Carving Wooden Gears and Parts for Clocks

[stoneinsc]

Has anyone had first hand experience with this form of carving?

I am considering buying a plan for a wooden gear clock, but was first interested in the potential success of this mission, before investing the money.

Thanx for any help or insights.

Dick

[gsrice]

I've been digging around the internet to see if it do able -- sounds like its possible --

here's the site with plans that may help --

http://www.wooden-gear-clocks.com/

Greg

[Digitalwoodshop]

There are some over on the Sawmill Creek website doing it with Laser Engravers with good luck.

Based on my experience cutting the FRP Plastic name tags with the 1/16 inch end mill I would believe that cutting clock gears is possible.

Saw a post on that here too I believe.

AL

[Kenm810]

stoneinsc,

If you do a forum search for Wooden gears,
you'll find several posts about carving wood gears
and a bit of info on wooden clock kits.

Wooden gear clock??? (http://forum.carvewright.com/showthread.php?t=4551&highlight=Wooden+gears)
Wooden Involute Gears (http://forum.carvewright.com/showthread.php?t=9075&highlight=Wooden+gears) (http://forum.carvewright.com/images/misc/multipage.gif 1 (http://forum.carvewright.com/showthread.php?t=9075&highlight=Wooden+gears) 2 (http://forum.carvewright.com/showthread.php?t=9075&page=2&highlight=Wooden+gears) 3 (http://forum.carvewright.com/showthread.php?t=9075&page=3&highlight=Wooden+gears) ... Last Page (http://forum.carvewright.com/showthread.php?t=9075&page=4&highlight=Wooden+gears))

[jpitz31]

I was going through the TurboCAD Deluxe manual the other day. They have a gear wizard built into their product. You specify your data about your gear size, teeth per inch etc and the software will lay out a gear for you.

Looked pretty interesting.

Joe

[rjustice]

One of the tough things about exporting out of a cad system, and translating into designer has been getting the scale back exactly to 1:1 with gear teeth this is going to be pretty important.

I am curious as to whether if you export the gear design (out of a cad system) to an STL file, then import it using the new STL converter, and be able to now lock and maintain scale from the original model. Seems that i read that the new converter maintains scale somewhere.

I think that this is very do-able

Happy carving,

Ron

[liquidguitars]

All 3D programs establish a word scale and its really up to the translator to find the correct scale relationship, for example Lightwave to Visual mill is 32 percent scale increase to make the project 1:1 " if i remember correctly" Maya 3d 80% and so on.. once you find the magic numbers your good..

Designer/STL lets you scale this relationship to translate correctly with any 3D object.

LG

[James RS]

Couldn't you include a 1inch square and use that when scaling

[liquidguitars]

James,

That would work but I use 4 blocks one on each corner, then measure the outsides that makes a "bounding box" around your scan. so as long as your bounding box measurement is used any part in that box will be 1:1 into Designer.

LG

[JLT]

Has anyone had first hand experience with this form of carving?

Dick,

Per Ken's (Ken810) earlier note, take a look at thread http://forum.carvewright.com/showthread.php?t=9075, particularly posts #43, #48, #49, and #63. Attached therein are some VB programs that generate gear profiles and the grasshopper escapement profile. (I've also created a ratchet profiler, and can make that available if you're interested. Furthermore, if you have another escapement profile in mind, let me know and I can probably drum up a variation of the VB program in quick order).

It's actually worthwhile to read that entire thread, as a couple of folks with mucho experience piped in along the way.

The prototype I put together is functional, although only for a few hours of run time. (I never locked the grasshopper escapement and pendulum in alignment, and they would slowly drift out of alignment while running, to the point where all of a sudden, the clock would race forward as the weight quickly dropped). Also, off of eBay, I bought a bunch of the 3/8" RC bearings to use on my next clock, as I felt that the nylon "bearings" in the prototype added too much drag.

I've yet to get back into tinkering with my next clock concept, though. (Was fighting QC issues, plus am in the process of finishing off an addition to the house). Bought the Rock chuck (thanks Ron!), the new rubber belts, and a couple of 1/16" cutting bits, so all I need now is time!

Jon