FIRM GRIP Pin gear drive units replace conventional gear rack systems
Engineering solutions provider BMG’s comprehensive range of Tsubaki power transmission components encompasses pin gear drive units that replace conventional gear rack systems, with typical applications being in rotary kilns, casting lines, drives for large transporters, handling robots and pallet changers of machine tools.
“Tsubaki standard series (steel) and the S series (stainless steel) pin gear drive units are a combination of a pin structure wheel/rack and a sprocket with a special high strength tooth profile that engages continually and smoothly with the rollers. This feature allows greater freedom when designing rotating or linear drive units. Another advantage is the high pin wheel/rack balance, which offers greater transmission torque,” says BMG power transmission business unit manager Carlo Beukes.
These units are used in environmental sanitation equipment, railroad turntables, welding roll overs and in revolving door mechanisms.
“BMG’s Tsubaki pin gear drive units, which have a separable segment design to ensure easy installation, can be used in large scale equipment, by increasing the number of segments required for each application. In a rotational drive, the pin wheel diameter is extended by increasing the number of pins and in a linear drive, the pin rack length is determined by the number of pins used.”
These pin gear drive units can be surface coated for additional protection and teeth are hardened to improve strength and wear resistance. Blackening enhances the appearance of these units and protects against corrosion. Electroless nickel plating (NEP) offers corrosion and wear resistance and Tsubaki NEP treatment has rust and weather resistant characteristics.
In the standard series, lock type pin gears have a friction fastening mechanism for easy phase adjustment. Units, with only two-thirds, or half, the standard amount of backlash, are also available. This feature improves stopping accuracy where necessary.
Tsubaki has published an easy-to-follow procedure guide to ensure the correct pre-selection of the pitch circle diameter of the pin gear drive unit. This guide offers critical information on how to calculate applied and tangential loads and how to select the correct frame number of the unit required. This guide also includes correct installation procedures.
This range has been designed for easy installation – even with rough installation precision. Projections on the pin wheel frame share the same centres as the roller mounting holes, so projections can be used as a reference surface for centring when fitting the pin wheel into the pilot section on the equipment.
In pin racks, it is critical to ensure the parallelism of the equipment side mounting reference surface and that the pin gear centre is equal to, or less than, the indicated value of the gear centre parallelism as set out in the Tsubaki guide. This is achieved by ensuring the machine is correctly aligned.
The complete range of Tsubaki power transmission components is available from BMG’s national branch network.