Scientific American Supplement, No. 470, January 3, 1885Various
Science
Scientific American Supplement, No. 470, January 3, 1885
Various
Science -- Periodicals
Of the same general nature is the combination known as the "Epicycloidal
Multiplying Gear" of Elihu Galloway, represented in Fig. 39. Upon
examination it will be seen, although we are not aware that attention has
previously been called to the fact, that this differs from the ordinary
forms of "pin gearing" only in this particular, viz., that the elementary
tooth of the driver consists of a complete branch, instead of a
comparatively small part of the hypocycloid traced by rolling the smaller
pitch-circle within the larger. It is self-evident that the hypocycloid
must return into itself at the point of beginning, without crossing: each
branch, then, must subtend an aliquot part of the circumference, and can
be traced also by another and a smaller describing circle, whose diameter
therefore must be an aliquot part of the diameter of the outer
pitch-circle; and since this last must be equal to the sum of the
diameters of the two describing circles, it follows that the radii of the
pitch circles must be to each other in the ratio of two successive
integers; and this is also the ratio of the number of pins to that of the
epicycloidal branches.
Thus in Fig. 39, the diameters of the two pitch circles are to each other
as 4 to 5; the hypocycloid has 5 branches, and 4 pins are used. These pins
must in practice have a sensible diameter, and in order to reduce the
friction this diameter is made large, and the pins themselves are in the
form of rollers. The original hypocycloid is shown in dotted line, the
working curve being at a constant normal distance from it equal to the
radius of the roller; this forms a sort of frame or yoke, which is hung
upon cranks as in Figs. 36 and 38. The expression for the velocity ratio
is the same as in the preceding case:
V¹ = v'(1 - f/F); which in Fig. 39 gives
V¹ = v'(1 - 5/4)= -¼v':
the planet wheel, or epicycloidal yoke, then, has the higher speed, so
that if it be desired to "gear up," and drive the propeller faster than
the engine goes (and this, we believe, was the purpose of the inventor),
the pin-wheel must be made the driver; which is the reverse of
advantageous in respect to the relative amounts of approaching and
receding action.
In Figs. 40 and 41 are given the skeletons of Galloway's device for ratios
of 3:4 and 2:3 respectively, the former having four branches and three
pins, the latter three branches and two pins. Following the analogy, it
would seem that the next step should be to employ two branches with only
one pin; but the rectilinear hypocycloid of Fig. 38 is a complete
diameter, and the second branch is identical with the first; the straight
tooth, then, could theoretically drive the pin half way round, but upon
its reaching the center of the outer wheel, the driving action would
cease: this renders it necessary to employ two pins and two slots, but it
is not essential that the latter should be perpendicular to each other.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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