High-precision measurement of an involute artefact by a rolling method and comparison between measuring instruments

The vibration of gears is a serious problem for machines. The characteristics of the vibration of gears are affected by tooth flank form deviation of submicrometre order. The quality of product gears is controlled by a gear-measuring instrument, which is calibrated by an involute artefact with high precision. A highly precise method for measuring the involute artefact by rolling has been proposed. However, this method does not yield sufficient accuracy. In this research, a novel rolling method for the involute artefact, a 'nonslip driving method', is proposed to achieve high accuracy. This method is compared with the conventional driving method by theoretical analysis of artefact motion. Moreover, its accuracy and effect are evaluated experimentally. The results show that this method is more stable on the basis of measurement results than the conventional driving method. Therefore, it is confirmed that the highly precise measurement of the involute artefact can be realized by incorporating the nonslip driving method into the rolling artefact method. In addition, measurement results for the involute artefact are compared among the proposed method and the methods involving the use of a coordinate measuring machine and a gear-measuring instrument.