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Sustainable Rotor Shaft Manufacturing

The automotive industry and its suppliers are undergoing profound structural change. Electrification, volatile markets and geopolitical instability, along with increasingly intense global competition, are creating high costs and innovation pressures across the entire value chain. These developments not only affect the general drivetrain components but also rotor shafts for electric motors, which combine high functional density with demanding manufacturing and quality requirements. Recent restructuring efforts, plant closures and bankruptcies have highlighted the need to critically reassess existing manufacturing concepts, especially for components such as rotor shafts with integrated functional elements. For automotive suppliers, technological capability and cost efficiency are no longer the only priorities; process robustness and investment security are increasingly moving into focus. New manufacturing solutions must not only be technically convincing, but also enable a substantial reduction in manufacturing costs, energy consumption, the associated CO2 emissions and process complexity (Refs. 1,2).

Strain Wave Gear Production in the Age of Humanoid Robots

Humanoid robots need precise strain wave gears in their joints, and building and inspecting those gears at scale will call for equally advanced production technology

Perceive, Understand & Perform

AICA and Schaeffler demonstrate the role Physical AI can play in the manufacturing environment

The Near Future of Mechanical Drive for Humanoid Robots

AI has moved humanoid robots forward, but safety, reliability and cost in the actuator drivetrain still stand in the way of commercial deployment

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Technical Articles

Root Interference

This excerpt from Gear Technology Solutions explains how oversized cutter blade edge radii cause root interference in bevel gears, and how to select correct radii to avoid noise, flank damage, and tooth fracture.

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Design Principles of Bevel Gears: Rationale for Zero Sum Profile Shifts and Generating Gear Choices

This article demonstrates why bevel gears are designed with a zero sum of profile shifts—showing that independent shifts merely replicate what a modified pressure angle already achieves—and explains the practical benefits of using conical generating gears for tooth profile crowning.

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Analytical Calculation of the Gear Body Stiffness of Face Gears

This paper presents a new analytical method using plate and disk mechanical models to calculate the gear body stiffness of face gear wheels, showing that stiffness decreases toward the outer radius—a behavior that conventional cylindrical gear approaches fail to capture.

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Design and Load Capacity of Crown Gears in Comparison to Bevel Gears

Through loaded tooth contact analysis of two applications, this paper demonstrates that crown gears can match bevel gear load capacity while offering meaningful advantages in weight reduction, axial-force-free pinion mounting, and assembly simplicity.

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Design

In modern automotive vehicles, gear noise becomes more and more of an issue. The main reason is the reduced masking noise of the engine, which vanishes completely in the case of an electric driveline. Improved gear quality unfortunately does not correlate with a better noise performance in any case. High gear quality makes sure that the gear flanks are inside tight tolerances and that all teeth are nearly identical. Even if the running behavior of such gear sets shows a very low sound pressure level, the noise perception for human ears may be annoying.

Grinding

The trend towards hard fine finishing of gears for automotive transmissions is accelerating. In recent years, the focus has been on increasing the efficiency of gears in order to make optimum use of the narrow gear ratio range, gear by gear, and to reduce fuel consumption. Surface finish, in particular, is under increased scrutiny since it plays such a decisive role in achieving the noise and efficiency requirements of gear units for today’s EV applications.

Inspection

Different component characteristics in electric vehicles lead to higher noise and load requirements in the automotive industry. E-mobility—to a certain degree—is changing how gear analysis and inspection is carried out. Dissecting noise issues in gears and gearboxes requires an analytical approach like a detective. The problem could stem from the design itself, tolerancing or tip/root relief issues, tooth flank form deviations like waviness or perhaps crowning issues that directly impact noise. Every aspect of gear production needs to be examined to provide the most accurate results.

Heat Treating

Various in-situ methods can track realtime heat treatment response in bulk materials. This can aid material engineers in designing the most effective heat treatment procedures and processing methods. In-situ  methods such as thermogravimetry (TG), differential thermal analysis (DTA), and dilatometry, offer capabilities to examine heat treatment behavior in real time, giving insight into the thermochemical mechanisms and the thermal behavior of steel.

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Videos

Grob Showcases Gear Ring Production with Power Skiving

The Grob G750T boasts efficient machining for gear rings by offering precise and efficient power skiving and seamless integration of milling and turning for maximum flexibility and productivity.

Industry News

CMC, provider of integrated intermodal solutions in the U.S., and WorkforceLinc, workforce development division of Lincoln Educational Services Corp., are expanding their intermodal technician training program to the Port of Baltimore. 

Product News

Universal Robots (UR), a Teradyne Robotics company, introduced Gen 7, its seventh-generation collaborative robot platform, at IMTS 2026 in Chicago. Gen 7 has a redesigned control box, teach pendant and tool flange and runs on the company's PolyScope X operating system. It is designed to support AI-based applications such as vision guidance and force-sensitive assembly on the production floor.

Calendar

AIoT World Expo

Feb 9, 2027 - Feb 11, 2027

The AIoT World Expo (Ft. Lauderdale, FL) explores the potential of intelligent machines, prescriptive analytics, sensor driven analytics and block chain solutions. Attendees learn about IoT technologies that are driving the transformation in manufacturing, supply chain and operations.

Additive Manufacturing Strategies 2027

Feb 23, 2027 - Feb 25, 2027

CES 2027

Jan 6, 2027 - Jan 9, 2027

PowerGen 2027

Jan 18, 2027 - Jan 21, 2027

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