Plastic - Articles - Page 6 | Gear Technology Magazine

The turbines are still spinning. They’re spinning on large wind farms in the Great Plains, offshore in the Atlantic and even underwater where strong tidal currents offer new energy solutions. These turbines spin regularly while politicians and policy makers— tied up in discussions on tax incentives, economic recovery and a lot of finger pointing—sit idle. Much like the auto and aerospace industries of years past, renewable energy is coping with its own set of growing pains. Analysts still feel confident that clean energy will play a significant role in the future of manufacturing—it’s just not going to play the role envisioned four to five years ago.

The Relative Performance of Spur Gears Manufactured from Steel and PEEK

March 1, 2012

This paper seeks to compare the data generated from test rig shaft encoders and torque transducers when using steel-steel, steel-plastic and plastic-plastic gear combinations in order to understand the differences in performance of steel and plastic gears.

The Plastic Gear Pay-Off

March 1, 2012

Matthew Jaster

Eliminating noise, weight and wear proves valuable in 2012.

Load-Sharing Model for Polymer Cylindrical Gears

November 1, 2011

This paper presents an original method to compute the loaded mechanical behavior of polymer gears. Polymer gears can be used without lubricant, have quieter mesh, are more resistant to corrosion, and are lighter in weight. Therefore their application fields are continually increasing. Nevertheless, the mechanical behavior of polymer materials is very complex because it depends on time, history of displacement and temperature. In addition, for several polymers, humidity is another factor to be taken into account. The particular case of polyamide 6.6 is studied in this paper.