A gear is a kind of machine element in which teeth are cut around cylindrical or cone shaped surfaces with equal spacing. By meshing a pair of these elements, they are used to transmit rotations and forces from the driving shaft to the driven shaft. Gears can be classified by shape as involute, cycloidal and trochoidal gears. Also, they can be classified by shaft positions as parallel shaft gears, intersecting shaft gears, and non-parallel and non-intersecting shaft gears. The history of gears is old and the use of gears already appears in ancient Greece in B.C. in the writing of Archimedes.

A sample box of various types of gears Functions of a Gear Drive:

A gear drive has three main functions: to increase torque from the driving equipment (motor) to the driven equipment, to reduce the speed generated by the motor, and/or to change the direction of the rotating shafts. The connection of this equipment to the gear box can be accomplished by the use of couplings, belts, chains, or through hollow shaft connections.

Speed and torque are inversely and proportionately related when power is held constant. Therefore, as speed decreases, torque increases at the same ratio.

The heart of a gear drive is obviously the gears within it. Gears operate in pairs, engaging one another to transmit power.

Spur Gear

Spur gears transmit power through shafts that are parallel. The teeth of the spur gears are parallel to the shaft axis. This causes the gears to produce radial reaction loads on the shaft, but not axial loads. Spur gears tend to be noisier than helical gears because they operate with a single line of contact between teeth.  While the teeth are rolling through mesh, they roll off of contact with one tooth and accelerate to contact with the next tooth.  This is different than helical gears, which have more than one tooth in contact and transmit torque more smoothly.

Helical Gear

Helical gears have teeth that are oriented at an angle to the shaft, unlike spur gears which are parallel. This causes more than one tooth to be in contact during operation and helical gears are capable of carrying more load than spur gears. Due to the load sharing between teeth, this arrangement also allows helical gears to operate smoother and quieter than spur gears. Helical gears produce a thrust load during operation which needs to be considered when they are used. Most enclosed gear drives use helical gears.

Double Helical Gear

Double helical gears are a variation of helical gears in which two helical faces are placed next to each other with a gap separating them.  Each face has identical, but opposite, helix angles. Employing a double helical set of gears eliminates thrust loads and offers the possibility of even greater tooth overlap and smoother operation. Like the helical gear, double helical gears are commonly used in enclosed gear drives.

Herringbone Gear

Herringbone gears are very similar to the double helical gear, but they do not have a gap separating the two helical faces. Herringbone gears are typically smaller than the comparable double helical, and are ideally suited for high shock and vibration applications. Herringbone gearing is not used very often due to their manufacturing difficulties and high cost.

Bevel Gear

Bevel gears are most commonly used to transmit power between shafts that intersect at a 90 degree angle. They are used in applications where a right angle gear drive is required. Bevel gears are generally more costly and are not able to transmit as much torque, per size, as a parallel shaft arrangement.

Worm Gear

Worm gears transmit power through right angles on non-intersecting shafts. Worm gears produce thrust load and are good for high shock load applications but offer very low efficiency in comparison to the other gears. Due to this low efficiency, they are often used in lower horsepower applications.

Hypoid Gear

Hypoid gears look very much like a spiral bevel gear but they operate on shafts which do not intersect, which is the case with a spiral bevel gear. In the hypoid arrangement because the pinion is set on a different plane than the gear, the shafts are supported by the bearings on either end of the shaft.