Mechanical structural interference detection for dedicated hybrid transmissions

Planetary gear set (PGS) has been one of the best components to constitute a transmission configuration, including the dedicated hybrid transmission (DHT). Using different synthesis approaches, the DHT configurations can be obtained through algorithms. However, different synthesis results correspond to different connection states of the planetary gear system. There are a certain number of results that violate the motion requirements of the mechanical principal need to be detected and removed. Therefore, this paper presents a novel modeling method to systematically remove the interference structures, with graph theory in structural synthesis. Based on the original graph theory, this paper proposes an equivalent replacement modeling method to convert the motor graph model into a brake-like graph model. Based on the conversion, avoid the appearance of the hanging points in the graph model. By applying the proposed approach, a DHT structure proves the feasibility of the method. The proposed detection approach can systematically detect all the PGS-based transmission with multi-PGSs, multi-shifting elements, and multi-power sources.