Design and Analysis of Drum Brake

Abstract

The brake drum is a specialized brake that uses the concept of friction to decelerate .The deceleration is
achieved by the assistance of the friction generated by a set of brake shoes or pads. During the brake operation heat is
ejected out this causes damage to the brake. To satisfy this condition the drum material should possess a high thermal
conductivity, thermal capacity and high strength .The common material used for construction of brake drum is cast iron.
A thermal analysis of different materials such as aluminium alloy, cast iron and stainless steel 304 for a brake drum will
be done. Grey cast iron is the conventional material used for making brake drums of light and heavy motor vehicle. The
problems encountered in the cast iron material are described. An Al MMC brake drum has been designed to replace the
heavy cast iron brake drum of a typical passenger vehicle. The design parameters such as inner radius, outer radius, and
the width of drum, load and the allowable deformation are kept same for both cast iron and MMC brake drum. The
maximum temperature that is generated is calculated with the help of the ambient temperature for all the three materials.
The area of cross section is calculated and thus their weight is calculated for three different densities of the three
materials. A model is created with the help of computer aided drafting software, namely CATIA. Steady state condition is
studied for all the three materials. Then thermal deformation is calculated assuming a pressure of one Newton is applied
as a braking energy or force. A comparison of all the three results is done and MMC material is proved better than the
other materials.