It wasn’t long ago that cylindrical gear chamfering and deburring was almost an afterthought. Now the process ranks as high in importance as hobbing, shaping and grinding. Seemingly every gear manufacturer, particularly those developing transmission gears for e-drive applications, recognizes that anything less than a flawless tooth flank can result in premature transmission failure, less-than-optimal efficiency, and unacceptable noise. Thus, generating a chamfer to precise customer specifications is critical to minimize the potential for sharp, brittle edges after heat treat; avoid edge load situations in the gearbox; and eliminate excessive stock and hardened burrs in the tooth flank prior to the hard finishing operations (conditions which can greatly diminish tool life).

The calculation program KISSsoft and its system add-on are used in a wide variety of applications: They are used for industrial gear units, the automotive industry, the energy sector, aerospace, shipping and numerous other special fields.

Amorphology Inc., a NASA spinoff company founded from technology developed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and the California Institute of Technology, has partnered with Additive Technologies (AddiTec), a founding partner of Meltio, an additive manufacturing company pioneering the development of affordable multi-metal 3D printing systems. Together, Amorphology and AddiTec are developing the additive manufacturing of multi-metal gear components for robotics.