Gear inspection has long been a highly specialized costly investment and an overall challenging part of the gear manufacturing process. Given that complicated gages, testers, and CNC equipment all go into creating high quality gears, companies may want to invest in a CMM to streamline inspection.

Shop floor inspection and gaging equipment is putting advanced metrology systems right on the factory floor. Here’s a collection of articles on shop floor inspection and gages from companies like Gleason, Mahr, Comtorgage, United Tool Supply and Frenco.

During the revision of ISO 1328-1:2013 Cylindrical gears — ISO system of flank tolerance classification, ISO Technical Committee TC 60 WG2 delegates discussed proposals that the standard should be modified to ensure that it is compatible with the ISO Geometrical Product Specification (GPS) series of standards (Refs. 1-3). This seems sensible because the gears are geometrical components, but after reviewing the implications, it was rejected because ISO TC 60 WG2 did not think the gear manufacturing industry was ready for such a radical change in measurement strategy. The feasibility of the implementation of gears into the GPS matrix of standards has been carried out and the results conclude that this is practical, provided some key issues related to measurement uncertainty and establishing appropriate KPIs are addressed.

PTB's two microgear measurement standards and their analyses using seven measurement methods which are then presented, evaluated and compared with each other.

A reader asks: We are currently revising our gear standards and tolerances and a few questions with the new standard AGMA 2002-C16 have risen. Firstly, the way to calculate the tooth thickness tolerance seems to need a "manufacturing profile shift coefficient" that isn't specified in the standard; neither is another standard referred to for this coefficient. This tolerance on tooth thickness is needed later to calculate the span width as well as the pin diameter. Furthermore, there seems to be no tolerancing on the major and minor diameters of a gear.

Klingelnberg presents the technical aspects of its roughness measurement system.

Gear noise is among the issues of greatest concern in today's modern gearboxes. Significant research has resulted in the application of enhancements in all phases of gear manufacturing, and the work is ongoing. With the introduction of Electric Vehicles (EV), research and development in this area has surged in recent years. Most importantly, powerful new noise analysis solutions are fast becoming available.

The secret to meeting today's inspection demands is influenced by the technology and those in charge of operating it.