Wooden Gears

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Gill

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In theory, it ought to be possible to devise some sort of jig to cut wooden gears rather than cutting each tooth individually. Can anyone suggest how this might be done?

Gill
 
I knew a clockmaker (unfortunately long gone) that had made is own jig to cut gear wheels for the clocks he constructed. It was a large steel round plate with lots of holes all around the circumference.

It most probably was an engineering feat requiring great skills?
 
The two main things you will need are:

1, Some form of dividing head - a method of rotationg the gear blank a set amount, each increment will be one gear tooth. These are easily available from model engineering suppliesbut you could make something up with a 360degree protractor, center pivot and some method of locking the work at intervals.

2, A method of moving a gear tooth cutter across the edge of the blank or advancing the blank into the cutter, something usually done on a milling machine but could be sorted on a router table.

Depending on the size of the gear you could get away with a scroll saw and a bit of fettling if the mesh is not too critical, print out a template on the computer and stick it to the wood.

Jason
 
I have seen a jig (plans for and explanation of )for cutting wooden gears on I think, a table saw. But unfortunately Im "running" for a train and havent got time now to dig the thing out. If you havent found it by time I get back Ill have a look for it. However if you google for wooden marble runs thats where I found it. I have a feeling that the site I saw it on was set up by a chap called Mattias if that helps. Sorry I cant help more at the moment.
 
Great ideas, guys! That Matthias Wandel is quite an innovative woodworker.

I think I can see how to cut gears now without too much effort. If I can translate the concept in my head into reality, I'll post a piccy. Expect the jig to look quite different to Mr Wandel's :? :wink: :) .

Gill
 
You could mount the timber in some sort of router lathe :D and using some sort of indexing cog run a dovetail cutter up the lenght of turned timber . you could then cut these down as cogs to any size you like . The draw back to this is the teeth would be end grain and probably break off and the other thing is i dont know where you would get a router lathe with an indexing cog and allow you to run the router freely over the work in a very precise way :whistle:
 
No good using a dovetail cutter, you want the bottom of the groove narrower than the top, one of these would be better. The angle needs to change in proportion to the diameter of cog & number of teeth as well.

BTW do you know anyone with the sort of route set up you describe :wink:

Jason
 
Sorry your right i got my angles wrong :oops:
As for somebody making such a route set up as i said theres no chance ! It would need to be a product so robust it could handle the max revs of a fully loaded router and be able to be so precise on all axis that it could handle the smallest and the largest of projects .
You would need spindles , cogs , wheels, adjustable beds , indexing facilitys and template following cababilities for such a thing .
Also if such a thing was available to the general public at http://www.woodworkersworkshop.co.uk/ it would need a turning facility and a linier moulding facility . Oh well we can only dream about such an invention eh \:D/
 
Thats cheating ! Thats an engineering tool not a wood working tool :lol:
Bloody good gloat though ! Bet Scrit hasnt got one of them .................. No , he probably has :D
 
:shock:

Blimey, guys - overkill or what?! This is Gill with her Kity dominated workshop we're talking about here :lol: .

I was thinking more along the lines of fixing a pin to a sled that could travel down my bandsaw mitre track. The pin would be directly in line with the blade and I could mount a wheel on it. By turning the wheel a fraction and using a fixed index guide, I could make repeat cuts on the bandsaw which could then accept slivers of wood which would make teeth.

I hope that description's understandable. As I said earlier, I'll post a piccy if the jig proves to be successful.

Gill
 
What are you going to do with these gears, Gill?

I have stuck gear patterns on to wood and cut them out on the scroll saw. Not accurate enough for a clock but good enough for the odd toy.

Andy
 
Hi
Does anyone remember seeing a Ben Huggins program where he showed a large wooden door with a big gear driven lock mechanism?
Looked like a bank vault door, I would love to get a pic or plans if anyone knows how.
regards
martin
 
How about an L-shaped device to hold a small router with the spindle axis parallel to the bench. Then mount the workpiece between two centres (again L-shaped) set so that the centre line of the router spindle is the same as the centre line of the workholder centres (which could be a simple as round nails filed to a point in the drill press). The indexing head could be made from a piece of plywood drilled to take dowels (detents) and the depth of cut controlled by the base plate of the router. There would need to be some way to centre the workpiece (turned dowel stock) in the centres, such as a turner's centre marker. The type of cutter possibly needs to be more like these. Alternatively maybe a Holzapfel lathe might do the trick :wink:

Scrit
 
mahking51":3s33jc87 said:
Hi
Does anyone remember seeing a Ben Huggins program where he showed a large wooden door with a big gear driven lock mechanism?
Looked like a bank vault door, I would love to get a pic or plans if anyone knows how.
regards
martin

I'm told that car boot sales are good for picking up some unusual items :)
 
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