So the old forklift I bought to use at home turned out to have a busted diff. Broken cross shaft and chewed up side and planetary gears.
While I'm waiting to find out if I can even get replacement parts, and if so how many kidneys I'd need to sell - I thought it would be an interesting discussion as to whether I could practically make some myself.
I've only ever cut spur gears using an involute cutter, and I know that there's a bit more to making bevel gears.

So - the items of discussion.
Two side gears: has ground stub shaft and back face, internal splines for the driveshaft, and some bevel gear teeth.
Two planetary gears: has a bore that runs on a cross shaft, spherical back face that runs in the diff carrier and some bevel gear teeth to match the side gears.














First thing I need to point out for those that aren't familiar with diffs, is that these gears aren't turning at any appreciable speed (unless you spin an individual wheel). They are there to allow the wheels to move at different speeds as you turn - ie the outside wheel moves faster than the inside wheel in a turn. reasonably high load on the teeth but slow speed of rotation.

I've got a mill with vertical and horizontal spindles, index head, shaper, and potentially the T&C grinder if I really needed to do some grinding.

Is it do-able, and if so what are the challenges?

Steve


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