In helicopter applications, the two-piece gear is typically joined by welding, bolts, or splines. In the case of the U.S. Army CH-47D Chinook helicopter, a decision was made to eliminate these joints through the use of integral design. Integral shaft spiral bevel gears must be designed such that the shaft does not interfere with gear tooth cutting and grinding. This paper discusses techniques to iterate in the design stage before manufacturing begins.

Contrary to what appears to be popular belief, 5-axis CNC gear manufacturing is not limited to milling with end mill, ball mill or CoSIMT (Conical Side Milling Tool — it is the generic form of the Sandvik InvoMill and Gleason UpGear tools.) tools, where throughput is too low to prevent production at any significant level. Straight and spiral bevel gear manufacturing on 5-axis CNC machines using face mill cutters provides essentially the same throughput as conventional gear cutting machines — with added benefits.

The geometry of the bevel gear is quite complicated to describe mathematically, and much of the overall surface topology of the tooth flank is dependent on the machine settings and cutting method employed. AGMA 929-A06 — Calculation of Bevel Gear Top Land and Guidance on Cutter Edge Radius — lays out a practical approach for predicting the approximate top-land thicknesses at certain points of interest — regardless of the exact machine settings that will generate the tooth form. The points of interest that AGMA 929-A06 address consist of toe, mean, heel, and point of involute lengthwise curvature. The following method expands upon the concepts described in AGMA 929-A06 to allow the user to calculate not only the top-land thickness, but the more general case as well, i.e. — normal tooth thickness anywhere along the face and profile of the bevel gear tooth. This method does not rely on any additional machine settings; only basic geometry of the cutter, blank, and teeth are required to calculate fairly accurate tooth thicknesses. The tooth thicknesses are then transformed into a point cloud describing both the convex and concave flanks in a global, Cartesian coordinate system. These points can be utilized in any modern computer-aided design software package to assist in the generation of a 3D solid model; all pertinent tooth macrogeometry can be closely simulated using this technique. A case study will be presented evaluating the accuracy of the point cloud data compared to a physical part.

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.

Recent advances in spiral bevel gear geometry and finite element technology make it practical to conduct a structural analysis and analytically roll the gear set through mesh. With the advent of user-specific programming linked to 3-D solid modelers and mesh generators, model generation has become greatly automated. Contact algorithms available in general purpose finite element codes eliminate the need for the use and alignment of gap elements. Once the gear set it placed in mesh, user subroutines attached to the FE code easily roll it through mesh. The method is described in detail. Preliminary result for a gear set segment showing the progression of the contact line load is given as the gears roll through mesh.

Optimization is applied to the design of a spiral bevel gear reduction for maximum life at a given size. A modified feasible directions search algorithm permits a wide variety of inequality constraints and exact design requirements to be met with low sensitivity to initial values. Gear tooth bending strength and minimum contact ration under load are included in the active constraints. The optimal design of the spiral bevel gear reduction includes the selection of bearing and shaft proportions in addition to gear mesh parameters. System life is maximized subject to a fixed back-cone distance of the spiral bevel gear set for a specified speed ratio, shaft angle, input torque and power. Significant parameters in the design are the spiral angle, the pressure angle, the numbers of teeth on the pinion and gear and the location and size of the four support bearings. Interpolated polynomials expand the discrete bearing properties and proportions into continuous variables for gradient optimization. After finding the continuous optimum, a designer can analyze near-optimal designs for comparison and selection. Design examples show the influence of the bearing lives on the gear parameters in the optimal configurations. For a fixed back-cone distance, optimal designs with larger shaft angles have larger service lives.

Could the tip chamfer that manufacturing people usually use on the tips of gear teeth be the cause of vibration in the gear set? The set in question is spur, of 2.25 DP, with 20 degrees pressure angle. The pinion has 14 teeth and the mating gear, 63 teeth. The pinion turns at 535 rpm maximum. Could a chamfer a little over 1/64" cause a vibration problem?

An analytical method is presented to predict the shifts of the contact ellipses on spiral bevel gear teeth under load. The contact ellipse shift is the motion of the point to its location under load. The shifts are due to the elastic motions of the gear and pinion supporting shafts and bearings. The calculations include the elastic deflections of the gear shafts and the deflections of the four shaft bearings. The method assumes that the surface curvature of each tooth is constant near the unloaded pitch point. Results from these calculations will help designers reduce transmission weight without seriously reducing transmission performance.

CNC technology offers new opportunities for the manufacture of bevel gears. While traditionally the purchase of a specific machine at the same time determined a particular production system, CNC technology permits the processing of bevel gears using a wide variety of methods. The ideological dispute between "tapered tooth or parallel depth tooth" and "single indexing or continuous indexing" no longer leads to an irreversible fundamental decision. The systems have instead become penetrable, and with existing CNC machines, it is possible to select this or that system according to factual considerations at a later date.

There are different types of spiral bevel gears, based on the methods of generation of gear-tooth surfaces. A few notable ones are the Gleason's gearing, the Klingelnberg's Palloid System, and the Klingelnberg's and Oerlikon's Cyclo Palliod System. The design of each type of spiral bevel gear depends on the method of generation used. It is based on specified and detailed directions which have been worked out by the mentioned companies. However, there are some general aspects, such as the concepts of pitch cones, generating gear, and conditions of force transmissions that are common for all types of spiral bevel gears.