Principles of Gear Inspection
Over the next few editions of this column, I’d like to provide an understanding of the principles of gear inspection as they apply to...
Like any problem, a heat-treating difficulty must be dissected into smaller parts
What follows is a true account in a captive heat treat facility with batch integral quench furnaces, one of which was carburizing without a...
Trend Talks: Tim Byrd
In college, I had a part time job promoting CEU’s (Continuing Education Units) for doctors and nurses. I would call a doctor’s office, tell...
Q&A with Bill Mark
What is your position at Penn State?
I’m with the applied research laboratory and graduate program in acoustics, and I’ve been here about 20 years....
Considering As-Heat Treated Grain Size
When reviewing and working to customer steel specifications, it seems to me that one of the most misused and misunderstood gear material requirements is...
Pitch and Pressure-Angle Changes
The engineer has the responsibility for the design of an involute gear set, and the tools that are used to cut the teeth in...
From smaller cold-formed steel, gears can be cold pressed into the final shape and...
All gears begin their lives as a forging, casting, hot-rolled bar, billet, powder metal, and, most recently, directly from 3D printing (additive manufacturing). Depending...
Trend Talks: Tim Byrd
I’m at the AGMA Basic Gear Training class in Chicago, talking to Robert Hamilton of Hamilton’s Industrial Machine Shop, located in Kingston, Jamaica. We’re...
Q&A with Bob Lowe
What is a control system integrator?
Control system integrators design and implement sophisticated control systems for manufacturing and industrial facilities. Using their knowledge of engineering,...
Dealing with ‘Ghost Signals’
During my time in the nondestructive testing field, I have experienced one anomaly continually arise while performing specific ultrasonic examinations of forgings. I’m speaking...
Using the Proper Computational Tool
As a practical matter, audible gear noise is subject to a tortuous path from the gear mesh to the ear. From a meshing gear...
Carburizing, quenching PM gears
Powder metallurgy has been around for hundreds of years, but has only been used for commercialized applications within the last 50 years. And like...
Q&A with Stefan Scherbarth
I’ve heard a great deal of buzz about InvoMilling™. How did the idea come about?
I was visiting a big machine tool maker in Germany,...
Q&A with Brian Richardson
Tell me about the origins of the Brevini Group.
On the road from Bologna, Italy to the city of Reggio Emilia, there is a scattering...
Q&A with Scott Richards
James Engineering specializes in deburring machines. A number of gear manufacturers are still hand deburring their products, aren’t they?
I’m working with one right now—a...
Why is the Center in Tension?
Consider that each ring segment has the same volumetric expansion. Next, take the mid-wall circumference and multiply that by the volumetric expansion resulting from...
All-Steel Hypoid Gears
In comparison, worm gear drives use softer, bronze gearing, which shortens service life, and they operate at efficiencies that decline as ratio increases. Hypoid-gearing...
A look at controlled rotation systems
Driverless technology, in its fundamental form, already exists in academia and private consortiums. The basic components are here: GPS can track and sense a...
Proper cooling is paramount
In higher-alloy material, such as precipitation hardening steels (PH), hardening requires a two-step application—one of removing heat by quenching followed by adding heat to...
Q&A with Jack Nowlin
What does C-B Gear specialize in?
We started business in 1952 as a job shop, doing mostly replacement gears, and we’ve been providing the industry...
