Chain to Sprocket

[Daniel Brim]

Hi all. Does anyone know how to connect a chain to a sprocket in Inventor using constraints? I have built a 3/8ths pitch chain with cbills' chain I-parts. Each link has a full range of motion. The chain was put together by flush constraints. I now have a 3/8ths pitched sprocket from the First Cad Library. My strategy was to mate the outside edge of the sprocket to the inside of the chain, and then use tangent contraints to attach the cylinder things (I don't know the term) on the chain to the inside of the teeth on the sprocket. It only let me do this at three points. Any ideas?

-Daniel

[GregT]

Originally Posted by DanielBCR

Hi all. Does anyone know how to connect a chain to a sprocket in Inventor using constraints? I have built a 3/8ths pitch chain with cbills' chain I-parts. Each link has a full range of motion. The chain was put together by flush constraints. I now have a 3/8ths pitched sprocket from the First Cad Library. My strategy was to mate the outside edge of the sprocket to the inside of the chain, and then use tangent contraints to attach the cylinder things (I don't know the term) on the chain to the inside of the teeth on the sprocket. It only let me do this at three points. Any ideas?

-Daniel

What your suggesting should work in theory, but can fail for a few reasons. For instance, if you rounded (or the person who drew the sproket rounded) it will fail. If the sproket, by design, does not line up perfectly with the chain rollers (the cylinder parts) it will fail.

What do you mean "tangent constrains to attach the cylinder things on the chain to the inside of the teeth"? What specifically are you applying this constraint to? I would mate centers to eachother (center axis of the roller to center axis of the round inside part of the sproket tooth).

If you really want a chain made up of links I suggest you measure the exact distance between the centers of your sproket and use this number as your chain's pitch. Then measure the linear distance between the centers on your sproket - make this your roller OD. Then mate the centers of the chain to the centers of the sproket. A chain drawn this way would have to work.

I've drawn a lot of chain but never specifically to connect sprokets when (I could model it with a single solid body)... too much work and system resources

Greg