This time I did look on thingiverse first and there are loads of people that have published tools to make gears, but still, I really do feel the best way to learn is to do it yourself. It is not about re-inventing wheels (or gears) which I do a lot anyway, it is more about the process of understanding it by doing it. Published on thingiverse...
I ended up making a simple library to make the shape for involute gears. It is pretty simple, the shape of the gear is like the shape that would be made if you had a bit if string attached to the circle and unwound it. There it a great animation on that wikipedia site.
I had to take it further, of course. A general purpose gear module with loads of options...
A simple gear...
With a spindle in the middle...
Or pretty much any combination of the above.
But I did not stop there - I made a nice gear example module. Allowing some interlocking gear examples...
And they work!
So more toys for my grandson to play with...
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