Tribology Without Friction: Limited Travel Solid State Design Elements Available to Purchase

Many mechanical systems have components performing limited displacements relative to other components. Examples: meshing motions between teeth of power transmission gears; compensation motions in universal joints and Oldham couplings; wedge mechanisms of clamping devices including friction-based shaft-to-sleeve connections. Typical features of such connections are: high contact force magnitudes; high stiffness in one direction and low resistance to motion in the perpendicular direction(s); high motion sensitivity (ability to perform very small motions under small motive forces while subjected to high contact loads in a perpendicular direction); maintaining no-backlash connection in case of reversal of contact forces requiring the connection to be preloaded; low friction losses; small size and low cost of the connection; high durability combined with low maintenance requirements.