[MOC] 1,000 Speed Gearbox, create any 3 decimal gearing ratio

[TechnicBrickPower]

Here I present an  MOC gearbox with 1,000 different speeds. The gearing ratios are selected using 10 switching levers each of which adds a power of 2 to the overall output gearing ratio. A down gearing of 1000 to 1024 at the end of the gearbox means any 3 digit decimal gearing ratio can be selected, for example 0.123, 0.777 or 0.017. The gearbox uses over 130 gears and 12 differentials.

 

[Jockos]

you created the ultimate Fast&Furious gearbox!!

[Aris]

Impressive! Very complicated 

[2GodBDGlory]

Wow! That is fearsomely complicated, and very cool! It seems like there is a lot of math behind it, which is nice. Of course, that would be an awful gearbox to put in a model car, since it is huge and must be very inefficient, but that is not the point at all.

Good work!

[Rudivdk]

1000 ratio's is quite an achievement, but other than 'because I can' I fail to see the possible applications for it. Nevertheless great engineering and math to figure this out!

I am however most impressed by the fact that you can run it all from 1 single L-motor. Is it just built that good, or are you using some lubricant to keep it all going round? I mean, 130+ gears and a bunch of differentials in LEGO should give a lot of resistance...

[Pauls Technic]

That is pretty crazy, well done.

[TechnicBrickPower]

13 hours ago, 2GodBDGlory said:

Wow! That is fearsomely complicated, and very cool! It seems like there is a lot of math behind it, which is nice. Of course, that would be an awful gearbox to put in a model car, since it is huge and must be very inefficient, but that is not the point at all.

Good work!

Hi yeah it was a lot more complicated to build than I first thought, and yes probably not a great car gearbox - you wouldn't need 99% of the gears lol. But it might have other applications somewhere else....

13 hours ago, Rudivdk said:

1000 ratio's is quite an achievement, but other than 'because I can' I fail to see the possible applications for it. Nevertheless great engineering and math to figure this out!

I am however most impressed by the fact that you can run it all from 1 single L-motor. Is it just built that good, or are you using some lubricant to keep it all going round? I mean, 130+ gears and a bunch of differentials in LEGO should give a lot of resistance...

Hi Rudivdk. I am not sure if it has applications but sometimes the invention comes before the application! For me it's more about the learning process and then if I do have an application that needs certain types of gearing then I might be able to create it based on this experience. It is well built yes and no lubricant other than my greasy fingers lol.  I was surprised how well it worked, but then I knew if I kept the gearing ratio low (<=1) then it should be ok. Part of the trick is to make sure none of the gears spin faster than the input axle. I might try to put some load on it to see what happens - I think then the friction will set in quickly. Might turn it into a car lol.

[JGW3000]

Somewhat mind boggling what you accomplished. I too am surprised that everything works well without too much friction, but as you stated, once an output load is applied, then gears may start stalling. One application is to use as a device like a stroboscope to determine RPM of a motor, but somewhat difficult to see how that may be implemented.

[aeh5040]

Ha ha ha - you are insane (in a good way)!

It's great that you find a way to do it that doesn't require everything to be geared up first.  At the heart of it, it looks like a very nice simple and robust design (the best kind).

Looks like you've also done a great job with the structure and bracing. My guess is it could actually handle some load.

Edited May 23, 2020 by aeh5040

[TechnicBrickPower]

On 5/24/2020 at 6:00 AM, aeh5040 said:

Ha ha ha - you are insane (in a good way)!

It's great that you find a way to do it that doesn't require everything to be geared up first.  At the heart of it, it looks like a very nice simple and robust design (the best kind).

Looks like you've also done a great job with the structure and bracing. My guess is it could actually handle some load.

Thanks aeh5040. I am sure you're not insane until you build a 1,000,000 speed gearbox.  It is surprisingly robust. I have a had a few designs that looked good on paper but were dreadful in practice. Has helped me learn though. I will try loading it - I am tempted to turn it into some sort of vehicle just for a laugh.