of gear
Fig. 11 shows results of honing with single layer diamond
hobbing in detail [20, 21]. In an industrial application of his
abrasives [10]. This is remarkable, because usually the use of
approach the temperature input into large ring gears (ø = 3.1
diamond tools is not suitable for any steel material due to its
m) was measured by several resistance thermometers. The
carbon affinity. In this special case with significantly low
setup is shown in Fig. 12.
cutting speeds in the range of only 1- 8 m/s the internally
The sensors of type PT 100 SMD 1206 were applied on a
geared ring-shaped honing tool is only exposed to high
carbon carrier protected by thermal grease and a brass
mechanical load. This load can be perfectly handled by
capsule. To get information in different dimensions the setup
diamond abrasives, thus in this exceptional case diamond is
was chosen along the width of the gear, along the axial pitch
the preferred abrasive for single layer electroplated honing
and in the direction of the cutting depth. By the assumption of
tools. The residual stress state stays in a high compressive
a rotational symmetry the sensors where spread on different
level at the surface even after a high number of honed gears,
teeth, compare Fig. 12 upper left. The experiments were
Fig. 11 left. The residual stress profiles show a desired
conducted using an indexable insert hob (cemented carbide).
behavior, the compressive stress level at the surface as well as
To cut the gap accurately between the relative position of the
the penetration into the subsurface area even rise from gear
hob and the sensors the workpiece positioning was crucial. It
number 1 to gear number 1450, Fig. 11 right. In general the
was realized by an angular adjustment of the workpiece before
gear honing process is not arousing suspicion to induce
cutting. For large ring gears with a large modulus, a two-step
thermal damage to the workpiece. The low cutting speeds in
conjunction with the high mechanical load on
8 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12

cutting strategy was used to decrease the load of the tool. The hobbing it increases to 105 µm and for dry hobbing to 178
chosen cutting parameters and the gear geometry are shown in µm. All other geometry values and gearing parameters are
the table of Fig. 12. within the quality range. Additionally, no tendencies are
obvious and moreover the higher workpiece temperature (ΔT
= 35°C) seems not affecting the geometry. There were no
further investigations to analyze the residual stress state,
because it would have been necessary to destroy the large
gears to cut out single teeth for X-ray diffraction analysis.
Knowing that this was just a single industry test, it seems that
dry finish hobbing is possible for the demanded application.

3.2.2 Profile milling

Another manufacturing technique which is used for ring

gears is profile milling. As it is for gear hobbing profile
milling is widely used for green manufacturing. Compared to
hobbing profile milling is also capable to manufacture internal
gears.
For high loaded applications such as tunnel driving
machines and ball bearings the gear has been heat treated to
ensure the performance. But because of the heat treatment the
geometry of the gear is distorted and a hard finish process step
Fig. 12. Experimental setup for large ring gear finish hobbing [20, 21] is necessary.

The main focus of the experiment was the comparison of

dry and wet hobbing using water-based emulsion as coolant.
For both experiments the temperature curves are close
together which means that both gears were heated up
homogenously, see Fig. 13. Starting with the first cut it is
obvious that the heat capacity of the emulsion (90% water)
reduces the workpiece temperature significantly. Comparing
the peak workpiece temperature of the first cut the gear
temperature is close to double (28°C to 51°C). Because the
workpiece has an increased temperature level for the second
cut the temperature gap is even higher (28°C to 44°C). The
actively chilled coolant inhibits the heat dissipation into
workpiece, that way the gear temperature between first and
second cut is nearly the same.

Fig. 14. Single tooth gap finish profile milling of hardened gears [22, 23]
Fig. 13. Comparing the temperature curve of dry hobbing and hobbing
with coolant [20, 21]
An investigation was done on an internal ring gear
(AISI4140) with a modulus of 14 mm and, outer diameter of
After hobbing the gear geometry was measured. Surface
2500 mm and 162 teeth. After soft machining the ring gear an
roughness always stayed in requested tolerances. All of the
induction heating was applied to get a surface hardness of 56
gearing parameters are in the quality range of IT12. Only the
to 58 HRC. After hardening a profile cutter with tungsten
circularity was increased and out of quality range. The initial
cemented carbide indexable inserts was used, Fig. 14 upper
circularity after turning was 80 µm for both rings. For wet
right. With up-cut milling all tooth gaps were manufactured.
 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12 9

Without changing the inserts, the wear is increased with every with 200 m/min. The result for PCBN with vc = 200 m/min is
cut gap. The width of the flank wear was measured every 40
very similar to those of cemented carbide. The shape of the
gaps (geared length of 8 m). The wear increases right from the
curves for the initial state are very similar, starting with lower
beginning up to 100 µm and then kept constant for about 60
compressive stresses at the very top layer (-200 MPa and -350
m. After that it increases again and reaches the maximum
MPa).
flank wear of 200 µm at 83 m. More details of the wear
experiment are to be found in [22, 23].
During the test, residual stress depth profiles were done by
cutting out single teeth, which showed high local maxima in
Barkhausen noise testing. The measurements were carried out
with a mobile X-ray diffractometer Stresstech Xstress 3000
with a goniometer G3.
It is obvious that the residual stress changes with increasing
wear of the inserts, Fig. 14 lower part. For the initial state of
the insert the residual stresses in 0° and 90° orientation of the
cutting direction compressive stresses result at the outer
surface layer (-710 MPa to -380 MPa respectively). After a
depth of 50 µm the residual stresses reach a steady state which
seems not to be affected by the milling process. The tensile
stresses of about 100 MPa for the 90° direction is probably
caused by the rolling process of the ring. Cutting with the Fig. 15. Experimental setup for two flanked analogy test for hard skive
worn inserts the residual stresses of the outer surface layer for hobbing
0° increase significantly from -710 to 50 MPa. For 90° it is
nearly the same. However, the level of the tensile stresses is After that the stresses decrease to the local minimum in a
very low and can be considered as uncritical. It can be seen depth of 20 µm with -450 MPa for cemented carbide and -810
that coated ultrafine grained tungsten carbide inserts are able MPa for PCBN. After worn out of the cutting insert the
to perform dry profile milling of hardened large gears and resulting residual stresses look very similar with still
may promote the function- oriented characteristic of compressive stresses of about -300 MPa. The shape of the
compressive residual stresses [24]. curve differs to the initial state and the cutting speed influence
is not present anymore.
3.2.3 Skive hobbing

For small companies with small batch production a

separate gear grinding machine can be too expensive. For that
case skive hobbing is a possibility to produce hard finished
gears on a single machine tool. As a first step gear hobbing as
soft machining is applied followed by case-hardening. After
that the same gear hobbing machine tool can be used. On the
side of the hob the rake angle changes from 0° to -20°.
Because of the hardened surface layer of about 58 HRC
tungsten cemented carbide is widely used as tool material. To
decrease thermal effects and the wear of the hob cutting oil is
mostly used. Additionally, the cutting parameters are very
moderate. Due to its superior properties polycrystalline boron
nitride PCBN is another opportunity for this application. In
cutting industry, it is already widely used for turning
applications.
Using PCBN the cutting speed can be increased and it is
possible to work without lubricant. By increasing the cutting
speed, the cutting temperature increases as well. Thus the
influence of the adapted process on the surface integrity of the
gear has to be examined. For the first time a two flanked
analogy test for hard skive hobbing was applied using a full Fig. 16. Residual stresses after skive hobbing in two flanked analogy test
face PCBN insert, see Fig.15. With a depth of cut ae of 100
µm the case-hardened gear was manufactured. 3.2.4. Hard skiving
After reaching the maximum flank wear of 50 µm the
Recently gear skiving has gained fast rising interest as
cutting test was stopped. From the first and last cut gear a
potential soft machining process for internal and external
tooth was separated and examined by X-ray diffraction as
gearing [25, 26]. The biggest potential is seen in the fact, that
shown in Fig. 16. For this investigation the results of
besides dedicated machine tools this technology can also be
cemented carbide with a cutting speed of vc = 200 m/min and
applied on modern machining centers as long as they can
PCBN with vc = 400 m/min were compared. It seems that a
higher cutting speed is able to induce more compressive
residual stresses than cutting
10 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12

provide the necessary kinematics and spindle performances. stresses are present directly on the surface, very low
Mandatory to apply this technology is an adapted software residual stresses form in the immediate subsurface zone of
package for skiving. While soft skiving is already introduced the downwardly (↓) machined gears, which are
in industry the potential of hard skiving is not yet explored. approximately at the same level as the ground test series.
First attempts are being made to identify suitable process
parameters and cutting tool materials to apply this fast process
also to hardened gears [27]. Specific results on surface
integrity aspects on hardened gears are not yet published.
Only first results for soft gears with a surface hardness of 30
HRC machined by skiving have been reported in [28].

4. Introducing compressive residual stresses by rolling

While all the above-mentioned processes are used for

material removal on gear flanks there is also an option to
induce desired compressive residual stresses by different
methods without material removal. Shot peening was already
addressed in the paper, see Fig. 2 and [12], but there is
another upcoming interesting process to be applied on gear
flanks based on rollers [29]. Compared to shot peening, this
finishing process offers the essential advantage of a greater
depth effect of the hardening mechanisms, which usually
results in higher load tolerances. By means of a newly
developed inline-deep rolling tool, these positive impacts can
also be made available for gear manufacturing, Fig. 17. It Fig. 18. Residual stress profiles of inline-deep rolled spur gears [29]
illustrates the schematic design and the predicted mode of
action of the developed tool. Individual rollers arranged one Only at greater material depths the measured values
behind the other are mounted “in line” on a roller holder. By increase again. Thereby a dependence on the deep rolling
means of different roller widths, which are matched to each pressure is clearly discernible. The deep rolling force also has
other according to the tooth root envelope curve, a suitable an immense influence on the upwardly (↑) produced
overlapping of the rolling paths in the tooth root can be specimens, but over the entire value range, so that even in
achieved by horizontal moving. As the rollers carry out the the p = 150 bar tests, maximum residual compressive stress
rolling process on both sides, the complete machining of a values of approximately
tooth space is done with only one passage of the inline tool. In -2.500 MPa can be recorded on the surface. The presented
order to increase efficiency and to maintain the cycle times results are gained on spur gears. By adapting the deep rolling
specified by the grinding process, several gears can be tools and the gear holder, it is also possible to transfer the
clamped one after the other. process to helical gearing. Further investigations on functional
behavior have to show, which of these stress profiles lead to
the best life time performance of the gears. The potential to
drastically improve the compressive residual stress level at the
surface and in subsurface areas is evident.

5. Monitoring of gear surface integrity conditions

Many laboratory reference methods are in use to analyze

the surface integrity state of machined workpieces like nital
etching, hardness testing, metallographic inspection or X-ray
diffraction metrology [30, 31]. The most promising method to
be applied as non-destructive process monitoring technique is
Fig. 17. Inline-deep rolling of gears [29] Barkhausen noise (BN) measurement. The principle of this
method is based on Bloch wall motions in ferromagnetic
Fig. 18 compares the measured residual stress depth materials initiated by alternating magnetization of the material
profiles of the different finishing states in the tooth root, [30, 32]. It has been widely applied for grinding burn
detected by means of a X-ray diffractometer Xstress 3000 detection, but can also be used for surface integrity check after
made by Stresstech GmbH. All investigated methods generate hard milling [22, 23], see section 3.2.2. Fig. 19 shows results
residual compressive stresses. While shot peening produces of an industrial use of robot based automatic inspection of
a characteristic curve known from literature with a discontinuous profile ground gears with a Barkhausen noise
maximum value of about -850 MPa at a depth of 100 µm, system [33]. The gears were ground in a regular two-step
there are interesting differences in the deep rolled specimens approach, first roughing for large material removal followed
depending on the machining direction. While in the case of by finishing to generate the desired surface roughness and
the upwardly deep rolled (↑) variants the maximum residual stress state. It must be mentioned that the roughing
compressive parameters were
 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12 11

partly chosen beyond industrial values to provoke grinding suitable to generate sufficient surface integrity states, namely
burn. The results reveal the sensitivity of the method to detect compressive residual stresses at the surface and in subsurface
thermal damage on gears fast and reliable. For calibration and areas. In a direct comparison of finishing alternatives by
interpretation of the BN-results, Fig 19 upper part, two abrasive processes, greatest care must be taken for
reference methods have been applied as well, namely nital discontinuous profile gear grinding. Here the complex contact
etching and X-ray diffraction for residual stress analysis, Fig. conditions are most suitable to generate undesired grinding
19 lower part. burn. For continuous generating gear grinding and gear
honing the danger of thermal damage is clearly reduced. This
is based on better coolant accessibility, smaller grinding tool -
workpiece contact areas for generating grinding and much
smaller cutting speeds and thus thermal load for honing.
For hard finish cutting processes some variants like profile
milling and skive hobbing are already applied in industry. The
demands on macro geometry of the cut gears are usually
lower compared to ground gears, because these machined
gears have most often larger dimensions. They are not used
for permanent high speed and high load rotation but more for
lower rotational speeds like in tunnel boring machines or for
positioning purposes like crane tower rotation or nacelle
orientation of wind power plants. But hard skive hobbing and
hard skiving will have the potential to compete with grinding
processes in smaller gear dimensions. For all cutting
processes the resulting residual stress state on the gear surface
is strongly influenced by tool wear.
If a specific high compressive residual stress state must be
guaranteed on the gear, additional processes like shot peening
or rolling are usually applied. While shot peening is well-
established already, deep rolling offers additional benefits like
larger penetration depths, but needs to be further explored
before industrial acceptance.
In any case adapted inspection methods are needed to
Fig. 19. Gear grinding process monitoring with Barkhausen noise [33]
ensure the desired surface integrity state and thus guarantee
the desired performance. While reference methods like nital
Rising material removal rates Qw generate higher thermal etching and X-ray diffraction will remain important for e.g.
load on the tooth flanks. This is clearly reflected by higher calibration, the need for fast and process near methods is
BN- amplitudes and confirmed by visible surface color continuously rising. The most promising technique for
changes during nital etching and rising tensile residual ferromagnetic materials like hardened steels is based on
stresses in subsurface areas. It is important to notice that these Barkhausen noise measurement. While robot-based post-
tensile residual stresses only occur in depths larger than 20 process systems are already used, the potential for in-process
µm, directly on the surface the residual stress state remains measurement in grinding machines is currently investigated.
compressive due to the moderate finishing conditions. Based In conclusion gears will remain important machine
on the measurement parameters, namely magnetization elements because of their unbeaten ability to convert torque,
frequency and amplitude, the BN-methods allows relevant speed and direction of rotating elements in any kind of
subsurface inspection, which is not available with only transmission. While some established application areas like
surface X-ray residual stress measurement. gear boxes for combustion engines might shrink, there will be
In future, the authors attempt to apply a sensor system for new options for electrical concepts (e.g. much higher
Barkhausen noise in a grinding machine tool with the aim of rotational speed, lower demanded noise level) or any kinds of
in-process monitoring during grinding with coolant supply. high loaded turbines (e.g. geared turbofan).
The concept includes considerations to use a wear protection
layer on the sensor to reduce wear and to also test a
measurement variant of the Barkhausen noise without direct Acknowledgements
sensor contact, with a thin air gap. First unpublished results
already reveal the high potential of this concept. The scientific work presented here has been supported by
the German Research Council (DFG) within the research
6. Conclusion priority programs SPP1480 and SPP2086 and the
collaborative research center SFB TRR136. The authors thank
In the presented paper results of surface integrity the DFG for this funding and intensive technical support.
investigations on gears were discussed. Gears belong to the
highest loaded machine elements and are thus subject to
severe quality control. Many cutting and grinding
processes are
12 B. Karpuschewski et al. / Procedia CIRP 87 (2020) 3–12

References [18] Reimann J. Randzonenbeeinflussung beim kontinuierlichen Wälzschlei-

fen von Stirnradverzahnungen (in German) Ph.D. thesis, RWTH Aachen;
[1] Hill D. The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices. 2014
Springer; 2012 [19] Reichstein M, Catoni F. Grinding of Gears with Vitreous Bonded CBN-
[2] N.N. World Gears. Industry Study with Forecasts for 2019 & 2024. The Worms. Annals of the CIRP 55/1: 355-358; 2006
Freedonia Group, Cleveland, OH; 2015 [20] Beutner M., et.al. Modeling, simulation and compensation of thermal
[3] N.N. Electric Vehicles to Accelerate to 54% of New Car Sales by 2040. effects in gear hobbing In: Thermal Effects in Complex Machining
Bloomberg New Energy Finance; 2017 Processes, Biermann, D., Hollmann, F. Springer: 347-366; 2018
[4] Mohd Tobi AL, Ismail AE. Development in Geared Turbofan Aeroengine. [21] Beutner M. Ein Beitrag zum Temperaturverhalten und zur thermischen
Materials Science and Engineering 131; 2016 Belastung beim trockenen Wälzfräsen (in German) Ph.D. thesis, Univ.
[5] N.N. 3rd International conference on High Performance Plastic Gears. VDI- Magdeburg; 2019
Reports 2355: 1267-1495; 2019 [22] Töfke M. Geometrisch bestimmte Trockenbearbeitung von gehärteten
[6] Karpuschewski B, Knoche HJ, Hipke M. Gear finishing by abrasive Großverzahnungen (in German) Ph.D. thesis, Univ. Magdeburg; 2015
processes. Annals of the CIRP 57/2: 621-640; 2008 [23] Karpuschewski B, et. al., Surface Integrity Aspects of Milled Large
[7] Bausch T. Innovative Zahnradfertigung (in German). Expert Verlag; 2011 Hardened Gears, Procedia CIRP, Vol 13: 37-42; 2014
[8] Lombardo S, Tobie T, Stahl K, Steinbacher M, Hoffmann F. Recent [24] Shaw BA, Aylott C, O’Hara P, Brimble K. The role of residual stress on
Development on Microstructure and Mechanical Properties of the fatigue strength of high performance gearing. International Journal of
Carbonitrided Parts; Part 2: Load Capacity of Spur Gears. HTM J. Heat Fatigue 25: 1279–1283; 2003
Treatm. Mat. 70/5: 218-227; 2015 [25] Klocke F et al. Technological and Simulative Analysis of Power
[9] Hüsemann T, Saddei P, Karpuschewski B. Discontinuous profile grinding Skiving.
of multiphase, case-hardened gears with improved load-carrying capacity; Procedia CIRP, Vol. 50: 773-778; 2016
Annals of the CIRP 68/1: 333-336; 2019 [26] Schulze V, Kühlewein C, Autenrieth H. 3D-FEM Modeling of Gear
[10] Marzenell C. Verzahnungshonen mit Diamantwerkzeugen (in German), Skiving to Investigate Kinematics and Chip Formation Mechanisms.
Ph.D. thesis Univ. Hannover; 2001 Advanced Materials Research 223: 46-55; 2011
[11] Schriefer H, Thyssen W, Wirz W, Scacchi G, Gretler M. Continuous [27] Zapf M, Klose J, Zanger F, Schulze V. Analysis of process forces and
generating gear grinding. Reishauer Publication; 2010 surface topography when manufacturing case-hardened gears by double
[12] Benedetti M, Fontanari V, Höhn BR, Oster P, Tobie T. Influence of shot flanked hard skiving. VDI-Reports 2355: 1647-1658; 2019
peening on bending tooth fatigue limit of case hardened gears. [28] Spatzig A, Fujimura N, Monden T et al. Machining Process Solutions to
International Journal of Fatigue 24: 1127–1136; 2002 support the Reduction of Distortion in Ring Gears after Heat Treatment.
[13] Karpuschewski B. Gear Grinding. In: The International Academy for VDI-Reports 2355: 1635-1646; 2019
Production Engineering, Laperrière L., Reinhart G. (eds) CIRP [29] Karpuschewski B, Lierse T, Schulze S. Inline-Deep Rolling: A New
Encyclopedia of Production Engineering. Springer; 2014 Approach to Increase Tooth Root Load Capacity. VDI-Reports 2355:
[14] Klocke F, Gorgels C, Vasiliou V. Analysis of the influence of gear 1787- 1797; 2019
dimensions on cutting speed and contact conditions during the gear [30] Inasaki I, Karpuschewski B: Abrasive Processes, in: Sensors in
honing process. Production Engineering 3: 255–259; 2009 Manufacturing, Wiley-VCH, Weinheim –New York: 236-272, 2001
[15] Malkin S, Guo C. Thermal Analysis of Grinding. Annals of the CIRP [31] Heinzel C, Eckebrecht J et al. Process performance, energy efficiency
56/2: 760-782; 2007 and surface integrity in grinding. Proc. of the 18th Intern. Manufacturing
[16] Türich A. Werkzeug-Profilerzeugung für das Verzahnungsschleifen (in Conf. in China IMCC, Shenyang: 28-40; 2019
German) Ph.D. thesis, Univ. Hannover; 2002 [32] Karpuschewski B. Mikromagnetische Randzonenanalyse geschliffener
[17] Stimpel F. Technologische Kenngrößen für das kontinuierliche Wälz- einsatzgehärteter Bauteile. (in German) Ph.D. thesis, Univ. Hannover;
schleifen von Evolventenverzahnungen (in German) Ph.D. thesis, Univ. 1995
Hannover; 2009 [33] Karpuschewski B, Bleicher O, Beutner M. Surface integrity inspection
on gears using Barkhausen noise analysis. Procedia Engineering 19: 162
– 171; 2011