"Lego Gears, Pulleys and Axles For Making Embossing Roller?" Topic

9 Posts

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Cacique Caribe	19 Dec 2011 10:13 a.m. PST
You guys might have seen these a while back: QUESTIONS: But, for a more SF tech feel in the foam wall impressions . . . Could a foam-embossing roller (about 2 inch diameter) be made using Lego cogs, gears, sprockets, pulley hubs and axles? If so, of all the millions of Lego bits sold, how do you know which gears and pulleys have the same outer diameter and use the same axle type? What language should I be looking for to get the same diameters? And how could you lock the gears at each end of the axle to keep them from slipping out? Any Lego gurus out there that could help me make sense of so much variety? I haven't seen a Lego up close in ages, so please explain as if to a total newbie. As you can see from just looking at these listings, a lot of Lego pieces were definitely not around when I was growing up. All we had was standard rectangular blocks and some slopes: auction Thanks so much, Dan Previous experiments making embossing rollers: link link
haywire	19 Dec 2011 10:33 a.m. PST
Last I checked Lego Technic Gears and Axles come in very specific sizes and should all be compatible with each other. link link
Rich Bliss	19 Dec 2011 2:35 p.m. PST
They are all compatible. Lego has only ever made one axle diameter and all gears will fit them. To lock in the Axles on the outside you need a couple of bushings on each end. Check out bricklink.com
Cacique Caribe	19 Dec 2011 3:41 p.m. PST
Bushings? Dan
chromedog	19 Dec 2011 10:58 p.m. PST
Little widget things that fit on the ends and stop the gears sliding off the rods.
AVAMANGO	20 Dec 2011 3:40 a.m. PST
Thats a neat little trick.
Insomniac	20 Dec 2011 4:19 a.m. PST
For this little project, I think you would have difficulty getting what you want from Lego gears. Why? 1. The gears slide on to a '+' shaped axle which only allows for a 90 degree rotation so that would limit the amount of step between gears. 2. It is very difficult to get gears/wheels the same outer diameter. 3. The spacing between teeth is always going to be similar because they are all made to mesh into one another…that means the spacing of the bricks will be the same, limiting their flexibility. I am not saying that it couldn't be done…you could find the right sized round, metal rod to fit through the gears to allow them to rotate freely to line them up where you want and then glue them in place…but you would be fairly limited.
Rottenlead	20 Dec 2011 3:05 p.m. PST
On a related note I used lego wheels to make tracks in my last terrain project. You can't see them in this photo but just along from this section I rolled the lego wheels through polyfilla type material while it was wet and the result was an excellent muddy style semi-dry river bed with tracks that could be tank or wheel based.
Cacique Caribe	20 Dec 2011 11:26 p.m. PST
GruntZ, Great idea! Dan

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