Cold Forging
By far the largest proportion of our product portfolio consists of gears of all kinds. They range from straight and spiral bevel gears and pinions through single- and multiple-toothed spur gears, produced as straight and helical gears, to crown gears. We are well-known in specialist circles as a manufacturer of high-precision and extremely durable gear components produced by cold forging. Our gearwheels have finished cold forged tooth flanks with a gear quality of 8-9 after hardening, which can either be assembled without further treatment or ground to gear quality 6. The modified teeth flanks are optimized for smooth running, reduced mesh impacts and increased stability and are able to withstand significantly higher loads than cut gears because of their cold forged microstructure, compressed tooth surface and optimized fillet section. Wezel competes with manufacturers of machined gears at home and abroad on quality and price. By comparison, sintered and plastic components are fundamentally less expensive, but they cannot bear anywhere near the same loads and are therefore not an alternative to our products. Gears manufactured using MIM or additive techniques play no role in high-volume production.
Cold forging with up to 1,250 tonnes
Wezel Gears
Unlike gear cutting techniques, cold forging leaves the grain of the component material intact (the image on the left shows the transition from root to flank). These gears can therefore operate under far higher loads than cut gears. Furthermore, it takes considerably longer for fatigue to occur in the root of the tooth. The grain also remains in place after hardening (right-hand image with case hardening).
Tooth root breakage basically involves progressive cracking when the strength value is exceeded in the critical tooth root cross-section. Tooth root load capacity can be determined in fatigue tests and in endurance tests on a back-to-back gear test rig.
Our gears have intelligent tooth flank corrections that help prevent mesh impacts and enable smoother tooth interlocking, which also optimizes noise characteristics compared to cut gears. In addition, this compensates for force imbalances and distributes loads more evenly.