Gear Technology’s annual State-of-
the-Gear-Industry survey polls gear manufacturers about the latest trends and opinions relating to the overall health of the gear industry. As in years
past, the survey was conducted anonymously, with invitations sent by e-mail to gear manufacturing companies
around the world.
If you are like most navigators of the printed page, the first thing you read in this final 2013 issue of Gear Technology was our State of the Gear
Industry Survey. And who would blame you? It’s not Sabermetrics, but once you’ve read it you’ll have a pretty
clear snapshot of last year and a peek
into the next. But if you also like to get a little closer to the bone about things, what follows are the collected opinions of five well-regarded people in the gear industry speaking to a number of issues with relevance.
When it comes to purchasing gear lubricants, many people on both the sales and purchasing side decide to play the numbers game. The person with the most numbers, or the biggest numbers, or the lowest numbers, must have the best product - right? Wrong; gear oil selection is not a game, and numbers alone cannot determine the right product for an application.
In today’s globalized manufacturing, all industrial products having dimensional constraints must undergo conformity specifications assessments on a regular basis. Consequently, (standardization) associated with GD&T (geometrical dimensioning and tolerancing) should be un-ambiguous and based on common, accepted rules. Of course gears - and their mechanical assemblies - are special items, widely present in industrial applications where
energy conversion and power transmission are involved.
If you've been following this space with any regularity, you know that grassroots efforts among industry and academia are springing up around the
country to help win the hearts, minds and talents of young people in nudging them towards a career in manufacturing. Add another partnership to the list.