T Th he e G Gl le ea as so on n S SP PI IR RO OF FO OR RM M

C Cu ut tt te er r S Sy ys st te em m



November 2000

The Gleason Works

1000 University Avenue
P. O. Box 22970
Rochester, New York 14692-2970
716-473-1000
- 3 -

The Gleason SPIROFORM

Cutter System
Dr. Hermann J. Stadtfeld
Vice President, Research & Development
The Gleason Works



1. Introduction
The new SPIROFORM

Cutter has stick type blades with a permanent front face and only
two surfaces that have to be resharpened. It solves the problem of face hobbing
(generating or Formate) a spiral bevel and hypoid flank surface identical to that using the
three face sharpened stick blade in an appropriate cutter head.






Figure 1: Different blade offsets
- 4 -

2. The Cutter System with Three Individually Sharpened Blade
Surfaces
Three face sharpened blades are known in face hobbing cutters from US Patent #
3,760,476. Those cutters may have three blades per blade group - one roughing or
bottom blade - one outside blade and one inside blade.



Figure 2: Effective offset angle is created by cutting velocity direction

The face hob cutter head has the following design specifications:
Slot Radius
Slot Offset
Number of Blade Groups
Blade Spacing
Built-In Hook Angle
Cutter Height



- 5 -



Figure 3: Zero effective hook angle by grinding the blade front face

There are some advantages of sharpening cutting edge side relief, clearance side relief
and front face.

A change of the cutting direction, as it happens for different job specifications, requires a
change in blade offset (Figure 1). A three side ground blade allows within some limits to
vary cutting direction (Figure 2) and effective hook angle (Figure 3 and Figure 4) without
any change in the cutter head. It is also possible to change the spacing between inside
and outside blade to some extent if the location of the front faces can be controlled
individually.

A disadvantage of the three-side ground blade is more complicated re-sharpening and
subsequently the removal of any coating on any of the three sides.

A coating of HSS or carbide blades is especially beneficial on the front face because of
the pressure and friction with hot chips.


- 6 -








Figure 4: Positive hook angle by grinding the blade front face



3. Cutter System with Two Individually-Sharpened Blade
Surfaces
If the cutter built-in offset angle is chosen in the middle of the possible variety of jobs,
then the blades built-in side rake angle accommodates the minimal deviation from the
optimal side rake. An optimal side rake angle is achieved if the effective offset and the
cutter built-in offset are identical (12

, the blade built-in side rake angle).

Only the cutting edge and clearance side - side relieves - are variable in their angle
relative to the blade shank which allows it to match them to different required offset
angles. In case of jobs on the two extreme ends of the spectrum; for example, the outer
blade has a higher side rake angle (e.g. 14), that makes the cutting edge sharper and
- 7 -

the inner blade has a lower side rake (e.g. 8), that makes the cutting edge duller (U.S.
Patent TRI-AC

). It has been proven that in case of a good choice of the cutter built-in
offset value, the compromise on the extreme ends of the job spectrum is negligible.

The cutter built-in hook angle is defined such that a 20 blade pressure angle, in
conjunction with the blade built-in side rake, provides a cutting edge with a zero effective
hook angle with respect to the motion direction.

In such a system, it is impossible to vary or control the hook angle individually. On the
other hand, the permanent geometry of the front face allows a permanent coating. Since
only the side reliefs are re-sharpened, the coating on the front face is not removed.

Due to re-sharpening, the cutting edge is moving down along the blade shank. The re-
sharpening removes the width of the worn coating, which results in a perfect fresh coating
on the front face along the new cutting edge.



4. Analysis of the Geometric Effects to the Flank Form by
Controlling the Front Face Orientation
The publications of Kotthaus ([1] and US Patent # 3,760,476) teach that maintaining a
sufficient side rake angle and especially to control the flank surface twist, the front face
has to be variable in two angular directions, the side rake angle and the hook angle. The
effective hook angle is the inclination around the normal radius (Figure 5) between the
cutting edge and the cutter head axis (Figure 4). The blade in Figure 4 is oriented such
that the relative cutting velocity vector lies in the presentation plane.

The effective hook angle is a function of the front face orientation with respect to the
blade shank, as well as the angle of the blade slot in the cutter head (built-in hook angle)
and the pressure angle of the cutting edge.





- 8 -



Figure 5: Relationship between hook angle and cycloidal path of different blade points

A change of the blade pressure angle has a direct influence onto the pressure angle of
the manufactured tooth flank.

A change of the hook angle in a face hobbing cutter blade causes a flank twist and
changes in profile crowning and pressure angle.

Figure 5 shows a blade with the Points A, B and C along a cutting edge that has a
positive hook angle. The figure also shows a cutting edge without any hook angle (Points
A
1
, B
1
and C
1
). The epicyclical path, generated by A is a different to the one generated
by A
1
. The curve associated with A
1
has a similar, but not identical, shape than the one
generated by A. The two curves are inclined and shifted relative to each other in Z-
direction. That means the spiral angle of curve A is increased relative to A
1
. The opposite
happens for curve B relative to B
1
.

- 9 -

The conclusion of the last paragraph is that the hook angle causes a positive flank twist
between heel and toe. This represents together with the already mentioned change in
profile crowning a rather complex flank form modification.

The blade systems that allow a change of the hook angle use this freedom for flank form
and V-H- movement (adjustability) optimizations. Studying the literature shows that the
inventor of those systems found it physically impossible to allow the same optimizations
by avoiding the individually-controlled front face. All attempts during the past 25 years to
develop a permanent front face cutter system with the same freedoms of the one with
front face ground blades remained without success.



5. New Cutter and Blade System
An interesting technical challenge was the attempt to develop a cutter and blade system
that allows all the freedoms of the three face sharpened blade, yet using a blade that is
shaped and sharpened on the two side relief surfaces only.

Finally, a discovery was made that relates the epicycloids, generated by different hook
and side rake angles. The idea is to find the radial location of one point along the cutting
edge of a given blade that lies on the same epicycloid, generated by a blade with different
hook and side rake angle. It is assumed that the given blade consists of a permanent
front face, no hook angle and a side rake that is constant along the shank. The hook
angle of this system is created by an inclination of the slot in the cutter head.

Figure 6 shows the two different blade types with the roll circle base circle kinematic
attached to the front face sharpened blade.

The Points B and B
1
of the two blade types are identical (Figure 5). The problem to solve
is to find the locations of the Points A
1
and C
1
, along the existing front face of the
simplified blade. The geographic height of the blade, with respect to the cutter head front
face remains constant.

To find the location of Point A
1
, the epicyclical kinematic with roll circle and base circle is
rotated clockwise until A contacts the front face of the new blade. This is the location of
- 10 -

A
1
. The movement from A to A
1
requires a rotation around the roll circle center,
superimposed by a rotation around the center of the base circle. The relationships for the
solution of this problem is shown in Figure 6 and expressed by the following equations:

E
X0x
+ R
B0x
= E
X3x
+ R
B3x
(1)

or:

S
*
sin(-
0
-j+
w
) + R
B0*
sin(
w
) = S
*
sin(-
0
-j+
w
+
w
) + R
B*
sin(
w
+
Hook
+
c
) (2)




Figure 6: Epicyclical kinematic of two different blade types

- 11 -

Where:
R
B0x
x-Component of Cutter Radius Vector (Blade without Hook)
R
B3x
x-Component of Cutter Radius Vector (Blade with Hook, rotated into
zero Hook Plane)
E
X0x
x-Component of Vector from Machine Center to Cutter Center (Blade
without Hook)
E
X3x
x-Component of Vector from Machine Center to Cutter Center (Blade
with Hook, rotated into zero Hook Plane)
S Radial Distance (Scalar of E
X0x
)

0
Cutter Phase Angle
j Swivel Angel

w
Offset Angle
R
B0
Scalar Cutter Radius (without Hook)

w
Rotation of Cutter Center around Base Circle

R
B
Scalar Cutter Radius (with Hook)

Hook
... Angle between R
B
and R
B0

c
Rotation of Blade with Hook Angle around Roll Circle (Cutter Center)

Between
w
and
c
is the following relationship:

w
=
c
/(1+z
generating gear
/z
cutter
) (3)

where:
z
generating gear
Number of Teeth Generating Gear
z
cutter
Number of Starts Cutter

Wanted is
w
out of formula (2). The mathematical solution is conducted with an iteration
algorithm. The difference between A
1
and A
2
is . is calculated as shown:

= I R
B3
- R
B0
I (4)

is the displacement of point A
2
along

normal radius (equal Z-Axis) to come to point A
1
,
that cuts the same epicycloid than point A. The epicycloid cut by A
1
will differ to some
extend from the desired one, cut by A. The shown approach is the physically closest
possible approximation, that infinitesimal observed represents a mathematical precise
solution. In practice it causes differences over the entire flank surface of only a few
microns and therefore can be neglected.
- 12 -


The analog scheme is applied to find Point C
1
(Figure 4), a rotation of the epicyclical
kinematic in counter clockwise direction brings C (Figure 3) to the front face of the new
blade.

According to the above shown solution any desired number of points along the cutting
edge with one particular hook angle can be converted into points on a cutting edge
without hook angle or any other chosen hook angle.

Depending on the mathematical function of the new cutting edge (circle, ellipse or higher
order), three, five or more points can be transformed from the original to the new cutting
edge. Three points, one on the tip, one in the center and one on the end of the cutting
edge, deliver a sufficient definition of the cutting edge function to capture the
characteristics of the different front face hook angles.

The possibility to influence the blade spacing in the cutter head by grinding the front face
of either inside- or outside- blade results in a tooth thickness or slot with change. The
SPIROFORM

blades can account for that feature also. A tooth thickness adjustment is
done by splitting the required amount and for example increasing the radius of the outer
blade cutting edge and decreasing the cutting edge radius of the inner blade by each half
the amount.



6. Summary

A method was found to convert a side relief and front face sharpened blade, held in a
face hob cutter head into a blade that has a permanent front face and is just profile
shaped or re-sharpened on the side relief surfaces.

The advantage of replacing the old style three face sharpened blade is in particular the
permanent character of the front face and its coating. The new carbide high speed cutting
depends to a large extend on the correct front face coating. Gear sets using three face
sharpened blades can only with high cost be converted into high speed carbide
manufacturing. To send a set of blades after re-sharpening to a coating facility requires
more expensive carbide blades in storage and includes the cost of up to 100 re-coatings
- 13 -

of each blade in the course of its life. This procedure increases the tooling cost by a
factor eight.




Figure 7: 160mm radius, 13 start SPIROFORM

cutter head

The new SPIROFORM

blades allow to convert all older three face ground jobs into a two
face sharpened blade system with a permanent front face coating. Gear sets have
not to be re-qualified after the conversion since the flank surface geometry stays
identically to the original.

Figure 7 shows a photo of a SPIROFORM

cutter with 160 mm radius and 13 starts. The

SPIROFORM

system uses no bottom blades. This provides a very solid and stiff cutter
construction. The used PENTAC

stick blades provide sufficient roughing action on the

secondary cutting edges (clearance sides).




- 14 -




Figure 8: Left side conventional, Right side cut with SPIROFORM

Front face coated blades provide good surface finish and improved productivity. The
SPIROFORM

blades are stepped in their building height, such that the tracks from outside
blade and inside blade blend smoothly together in the root fillet. Figure 8 shows to the
left an example of a conventionally cut ring gear. The gear to the right is cut using a
SPIROFORM

cutter and a Phoenix Free-Form machine. Surface finish and root blends
are superior for the SPIROFORM

gear.


- 15 -

7. Literature

[1] Kotthaus, E. Wirtschaftliches Herstellen von Spiralkegelrdern in kleinen und
groen Serien
Maschinenmarkt, 83. Jg. Heft 73, Sept. 1977, Wrzburg, Germany






































Many of the described techniques and machines, as well as many applications of special
cycles and methods are protected worldwide by patents or patent applications of The
Gleason Works. The mentioned registered trademarks

of The Gleason Works are marked

as such.

























The Gleason Works
1000 University Avenue

P.O. Box 22970

Rochester, New York USA 14692-2970

(716) 473- 1000












Cat. # 4325B