Quote:
Originally Posted by cadandcookies
Would you try to do the gear spacing this way? Seems to me that would still be difficult to do manually, though I have limited machining experience.
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I usually clamp all my plates together and mill them at once; it's far easier to do all the plates at once than one at a time. If the plates are all the same, I just clamp them all together with some kant-twists.
From the design I'm seeing here, you could try and make all the plates identical and do it on a manual mill. However, lightening patterns on a mill are rather tricky to pull off, and that may be a deal breaker for you if you're dead set on making this thing light (in which case I'm wondering how you plan on lightening that gear).
Putting bearings a few thousandths off on a mill is really hard if you're using a DRO, and still pretty hard if you're not. The mill takes the guesswork and eyeballing out of it in my experience, as the dials are all graduated and easy to read. If you're using a bad mill, that's one thing, but it's hard to screw up on a Bridgeport.
Flanges are magic. We supported the entire superstructure and our intake last year with a 1/16" thick sheet metal gearbox which also powered our intake. It held up until a head-on collision with our intake bent it up.
If this is your first year doing this, you're really good. Keep it up!
EDIT: You may want to opt for a 2-plate design if only 2 plates will have bearings anyway. JMO.