Gears and Gear Drives!!

GEAR…..
• Power transmission is the movement of energy
from its place of generation to a location
where it is applied to performing useful work

• A gear is a component within a transmission

device that transmits rotational force and
multiply its magnitude to another gear
 Purpose
• To reverse the direction of rotation
• To increase or decrease the speed of
rotation.
• To move rotational motion to a different axis
• To keep the rotation of two axis
synchronized
• Increase or decrease the torque.
Purpose
• Sports cars go fast
(have speed) but
cannot pull any weight.

• Big trucks can pull

heavy loads (have
power), but cannot go
fast.
 Advantages and Disadvantages of Gear Drive

Advantages
• It transmits exact velocity ratio.
• It may be used to transmit large power.
• It has high efficiency.
• It has reliable service.
• It has compact layout.

Disadvantages
• The manufacture of gears require special tools and
equipment.
• The error in cutting teeth may cause vibrations and noise
during operation.
 TYPES OF GEARS
1. According to the position of axes of the
shafts.
a. Parallel
1.Spur Gear
2.Helical Gear
3.Rack and Pinion
b. Intersecting
Bevel Gear
c. Non-intersecting and Non-parallel
worm and worm gears
 SPUR GEAR
• Teeth is parallel to axis of rotation
• Transmit power from one shaft to another parallel
shaft
• Used in Electric screwdriver, oscillating
sprinkler, windup alarm clock, washing machine
and clothes dryer
Internal spur Gear…
 Helical Gear
• The teeth on helical gears are cut at an angle
to the face of the gear
• This gradual engagement makes helical gears
operate much more smoothly and quietly than
spur gears
• One interesting thing about helical gears is
that if the angles of the gear teeth are correct,
they can be mounted on perpendicular shafts,
adjusting the rotation angle by 90 degrees
Helical Gear…
 Herringbone gears
• To avoid axial thrust, two
helical gears of opposite
hand can be mounted side
by side, to cancel resulting
thrust forces

• Herringbone gears are

mostly used on heavy
machinery.
 Rack and pinion

• A perfect example of this is the steering

system on many cars
 Bevel gears
• Bevel gears are useful when the direction of a
shaft's rotation needs to be changed
• They are usually mounted on shafts that are 90
degrees apart, but can be designed to work at other
angles as well
• The teeth on bevel gears can be straight or spiral
• Locomotives, marine applications, automobiles,
printing presses, cooling towers, power plants, steel
plants, railway track inspection machines, etc.
Straight and Spiral Bevel Gears
WORM AND WORM GEAR
• Worm gears are used when large gear reductions are needed.
It is common for worm gears to have reductions of 20:1, and
even up to 300:1 or greater
• Many worm gears have an interesting property that no other
gear set has: the worm can easily turn the gear, but the gear
cannot turn the worm
• Worm gears are used widely in material handling and
transportation machinery, machine tools, automobiles etc
WORM AND
WORM GEAR
Spur gear nomenclature
NOMENCLATURE….
• Pitch surface: The surface of the imaginary rolling cylinder
(cone, etc.) that the toothed gear may be considered to replace.
• Pitch circle: A right section of the pitch surface.
• Addendum circle: A circle bounding the ends of the teeth, in
a right section of the gear.
• Root (or dedendum) circle: The circle bounding the spaces
between the teeth, in a right section of the gear.
• Addendum: The radial distance between the pitch circle and
the addendum circle.
• Dedendum: The radial distance between the pitch circle and
the root circle.
• Clearance: The difference between the dedendum of one gear
and the addendum of the mating gear.
 NOMENCLATURE….
• Face of a tooth: That part of the tooth surface lying outside
the pitch surface.
• Flank of a tooth: The part of the tooth surface lying inside the
pitch surface.
• Circular thickness (also called the tooth thickness): The
thickness of the tooth measured on the pitch circle. It is the
length of an arc and not the length of a straight line.
• Tooth space: pitch diameter The distance between adjacent
teeth measured on the pitch circle.
• Backlash: The difference between the circle thickness of one
gear and the tooth space of the mating gear.
• Circular pitch (Pc) : The width of a tooth and a space,
measured on the pitch circle. D
Pc
N
 NOMENCLATURE….
• Diametral pitch (Pd): The number of teeth of a gear unit pitch
diameter. The diametral pitch is, by definition, the number of
teeth divided by the pitch diameter. That is,

Where Pd 
N
Pd = diametral pitch D

N = number of teeth
D = pitch diameter

• Module (m): Pitch diameter divided by number of teeth. The

pitch diameter is usually specified in inches or millimeters; in
the former case the module is the inverse of diametral pitch.
m = D/N
 Gear Tooth Geometry -2

The involute curve can be generated by wrapping a

string around a circle.

Gear Tooth
Shape
 Gear Ratio
• In order to determine what a gear will do
for us, we must quantify it.

• Gear Ratio = No. of teeth in follower

No. of teeth in driver

• G.R. = Ft / Dt e.g. ⅓ or 1:3

– Interpret above as one turn of driver will turn
the follower 3 times.
Gear Ratio
 Law of Gearing
 In order to have a constant angular velocity ratio, the common
normal at the point of contact between a pair of teeth must always
pass through the pitch point.
 This is the fundamental condition which must be satisfied while
designing the profiles for the teeth of gear wheels.
 This condition is known as law of gearing.
 The above condition is fulfilled by teeth of involute and cycloidal
form.
 If the shape of one tooth profile is arbitrarily chosen and another
tooth is designed to satisfy the above condition, then the second
tooth is said to be conjugate to the first.
 The conjugate teeth are not in common use because of difficulty in
manufacture, and cost of production.
 Path of contact
The pinion 1 is the driver and is rotating clockwise.
The wheel 2 is driven in the counter-clockwise
direction. EF is their common tangent to the base
circles.
Contact of the two teeth is made where the
addendum circle of the wheel meets the line of action
EF, i.e. at C and is broken where the addendum circle
of the pinion meets the line of action, i.e. at D. CD is
then the path of contact. Let
r = pitch circle radius of pinion
R = pitch circle radius of wheel
ra = addendum circle radius of pinion
Ra = addendum circle radius of wheel.
Path of contact = path of approach + path of recess
CD = CP + PD
= (CF – PF) + (DE – PE)
Arc of contact
Minimum Number of Teeth on
the Pinion in Order to Avoid
Interference
 Comparison Between Involute and
Cycloidal Gears

In actual practice, the involute gears are more commonly used as

compared to cycloidal gears, due to the following advantages :

 The most important advantage of the involute gears is that the centre
distance for a pair of involute gears can be varied within limits without
changing the velocity ratio. This is not true for cycloidal gears which
requires exact centre distance to be maintained.

 In involute gears, the pressure angle, from the start of the

engagement of teeth to the end of the engagement, remains constant.
It is necessary for smooth running and less wear of gears. But in
cycloidal gears, the pressure angle is maximum at the beginning of
engagement, reduces to zero at pitch point, starts decreasing and
again becomes maximum at the end of engagement. This results is
less smooth running of gears.
Advantages of Involute Gears…

 The face and flank of involute teeth are generated by a

single curve where as in cycloidal gears, double curves
(i.e. epi-cycloid and hypo-cycloid) are required for the
face and flank respectively. Thus the involute teeth are
easy to manufacture than cycloidal teeth. In involute
system, the basic rack has straight teeth and the same
can be cut with simple tools

 The only disadvantage of the involute teeth is that the

interference occurs with pinions having smaller number
of teeth. This may be avoided by altering the heights of
addendum and dedendum of the mating teeth or the
angle of obliquity of the teeth.
Advantages of cycloidal gears..

 Since the cycloidal teeth have wider flanks, therefore the cycloidal
gears are stronger than the involute gears, for the same pitch. Due
to this reason, the cycloidal teeth are preferred specially for cast
teeth.

 In cycloidal gears, the contact takes place between a convex flank

and concave surface, whereas in involute gears, the convex
surfaces are in contact. This condition results in less wear in
cycloidal gears as compared to involute gears. However the
difference in wear is negligible.

 In cycloidal gears, the interference does not occur at all. Though

there are advantages of cycloidal gears but they are outweighed by
the greater simplicity and flexibility of the involute gears.
 VELOCITY RATIO OF
GEAR DRIVE
d = Diameter of the wheel
N =Speed of the wheel
ω = Angular speed
 2 N 2 d 1 T1
velocity ratio (Vr) =   
 1 N 1 d 2 T2
 Design limit of gear ratio is 10:1 for each stage,
 Using a lower limit of 12 teeth for the pinion (in order
to avoid interference)
single reduction gear of 120 kW with a pinion 250 mm
pitch circle diameter and speed 650 r.p.m. is supported in
bearings on either side. Calculate the total load due to the
power transmitted, the pressure angle being 20°
 GEAR TRAINS
• A gear train is two or more gear working
together by meshing their teeth and turning
each other in a system to generate power and
speed
• It reduces speed and increases torque
• Electric motors are used with the gear systems
to reduce the speed and increase the torque
 Types of Gear Trains
1. Simple gear train
2. Compound gear train
3. Planetary gear train

4. Simple Gear Train

 The most common of the gear train is the gear pair
connecting parallel shafts. The teeth of this type can
be spur, helical or herringbone.
 Only one gear may rotate about a single axis
Simple Gear
Train
 Compound Gear Train
• For large velocities, compound arrangement is
preferred
• Two or more gears may rotate about a single axis
What is the output in revs/min at D and what is the direction of
rotation if Gear A rotates in a clockwise direction at 30 revs/min?

• RPMs for gear B is 30*3 = 90

rev/min

• Since Gear B & C will rotate at

90rev/min

• Gear D moves at 90*4 = 360

rev/min

30*12 = 360 rev/min

Planetary Gear Train
(Epicyclic Gear Train)
 Planetary Gear Train…
 In this train, the blue gear has six times the diameter of the yellow
gear
 The size of the red gear is not important because it is just there to
reverse the direction of rotation
 In this gear system, the yellow gear (the sun) engages all three red
gears (the planets) simultaneously
 All three are attached to a plate (the planet carrier), and they
engage the inside of the blue gear (the ring) instead of the outside.
 Because there are three red gears instead of one, this gear train is
extremely rugged.
 Planetary Gear Train…
 Planetary gear sets is that they can produce different gear ratios
depending on which gear you use as the input, which gear you
use as the output, and which one you hold still.
 They have higher gear ratios.

 They are popular for automatic transmissions in automobiles.

 They are also used for power train between internal combustion
engine and an electric motor
 Design of Compound Gear Drive

• Design a compound gear train for an exact train ratio

of 180:1. Find the combination of gears that will give
that ratio (specify the number of teeth).
Non circular gears
Non circular gears
Non circular gears
Non circular gears