Rapid prototyping and manufacturing technology applied to the forming of spherical gear sets with skew axes

摘要

This paper proposes a systematic method to design and synthesize spherical gear sets in space. Based on the kinematics of spherical mechanisms, a parametric mathematical model for spherical gear sets with skew axes is presented and a computer solid-model for spherical gears is designed and formed. Using the gear solid-model database, non-ambiguous data set descriptions of rapid prototyping and manufacturing (RP&M) machines have been generated. A design example is presented to demonstrate RP&M procedures for the surface generating of a complex spherical gear set with skew axes. The result of this work can be of crucial benefit in research in new gear types and industrial development. In this paper, important detail techniques are also proposed for the solid-models of CAD/CAM systems, describing how they can be converted successfully into the RP&M (SL) system, and built up gear set models.