Finite element analysis and structural improvement of universal shaft for loader

JIN Mei-zhen
（College of Architecture and Civil Engineering， Zhejiang Guangsha College of Applied Construction Technology，Dongyang 322100， China）

Abstract： Aiming at the problem of insufficient strength used to appear in the fork part of the universal shaft in tests，a finite element model of universal shaft for loader was established with the application of Pro/E and ANSYS through meshing，setting material properties and adding constraint and load. The position and distribution of maximum stress，maximum deformation of slide，spline and cross shaft fork were acquired by the static stiffness analysis，stress analysis and kinetic analysis.The weak positions and the reason for insufficient strength on the universal shaft were found. Based on this，the original structure and dimension of the universal shaft were further modified by increasing the diameter of the cylinder between the fork and spline on the spline shaft fork，increasing the width and thickness of the fork of the spline shaft fork，slide shaft fork and flange fork. The results indicate that crack doesn't appear for improved universal shaft in tests，which provided sufficient basis for the design，production and application of the fork part of the universal shaft.
Key words： loader； universal shaft；finite element method（FEM）；structure analysis；ANSYS/LS-DYNA