Virtual-Power Flow and Mechanical Gear-Mesh Power Losses of Epicyclic Gear Trains

The concept of virtual power is first defined as the power measured, in a noninertial frame, in an epicyclic gear train. We then introduce the concept of virtual-power ratio, an invariant related to the power loss in an epicyclic system. It is shown that virtual-power flow and balance exist in an epicyclic gear train, based on which a novel algorithm to compute the gear-mesh powerloss and the train efficiency is formulated. This algorithm is general enough to be applied to any given epicyclic gear train. Our results are compared with previous work on the subject.