Helical Gear

The Helical Gear node.

The Helical Gear group generates a spur gear with a helical twist.

Inputs

Module

The module for this gear.

Teeth

The number of teeth on the gear.

Pressure Angle

The pressure angle in degrees. A typical value is the default \(20^\circ\) but some gears may need a slight tweak. This value influences the shape of the gear flank.

Flank Resolution

This integer value sets the resolution of the sides of the gear cog. The default sets a reasonable default but set this lower if to control vertex count. Any large value may be reduced by distance merging in the implementation.

Depth

The thickness of the gear.

Hole Radius

The size of the center hole. This may be zero. The upper bound is constrained so the hole can’t be larger than the dedendum.

Half pitch rotation

All gears are created with a right side cog that straddles the X-axis. Checking this will rotate the gear a half a tooth thickness so that the root straddles the X-axis. This is convenient for meshing gears.

Angle

The angle, in degrees, specifed from \(90^\circ\) on the Z-axis. For two meshing helical gears the angle of the second gear must have the negated angle value of the first.

Left twist

Negates the Helix Angle for meshing gears.

Z Faces

The integer number of horizontal slices that form the resolution of the helix. The default is a reasonable value for \(20^\circ\) but you may need more for \(45^\circ\).

Outputs

Geometry

The generated gear geometry.

Ref. Pitch Radius

The reference pitch radius of the generated gear. This is useful for setting the distance between two meshed gears.

Teeth

For convenience, the number of teeth on this gear.

Examples

12 to 16 meshed helical gears.

This example is similar to the meshed spur but notice how with meshed helical gears, the second gear has a negative matching helix angle and an apposing twist.

Geometry node network for meshed helical gears.