This paper introduces mandatory improvements in design, manufacturing and inspection - from material elaboration to final machining - with special focus on today's large and powerful gearing.
The large gears found in mining, steel, construction, off-road, marine and energy applications—massive and
robust in nature—need to tackle the greatest production demands. This, in turn, means that a special emphasis must be put on the heat treating methods used to increase the wear resistance and strength properties of gears this size.
In the wide, wide world of moving
parts, the gears required for the big
jobs—the really big jobs—often experience big problems. Proper lubrication of these gears is paramount in industrial applications such as wind turbines, kilns, sugar mills, crushers, heavy construction, offshore drilling rigs, mining and quarrying.
In this article, the authors calculated the numerical coordinates on the tooth surfaces of spiral bevel gears and then modeled the tooth profiles using a 3-D CAD system. They then manufactured the
large-sized spiral bevel gears based on a CAM process using multi-axis control and multi-tasking machine tooling. The
real tooth surfaces were measured using a coordinate measuring machine and the tooth flank form errors were detected
using the measured coordinates. Moreover, the gears were meshed with each other and the tooth contact patterns were investigated. As a result, the validity of this manufacturing method was confirmed.