gear generator?

Hey all,

I have access to a lasercutter, and one thing I'd like to play around with is to create some lasercut gears. does anyone know of any good/easy software i could use to generate basic gears in DXF or other vector format for use in a lasercutter?

also, i dont know much about gears, but i basically want two meshing circular gears. i'm not sure about the ratio, but i think 2:1 would be a good start. what is the best type of gear to use? spur? i dont want to get too complex. simple and robust is the idea here =)

what is a good minimum size i should keep in mind as well?

Hey Zach

I don't really know of any of the parameters that would be good to use for gear from the laser cutter, but I have been working in Autodesk Inventor 10 recently. If you can get your hands on the trial version, I think you'll be amazed at how easy it is to create any DXF file. All of the gear create menus etc. are completely intuitive.

Just as a side note to prove my point. All of the kids in my highshcool pre-engineering class had to learn how to use the software in order to pass, so I think you will be able to as well. hope that that endorsement helps!

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Jay

Uh, Zach...

[3dreplicators.com]

HeyHey

Thats pretty handy for a free piece of software. I mean, Its still nothing like autodesk, but I only get to use that because my school has it. Thats really helpful Forrest

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Jay

yo, sorry forrest. i knew you did that, but i couldnt find where it was.

can AoI export that 2D drawing to something like DXF? i guess i'll find out!

update: AoI doesnt export 2D formats

The code is in Java in the script and is pretty straightforward. It basically just draws a 2D outline of the gear. I don't know what the DXF file spec looks like, though.

I spent some time looking for code that I could buy before I wrote that script. The cheapest I could find at the time cost about $250. That's been some time ago, however.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/13/2008 07:44PM by Forrest Higgs.

Some info here that might be useful: [www.eng-tips.com]

Here's an extruded gear couple generator AOI script, Gear Couple at:
[members.axion.net]

It is a combination of Forrest's, Vik Olliver's and Francois Guillet's Involute Profile Gear script and Thomee Wright's Drill script. I haven't made a tutorial for it or an announcement because I've been concentrating on Export Slices, at:
[members.axion.net]

Since there is no tutorial, use Forrest's tutorial at:
[3dreplicators.com]

and good luck with the extra features

I wrote a program in C# that generates gears for Solidworks. The gear teeth are actual involute curves and the fillets are true trochoidal fillets that you would get from a cutter. The best reading on this is from Earle Buckingham. I'm currently working on transferring the program to java. I have some applets posted here that give dimensions for measing over rolls or measuring tooth span. Check it out.
[www.members.cox.net]