Gear manufacturers produce far more than traditionally shaped spur gears. Bevel gears, which are conically shaped and most often mounted on shafts that are 90 degrees apart, but can be designed to work at other angles as well, are one of the lesser-known gear types, but they’re an important type of gear with a number of potential applications.
There are actually multiple categories of bevel gear, including:
- Straight bevel gears, with a conical pitch surface and straight, tapering teeth are mounted on shafts that are perpendicular to each other and also in the same plane.
- Spiral bevel gears, which have curved teeth seated at an angle that allows for gradual tooth contact, similar to helical gears, are mounted on shafts that are perpendicular to each other and also in the same plane
- Zerol bevel gears, which are spiral bevels with a spiral angle equal to zero.
- Hypoid bevel gears, which are related to spiral bevel gears, but the mating gears axes do not intersect. Hypoid Bevels have a hyperbolic pitch surfaces, rather than conical surfaces.
- Mitre gears are a type of bevel gears that have equal numbers of teeth, with perpendicular shafts are positioned at right angles from each other.
Applications
So what are bevel gears used for?
You’ll find bevel gears in a number of everyday items, devices, and machines, including automobiles, printing presses, power plants, cooling towers, marine applications, steel plants, and railway track inspection machines.
They’re commonly used in differential drives, which are capable of transmitting power to two axles that spin at different speeds (and are perfect for automobiles). They’re also used as the main driving action in hand drills, since the handle of the drill spins in a vertical direction to translate force to a horizontal rotation. You’ll also find spiral bevel gears as important components in rotorcraft drive systems, which need to operate at high loads and high speeds.
The main advantages of bevel gears are their ability to change operating angle, as well as mechanical advantage (by increasing or decreasing the ratio of teeth between the drive and accompanying wheels). However, wheels can only work with their intended counterparts, and they must be precisely mounted to work properly.
Bevel gears are an uncommonly recognized yet highly important gear in our modern world. For more information on bevel gears, or to place an order, make sure to contact Federal Gear today!