ANALYSIS AND DETERMINATION OF THE CAUSES OF THE HEAVILY LOADED GEARS FAILURE

Abstract

The destruction of gears occurs due to various reasons, first, connected with violation of manufacturing technology at different stages, poor quality assembly of the gear or the whole mechanism, as well as exceeding the specified operating loads. The aim of the study was to establish the causes of failure of the top drive gears in the drilling rig based on the mechanical and structural characteristics obtained by generally accepted methods, collectively used to assess the nature of the resulting damage. In order to
analyze the compliance of the gear manufacturing quality with the operational requirements and to identify the cause of their failure, we carried out complex studies, including microstructural analysis of the gear metal, determination of its chemical composition and mechanical properties, as well
as the study of the fracture surface morphology using scanning electron microscopy. As a result, we found that the gears failed due to a violation of the manufacturing technology in terms of wrong heat treatment.