Graphics Simulation Of The Gear Cutting

Gears are important driving components in mechanical engineering. The machining cutters of gear are very complicated. It's very difficult to design gear tools in traditional way, because it needs so many computations. The intelligent CAD software for complex cutter can help the user design cutters easily and quickly. The teeth profile of the designed cutter must be checked to ensure no such situations as undercutting... etc. happens when gears are machining with it. If we check the profile of gear tool through cutting after the tool is manufactured, it will waste a lot of money and time. So the simulation methods are proposed.The aims of this thesis are to research on graphic simulation for gear-cutting process and develop the corresponding software. With the software, the user can see the generation of gear teeth on the computer screen directly, and check whether the undercutting happens. The studies of the thesis is focused on the conjugating theory, the mathematical model for the machining process of gear, the model for gear cutters and the core algorithm for machining simulation梑oolean subtraction operation with OpenGL. The contents of the thesis are as follows:(1). The meshing theory of gear teeth is briefly introduced first, then the generation of conjugate shapes is studied in detail. According to the conjugate theory, the method and formulas for computating the shape of mating teeth are proposed. Based on the conjugate theory, the gear-machining model is built.(2). The Object-Oriented technology for software development and the Unified Modeling Language are introduced briefly, then the gear-machining simulation software is modeled with UML, and the UI is designed, too.(3). Researches on the teeth shape of cutters, and the model for the tooth shape is built. With the model, the gear tool can be modeled parametrically while simulation executes.(4). The cutter and the gear blank are modeled geometrically with OpenGL, and the core algorithm for machining simulation - boolean subtraction operation is studied in detail, and it is implemented based on the OpenGL's stencil buffer. In the end, the animation technology is studied, and the display list technology of OpenGL is used to improve the performance of the simulation software. (5). Conclude the contents of the thesis, and point out the way for next work.