[advertisement]

Bringing the Shop Floor to the Head of the Class

A conversation with Lance Brown

Lance Brown spent 28 years at CGI, Inc.—a Carson City, Nevada-based manufacturer of precision drive systems founded in 1967 and best known for its work in medical robotics and aerospace, now part of The Timken Company—working his way from the shop floor into design engineering and tackling gear problems across some of the most demanding industries in the world. Now, as MPMA’s first Senior Technical Instructor, he’s channeling that experience into a growing education program at a pivotal moment for the organization. We sat down with Brown to talk about the career that got him here, what he’s seeing in the classroom, and where MPMA’s training offerings are headed next.

The Edge of Efficiency

Atlanta Gear Works receives grinding wheel assist from Weiler Abrasives

Single-Flank Testing for Modern Gear Production

Detecting gear manufacturing deviations through advanced single-flank testing

[advertisement]

Technical Articles

Water Spray Quenching—A New Intensive Quenching Process for Case Hardening of Gears

Water spray quenching achieves heat transfer coefficients up to 4,000 W/(m²K)—nearly double conventional oil quenching rates—enabling potential material substitution and tailored quench intensity for complex gear components.

.

Smart Alloying Eliminates Manufacturing Steps in Automotive Gears

20NiMo9-7 alloy achieves up to 48 percent higher fatigue strength than conventional carburizing steels in the as-carburized condition, eliminating the need for shot peening and grinding in automotive gear applications.

.

The Intrinsic Pitch Cones in Hypoid Gears

A method to calculate pitch cones for hypoid gears using macrogeometry parameters—similar to non-offset bevel gears—while accounting for the added complexity of hypoid offset, tooling, and cutting technology is explored in this paper.

.

Investigating the Effects of Wear, Lubrication and Material Pairing on the NVH Performance of Plastic Gears

This study systematically evaluates how material selection, progressive wear, and grease lubrication affect the noise, vibration, and harshness (NVH) performance of polymer gears, providing new insights for designing quieter, more optimized transmission systems.

.

[advertisement]

Design

As a community, we gear engineers collaborate and share ideas to progress our collective capability. Technology progresses based on our efforts, and we have seen solid advances in the performance of our products as they become quieter, cheaper, more efficient, and more power dense. The pages of this magazine (past and present editions) are filled with examples where talented engineers have dug deeper into a subject using a more precise approach to a particular area concerning gear performance. The implied belief is always that greater precision (complexity) in the calculations brings greater accuracy (alignment with reality).

Grinding

For the transmissions of electric vehicles to develop the desired high torque under all driving conditions, a very large gear ratio is needed, which requires high speeds. And to ensure sufficient momentum at all speeds and enable the driver to accelerate without shifting gears, the electric drive must achieve up to 15,000 rpm, which is about three times that of a typical combustion engine. This puts a lot of strain on the rotor shaft. The manufacturers of rotor shafts are thus facing new challenges, such as the significantly lower shape and position tolerances and the need for greater machining precision.

Inspection

On the surface, it may not seem like the gear inspection industry has changed much over the last few years. Shops still primarily use either machines that are dedicated solely to measuring gears, or multiuse Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMMs). And regardless of which machine they use, software serves as the backbone that supports their many diverse sensors.

Heat Treating

The roots of heat-treating run deep within ASM (American Society for Materials) International, as its society was founded in Detroit in 1913 as The Steel Treaters Club. The heat-treating constituency of ASM created the Heat Treating Society (HTS) to provide focused leadership, communications, and service development to its network of worldwide membership of captive and commercial heat treaters, equipment manufacturers, researchers, governments, and technicians. To discuss Heat Treat 2023, the 32nd annual HTS Conference and Exhibition, Gear
Technology took a moment to catch up with conference chair Andrew Banka, vice president of Airflow Sciences Corporation. Heat Treat 2023 is colocated with IMAT and Motion + Power Technology Expo in Detroit, October 17–19.

[Sponsored Content]

Videos

Kapp Niles ZP Series

Gear Profile Grinding Machine ZP 10 with automatic tool changer from Kapp Niles. The machine concept stands for maximum workpiece quality, flexibility and a long service life. The basic machines are equipped with a dresser, integrated measuring device, balancing unit and comprehensive software. The machines feature generously dimensioned rotary tables with electrical direct drive and large rotary table bores.

Industry News

In February, Teradyne Robotics A/S, a subsidiary of Teradyne Inc. took legal action in Germany against Elite Robots’ German subsidiary, Elite Robots Deutschland GmbH for copyright infringement of Universal Robots’ software. The Regional Court of Hamburg issued a preliminary injunction against Elite Robots Germany.

Product News

Sandvik Coromant recently launched GC1240, the next-generation indexable milling grade engineered to overcome the toughest stainless steel machining challenges and deliver unwavering performance.

Calendar

Furnaces North America (FNA) 2026

Oct 12, 2026 - Oct 14, 2026

FNA (Indianapolis) is produced by the Metal Treating Institute (MTI) with media partner Heat Treat Today. The heat treat-only trade show and technical conference includes the latest products and technologies on industrial furnaces and ovens, atmosphere generation and control, quenching systems and quenchants, induction heating equipment, vacuum furnaces and pumps, heat treat software and controls and more

TPS (Turbomachinery & Pump Symposia) 2026

Sep 22, 2026 - Sep 24, 2026

WZL Gear Conference USA

Jul 15, 2026 - Jul 16, 2026

[advertisement]

Current Issue


Current Issue
Archives
Subscribe

Buyer's Guide

Cutting Tools Gear Blanks & Raw Material Gear Drives Gear Machines Gear Manufacturing Services Gears Grinding Wheels & Abrasive Tools Heat Treating Inspection Equipment Lubricants Machine Tools Resources Services Software Used Machinery Workholding & Toolholding

The Gear Industry Buyers Guide is your complete directory of suppliers in the gear industry, including great companies like these.


VIEW ALL