A Design Method of Serpentine Belt Accessory Drive System

Abstract

A new design method of Serpentine Belt Accessory Drive (SBAD) system is put forward in which the static and dynamic performances are considered. Using the design method, the design of the SBAD system is divided into 3 stages: the designs of the belt-pulley parameters (including the installation positions, radius, moments of inertia of the pulleys, etc.), the belt pretension and the tensioner parameters. The design of the belt-pulley parameters and the belt pretension are needed to satisfy the requirements of the static performances of the SBAD system. The optimization design method is used to design the tensioner parameters which based on the dynamic performance of the SBAD system. For the optimization design, the angle fluctuation of the tensioner arm and rotation angle fluctuation of the accessory pulleys are selected as the objective functions, while the tensioner stiffness, damping and installed angle, and the tensioner arm length are taken to be design variables. Numerical solutions for a SBAD system indicate that the proposed design method of the SBAD system is feasible, and the belt slipping on the pulleys does not occur.