The complete Industry News section from the February 2014 issue of Power Transmission Engineering.

Global economic activity remains good -- noise about China slowing, notwithstanding -- and despite the ObamaCare debacle, non-Christmas-related consumer spending looks pretty good. Europe is still Europe and China continues to grow 7-8 percent -- even as the government seeks to clamp down on its own shadow banking system. And India remains a mess.

This paper outlines the design considerations that go into construction of a drive system in order to explain the importance of specific data, why it is required, and where design freedom is necessary. Apart from loads and speeds, interface dimensions and site specific conditions are also needed. Deciding up front which gear rating practice to select can affect the torque capacity of the drive train by ~15%.

Involute splines are commonly used in gearboxes to connect gears and shafts, especially when high torque is transmitted through the coupling. The load is shared among multiple teeth around the coupling circumference, resulting in higher load capacity than a conventional single key. However, the total load is not equally shared among all spline teeth, mainly because of pitch deviations resulting from the manufacturing process. The load distribution along the spline engagement length is also nonuniform because of tooth misalignments and shaft torsional effects. This paper presents an investigation of the influence of spur gear loads on the load distribution of spline teeth.

When software goes bad, what do we call it? System failure? Human failure? A virus? A number of words will work. How about this? Glitch. It has that onomatopoeic quality that fairly screams, Downtime! And with good reason -- software-generated miscalculations can have very expensive -- if not perilous -- repercussions.

A reader asks what are the required parameters to properly specify a gear.

Collaboration moves bearing modeling and simulation software forward

Recently I had a disturbing conversation with a colleague here at the office. During the conversation, it became clear to me that my co-worker -- a really intelligent guy whom I respect a lot -- had no idea how even the most simple electric motor works.

The complete Industry News section from the December 2013 issue of Power Transmission Engineering.

Mounted ball bearings are everywhere in industrial applications. They serve critical roles in keeping a manufacturing operation running smoothly and in ensuring that equipment functions properly and reliably. So why might it be advisable to spend significantly more for a dimensionally comparable bearing from one supplier versus another?