pic: Triwheels

[pilleya]

Originally Posted by Cothron Theiss

I'm not on the OP's team so I don't know, but I assume it is because if the driving gear was large enough to contact the three driven gears, they wouldn't get the 2:1 reduction they need. The driving gear has to be small enough for the desired reduction.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=142662

The OP was originally planning on custom machining the gears for this, they may have been planning to make large ones( almost wheel diameter) to get the required reduction with 4 gears, but they didn't end up doing this. Probably a good choice to, machining gears is hard work and very time consuming.