Types of Gear Trains

• Simple gear train

• Compound gear train
• Planetary gear train
 Gears
Simple Gear Train
• Multiple gears can be connected together to form a gear train.

Each shaft carries only one

gear wheel.

Intermediate gears are known as

Idler Gears.

The idle gears are used for the following two purposes:
1. To connect gears where a large centre distance is required, and
2. To obtain the desired direction of motion of the driven gear (i.e. clockwise
or anticlockwise).
 Sometimes, the distance between the two gears is large. The motion from
one gear to another, in such a case, may be transmitted by either of the
following two methods :
1. By providing the large sized gear, or
2. By providing one or more intermediate gears.

Odd number Even number

For odd number

Gear Ratio
Gears

• Generally, the Gear Ratio is calculated by

counting the teeth of the two gears, and
applying the following formula:

Gear ratio = Number of teeth on driven gear

Number of teeth on driver gear
 Gears
Gear Ratio - Calculation

A 100 tooth gear drives a 25 tooth

gear. Calculate the gear ratio for the
meshing teeth.

Gear ratio = Number of teeth on driven gear

Number of teeth on driver gear

Gear ratio = driven 25 = 1

driver 100 4
This is written as 1:4
 Gears
Compound Gear Train
If two gear wheels are mounted on a
common shaft then it’s a Compound
Gear train.
The advantage of a compound train over a simple gear train is that a much
larger speed reduction from the first shaft to the last shaft can be obtained with
small gears. If a simple gear train is used to give a large speed reduction, the last
gear has to be very large. Usually for a speed reduction in excess of 7 to 1, a
simple train is not used and a compound train or worm gearing is employed.
Coaxial input & output
shafts
 Reverted Gear train

The driver and driven axes

lies on the same line. These B
are used in speed reducers,
clocks and machine tools. A
C

nA NB  ND
GR   INPUT Compound Gears
nD N A  NC GEAR 'A'
GEAR 'B'
If R and N=Pitch circle radius
GEAR 'D'
& number of teeth of the gear GEAR 'C'
RA + RB = RC + RD
OUTPUT

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 Planetary Gear Train

 Planetary, or epicyclic
gear trains allow the axis
of some of the gears to
move relative to the other
axes
 Sun gear has fixed center
axis
 Planet gear has moving
center axis
 Planet carrier or arm
carries planet axis relative
to sun axis
 Allow for two degrees of
freedom (i.e. two inputs)
Fig. 13–30

Shigley’s Mechanical Engineering Design

 Epicycle Gear train

It is the system of epicyclic gears in which at least one wheel

axis itself revolves around another fixed axis.

19
 Planetary Gear Train…
• In this train, the blue gear has six times the diameter of
the yellow gear
• The size of the red gear is not important because it is just
there to reverse the direction of rotation
• In this gear system, the yellow gear (the sun) engages all
three red gears (the planets) simultaneously
• All three are attached to a plate (the planet carrier), and
they engage the inside of the blue gear (the ring) instead
of the outside.
 Planetary Gear Train…

• They have higher gear ratios.

• Less space
• Long gear life
• High power capacity
• Less backlash effect.
• They are popular for automatic transmissions in
automobiles.
• They are also used in bicycles for controlling power of
pedaling automatically or manually.
• They are also used for power train between internal
combustion engine and an electric motor
Velocity Ratios of Epicyclic Gear Train
y-0.6𝑥 = 0