Non-circular gears

[clyon]

I am looking for a source for specific engineering details for non-circular gears. CAD drawings, software to design these gears, or even a clearly written guide to the geometry of creating them would help. The goal is visual interest in wooden sculpture. I've had good success with wooden clock gears and such. I can find photos, drawings that are more conceptual than precise, and articles addressing the practical uses of these gears to vary rotation speeds, etc. However, thus far nothing to take me from "Isn't that cool" to "I'm ready to cut a gear."

All clues greatfully rec'd.

Thanks

Chris

[gus]

Try a Google search of " non-circular gears " and read on. Shows one book on nothing but.

[bill.young]

Hey Chris,

There's information on a class project that someone did on oddly-shaped gears at http://www.decidedlyodd.com/cw/cs285/final-report.html that includes a link to source code in Python to generate some of the shapes.