A Method for Determining the AGMA Tooth Form Factor from Equations for the Generated Tooth Root Fillet

The determination of the AGMA tooth form factor requires that the dimensions of the critical tooth section, at which the maximum bending stress is deemed to occur, be found. Critical section dimensions have traditionally been measured from a scaled generated layout of the tooth profile. The layout procedure, however, requires very careful drafting, and even then it is difficult to achieve really satisfactory accuracy because of the complex operations required to produce the fillet curve, with the added difficulty of estimating the point of tangency with the Lewis iso-bending stress parabola. Although a number of analytical methods are available for computing the critical section dimensions, their solution has generally been cumbersome, or convergence on the correct solution remained a problem. This paper presents equations for the gear tooth root fillet curve which have been derived from an analysis of the relative motion between a rack cutter and gear tooth during the generating cycle. An improved iterative procedure is used to find the critical tooth section dimensions from these equations. A further application of the root fillet equations, which is also covered, is in the computer generation of tooth profiles for assessment of the final tooth shape.