Clutch pressure plate compactness effect on the clutch system heat dissipation

Abstract

In the recent years, the role and importance of clutch size and weight in transmission system have been continuously increasing primarily due to its geometrical and functional constraints in the clutch housing and high fuel efficiency target. Increasing demands on vehicle performance within a limited clutch system envelope lead to an increase of the clutches thermal solicitations. In this paper finite element method was used to investigate the effect of heavy truck clutch pressure plate compactness on the clutch system heat dissipation. Three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model was used to study temperature variation of the clutch system representing repetitive successive hill starts condition. Structural analysis based on CFD output was also studied and both CFD and structural analyses results were compared. Clutch plate stress distribution was also studied with structural analyses for the clutch burst condition. 2 cases with different plate compactness were investigated and the results show that clutch plate compactness has a significant impact on the clutches thermal performance.