bevel gear

are essentially conically shaped, although the actual gear does not extend all the way to the vertex (tip) of the cone that bounds it. With two bevel gears in mesh, the vertices of their two cones lie on a single point, and the shaft axes also intersect at that point. The angle between the shafts can be anything except zero or 180 degrees. Bevel gears with equal numbers of teeth and shaft axes at 90 degrees are called miter gears.

The teeth of a bevel gear may be straight-cut as with spur gears, or they may be cut in a variety of other shapes. 'Spiral bevel gears' have teeth that are both curved along their (the tooth's) length; and set at an angle, analogously to the way helical gear teeth are set at an angle compared to spur gear teeth. 'Zero bevel gears' have teeth which are curved along their length, but not angled. Spiral bevel gears have the same advantages and disadvantages relative to their straight-cut cousins as helical gears do to spur gears. Straight bevel gears are generally used only at speeds below 5 m/s (1000 ft/min), or, for small gears, 1000 r.p.m.

SPIRAL BEVEL GEARS