Billion to 1 Gear Reduction (8 moving parts)

thingiverse

This is a minimalist gear reduction box with only 8 moving parts that achieves a gear reduction ratio of 1,030,301,000:1 (1010^3:1). This is achieved in the following manner:The base gear has 100 teeth. The input gear has 10 teeth. The planet gear will revolve around the sun (input) gear every 10 turns (100/10). The first moving outer gear has 101 teeth instead of 100 so after the planet gear completes 1 full revolution it will have rotated 1 tooth relative to the base gear. After 101 revolutions the first moving outer gear will have completed 1 turn giving a gear ratio between the input gear and the first moving outer gear of 1010 (101 * 10).The moving outer gear acts as the input sun gear to the next stage. With 3 stages, the reduction achieved is 1010^3:1 which is just over 1 billion to 1.Parts needed:1 X base gear1 X 10 primary input1 X 10 gear3 X 45 planetary gear3 X 101 gear2 X 100 additional2 X 10 transfer gearAssembly instructions:Note: The first exploded view image shows the 101 gear split in half so you can see how the teeth sit next to the previous stage.Insert the 10 primary input into the outside of the base gear. Attach the 10 gear to the triangular protrusion (superglue will help). This will capture the base gear between the 10 primary input and the 10 gear.Press fit/glue two of the 10 transfer gears to two of the 101 gears on the side WITHOUT teeth. These parts are printed separately so that supports are not needed. If it looks like the part could have been printed without supports, you put them together incorreclty.Place a 45 planetary gear between the 10 input gear from the previous stage and the base gear. Place the 101 gear inside the pillars of the base gear with the side that has 101 teeth facing the previous stage. This will trap the planet gear between the current piece and the base. Make sure the notch on the outside of the 101 gear lines up with the notch on the base.Add a 100 additional gear to the base by sliding it onto the pillars. Make sure the notch on the outside lines up with the notch o the previous stage.Repeat the process until all stages are assembled.The 100 additional gear pieces are stationary relative to the base and are only printed separately for the purpose of assembly, but they function as a part of the base piece which is why I consider them to be functionally 1 component. The 10 gears are permanently fixed to the previous stage's final gear so they also function as 1 component. Once assembled, you can start turning the input gear. The notch on the first moving gear will slowly start to turn relative to the notch on the base gear. It will take several hundred turns of the input gear before you see any definite motion on the second gear that can't be attributed to backlash (wobble) in the gear mechanism.Creator's note:This is nothing more than a novelty that is simple (8 moving parts), mathematical, mechanical, and is something you'll never complete in your lifetime by manually turning the input. If you turned the input once per second for 12 hours a day it would take you more than 65 years to get the final output gear to rotate a single time. Sure, it would take a while, but it would be quite the feat which would go down in history as the most pointless waste of time ever accomplished by a human.