I'm trying to calculate the amount of torque I need to put into my braking mechanism in order to hold up a weight. The weight is 18kg at the end of a 170mm arm. this should result in an approx. 30Nm torque on the arm. Now I have two break pads on either side of the arm (outer diameter 40mm, inner diameter 12mm) They are pressed against the arm via a M10 bolt. The coefficient of friction is 0.2. What torque do I have to put into the bolt for the brakes to hold up the weight? I cannot find a simple formula for this online so if you could provide this and explain the calculation it would be great. Thanks
1 Answer
Assuming your arm is attached to a round disk sandwiched between the two friction pads $A=1500mm^2$ and assuming the brake pads are attached via a pair of washers to the $M10$ bolt, we calculate the friction on the one pad and then multiply by two. on my attached diagram.
We calculate the friction stress and friction force on a differential ring shown in the middle of the pad. Assuming the pads are rigid,
$$\sigma_{pad}= \frac{tension in the bolt*0.2}{area of contact}=P$$
Toque of the differential ring $d\tau \ $ with a width $dr$
$$d\tau_{differential- ring}= \int_{6}^{20} 2\pi rPr dr$$ Then we integrate to get the torque of one disk and multiply by two.
$$ \tau_{one-disk}=2/3P\pi r^3 \biggr\rvert _{6}^{20}$$
From the above, we can calculate P and the tension required in the M10 bolt.
From there, depending on the pitch and friction of the bolt, we can calculate its torque.
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