5

Design Formulas
The material presented thus far has shown how to choose a kind of gear and how to make
a preliminary estimate to the gear size required. The general nature of the detailed information required on gear drawings has also been discussed.
In this chapter we take up the calculation of the detailed dimensions and the checking
of the design against gear-rating formulas. The designer following this procedure should
get almost the right size design on the first try. If the load-rating calculations show that
the design is not quite right, it will usually be possible to make only one or two changes,
such as a change in pitch or a change in face width, to adjust the capacity within the proper
limits. It should not be necessary for the designer to scrap the whole design and start over
from scratch after checking the load rating.

5.1 Calculation of Gear Tooth Data

In this part of the chapter, we go over all the numbers and dimensions that will be needed
on the drawings of the various kinds of gears. Designers who are not familiar with the
limitations on gear size and shape that different materials or different manufacturing
equipment may impose should consider the design worked out in this chapter as tentative
until they have considered the things brought up in the later chapters of the book.
Table 5.1 is a glossary of gear terms used in Chapter 5. Table 5.2 shows the metric and
English symbols for the principal terms used in calculating gear data. (Many secondary
terms are defined in figures and tables used for specific calculations.)
5.1.1 Number of Pinion Teeth
In general, the more teeth a pinion has, the more quietly it will run and the better its
resistance to wear will be. On the other hand, a smaller number of pinion teeth will give
increased tooth strength, lower cutting costs, and larger tooth dimensions. In spur work,
for instance, a seven-tooth pinion of 64 diametral pitch has been found quite useful in
some fractional-horsepower applications.
Spur pinions used on railroad traction motors usually have from 12 to 20 teeth. Highload, high-speed aircraft pinions run from about 18 to 30 teeth. High-speed helical pinions
for ship propulsion frequently have from 35 to 60 teeth.
In general, low-ratio sets can stand more teeth than high-ratio sets. A 1:1 ratio set with 35
teeth will have about the same tooth strength as a 5:1 ratio set with 24 pinion teeth.
Table 5.3 may be used as a general guide for numbers of teeth for spur and helical gears.
Table 5.4 is worked out to give an approximate balance between gear surface durability
capacity and gear tooth strength capacity. To understand this table, let us consider a highspeed gear drive at 3:1 ratio with case-hardened and ground teeth at a surface hardness
243

Design Formulas

247

TABLE 5.3
General Guide to Selection of Number of Pinion Teeth
No. of
PinionTeeth

Design Considerations

Requires at least 25 pressure angle and special design to avoid undercutting. Poor contact
ratio. Use only in fine pitches.
Smallest practical number with 20 teeth. Takes about 145% long addendum to avoid
undercut. Poor wear characteristics.
Use where strength is more important than wear. Requires long addendum.
No undercutting with 20 standard-addendum design.
Good balance between strength and wear for hard steels. Contact kept away from critical
base circle region.
Strength may be more critical than wear on hard steelsabout even on medium-hard steels.
Probably critical on strength on all but low-hardness pinions. Excellent wear resistance.
Favored in high-speed work for quietness.

10
15
19
25
35
50

Note: Data given in Table 5.3 are rather general in nature. They are intended to give the reader a general view
of the considerations involved in picking numbers of teeth. For somewhat more specific guidance in
designing spur or helical gears, Table 5.4 shows how the choice tends to shift as hardness and ratio are
varied.

of 60 HRC (equivalent to about 600 HB or about 725 HV). The table says that a 25/75 teeth
ratio ought to be OK. This means that when a large enough center distance and face width
are picked based on surface durability calculations, further calculations on tooth strength
out to be OK if the module (or pitch) is chosen to get 25 pinion teeth. Gear people would
say that it was a balanced design between durability and strength.
For our 3:1 example with fully hard gears, the balance would be reasonably good in
short-life vehicle gears or somewhat longer-life aircraft gears. For turbine power gears
that would run for many more hours and would need a capability of around 1010 or more
pinion cycles, the durability calculations would considerably reduce the intensity of tooth
TABLE 5.4
Guide to Selecting Number of Pinion Teeth z1 (or NP) for Good Durability and Adequate Strength
Long-Life, High-Speed Gears Having
BrinellHardness

Vehicle Gears, Short Life at Maximum Torque

Having Brinell Hardness

Ratio, u
(mG)

200

300

400

600

200

300

400

600

1
1.5
2
3
4
5
7
10

80
67
60
53
49
47
45
43

50
45
42
37
34
32
32
30

39
32
28
25
24
23
22
21

35
30
27
25
24
23
22
21

50
45
42
37
34
32
31
30

37
30
27
24
23
22
21
20

29
24
21
18
17
17
16
16

26
22
20
18
17
17
16
16

Note: 1. Typical high-speed applications, that fit this table, are not turbine-driven helicopter gears. For turbinedriven industrial gears, more pinion teeth can be used because of lower allowable surface loading. (About
25% more is typical.)
2. Typical vehicle gears are spur and helical gears used in final wheel drives. (Considerably fewer pinion
teeth are used in hypoid and spiral bevel final drives.)

248

Dudleys Handbook of Practical Gear Design and Manufacture

loading. A balanced design might then be achieved at higher numbers of teeth, like 30 to
38 pinion teeth.
In high-speed turbine gearing, scoring hazards and noise and vibration considerations make it desirable to use as small a tooth size as possible. The designer might get
a good durability/strength balance at something like 35 teeth for the 3:1 example, but
decide to go up to 40 pinion teeth and put a little more face width and/or center distance
in to keep the rating within acceptable limits. This design would not have the lightest
weight possible, but would compromise enough to avoid scoring and noise hazards reasonably well.
In contrast to the example of high-speed turbine gear just cited, a vehicle designer with
hard gears at a 3:1 ratio might to as low as to 20/60 teeth rather than to 25/75. The much
shorter life, slow-speed vehicle gears can stand quite a bit of surface damage, but a broken
tooth puts the gear drive out of action immediately. The designer of vehicle gears needs
extra strength and can get it by using fewer and larger teeth. There is often a scoring
hazard in vehicle gears, but this is handled more by using special extreme pressure (EP)
lubricants than by using smaller teeth.
To sum it up, Table 5.4 is a general guide to where to start on tooth numbers, but a complete design study may show that it is desirable to use pinion tooth numbers that differ
from the table by a modest amount.
5.1.2 Hunting Teeth
The numbers of pinion and gear teeth must be whole numbers. It is generally desirable
particularly with low-hardness partsto obtain a hunting ratio between gear and pinion
teeth. With a hunting ratio, any tooth on one member willin timecontact all the teeth
on the mating part. This tends to equalize wear and improve spacing accuracy.
To illustrate this point, let us consider a tooth ratio of 21:76. The factors of 21 are 3 and 7.
The factors of 76 are 2, 2, and 19. This ratio will hunt because the parts have no common
factor. The gear should not be cut with a double-thread hob. A shaving cutter with 57 teeth
would be a poor choice for either part. The cutter has factors of both 3 and 19.
As a general rule, tooth numbers should be selected so that there is no common factor
between the number of teeth of a pinion and a gear that mesh together, and there should
be no common factor between the number of teeth of a gear and of a cutting tool that has
a gear-like meshing action with the part being cut.
Technical studies by Ishibashi and by Ichimaru [American Society of Mechanical
Engineers (ASME), 1980]* show that, in certain cases, improved gear load-carrying capacity can be obtained with a nonhunting ratio. Tests were made of spur gears having a hunting ratio of 25:27 and an integer ratio of 26:26. Pitch-line speed was about 7 m/s (1400 fpm).
At a low hardness of 185 HV (about 185 HB), Ishibashi found that the 26:26 ratio would
carry a little over 1000 N/mm2 surface compressive stress before pitting, while the 25:27
ratio would only carry about 800 N/mm2 before pitting. The pitting limit was defined as
the highest loading the gear pair would carry for 107 cycles without pitting. The numbers
just quoted are based on a part being considered pitted when 1% of the contact area is
pitted.
To put it another way, the tests showed that the integer ratio could carry about 25% more
hertz stress. Since hertz stress is proportional to the square root of K-factor, the integer
ratio carried about 60% more K-factor. At a higher hardness of 300 HB for one part and
* See references at the end of the book.