1. Development of heavy truck drive axle to single stage reduction drive axle
With the improvement of highway transportation conditions and the change of user’s requirements for vehicle performance, the heavy truck drive axle technology has gradually developed to single-stage. For the two-stage reduction drive axle, the main reducer is relatively small, and the size of the main reducer assembly is small, which makes the whole axle have large ground clearance and strong trafficability. Therefore, the application proportion of the two-stage reduction axle is still about 60%. Compared with the two-stage reduction axle, the single-stage reduction axle has the advantages of simple structure, light weight of the whole axle, high transmission efficiency, less vulnerable parts, less transmission chain and low friction resistance. In the past, due to the low trafficability of single-stage bridge, the application scope is small, but now the road condition has been significantly improved, and the trafficability requirements of heavy trucks are reduced. Because of this, the disadvantage of poor trafficability of single-stage axle can be ignored, so the application of single-stage reduction drive axle in the field of highway transportation must be more and more widely.
2. Development of heavy truck drive axle to multiple drive axle
In order to standardize the production of road vehicles and provide technical guidance for overload control, on April 28, 2004, the mandatory standard GB 1589-2004 “outline dimensions, axle load and mass limits of road vehicles”, jointly proposed by the national development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of communications and the Ministry of public security, was issued and implemented, which clearly stipulates the axle load. In order to reasonably distribute the torque to meet the use of independent suspension multi axle drive vehicle, some axle manufacturers independently develop multi axle drive axle. At present, most manufacturers have produced a combination of medium axle and rear axle. The power is input to the medium axle from the transmission shaft. The medium axle is equipped with an inter axle differential, and then transmitted to the rear axle through the inter axle differential and through the axle shaft. The double axle greatly increases the driving stability and bearing capacity of the vehicle. Therefore, the multi axle must be the development trend of the heavy truck drive axle in the future.
3. Development of heavy truck drive axle towards lightweight
At present, the development trend of vehicle technology is energy saving, safety, reliability and so on. Therefore, it is bound to require the development of vehicle axle in the direction of lightweight, high efficiency and high attendance. It is necessary to develop the lightweight of vehicle and bridge. Because of the overload phenomenon of heavy trucks in China, vehicle and Bridge manufacturers have to increase the safety factor of the whole bridge, resulting in the increasing weight of the whole bridge. But axle manufacturers hope to limit the overload phenomenon, so that they can develop lightweight axle, reduce the material cost and increase the market competitive advantage. For the development of vehicle axle lightweight, we should start from the direction of structural design and the use of new materials, improve and innovate the traditional vehicle axle structure and manufacturing technology, and seek new materials with lightweight and high performance, so as to make the vehicle axle have better performance under the condition of material reduction and weight reduction.
The future heavy truck drive axle is bound to develop in the direction of lightweight, energy saving, environmental protection and comfort, which requires the support of advanced design and manufacturing technology, as well as the development of new materials. With the rapid development of the logistics industry, the requirements for heavy trucks are more diverse. As an important part of heavy truck power transmission, the development of axle is also extremely important.