With this first installment we begin a series of randomly excerpted chapters from Dr. Hermann J. Stadtfeld's new book — Practical Gear Engineering.

Inspection of the cutting blades is an important step in the bevel gear manufacture. The proper blade geometry ensures that the desired gear tooth form can be achieved. The accuracy of the process can be compromised when the blade profile consists of several small sections such as protuberance, main profile, top relief and edge radius. Another common obstacle - are outliers which can be caused by dust particles, surface roughness and also floor vibrations during the data acquisition. This paper proposes the methods to improve the robustness of the inspection process in such cases.

One way to implement the growing performance requirements for transmissions is by optimizing the surface finish of the gearing. In addition to increasing the flank load capacity and the transmittable torque, this also allows for improvements in efficiency. On Oerlikon bevel gear grinding machines from Klingelnberg, fine grinding can be implemented efficiently in bevel gear production - even in an industrial serial process.

Large bevel gears drive the crushing machines used to process ores and minerals in the hard-rock mining and aggregates industries. This paper is intended to help the reader understand the unique aspects of these machines, and why crushing applications fall outside the traditional automotive paradigm for bevel gears.

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 theory behind the latest bevel gear cutting tools is explained in detail.

This paper analyzes the different influences of the deviations between nominal and actual geometry for a first-cut bevel gear. In each section, the customary tolerances are quantified and the possibilities to reduce them are discussed.

Deburring or chamfering of gear teeth is gaining attention in practical settings. And with a view to make the production sequence as efficient as possible, it is becoming increasingly important to be able to implement the deburring tasks directly on the cutting machine after spiral cutting.

UNIMILL is a milling method for the manufacture of prototype bevel gears using end mills or disk cutters.

The author compares the standard two-face blade technology with the three-face blade technology for manufacturing bevel gears.