In this project a novel method to transfer torque between two parallel but not collinear shafts will be designed and developed. According to the conventional practices an Oldham Coupler is employed for same. There is a lot of frictional losses in transmitting power when Oldham Coupler is employed. Hence, a novel transmission for the same purpose is designed and developed for eliminating the sliding pairs (which is the major reason of frictional losses) and opportunity of utilizing only the turning pairs (which is highly desireable with respect to sliding pairs in machine components).
An overview of the Oldham Coupler (not the project / solution we will provide) is mentioned below to give clear insight and demonstration of the frictional losses and manufacturing as well as installation complexities.
It has three discs, one coupled to the input, one coupled to the output, and a middle disc that is joined to the first two by tongue and groove. The tongue and groove on one side is perpendicular to the tongue and groove on the other. Often springs are used to reduce backlash of the mechanism. The coupler is much more compact than, for example, two universal joints.
The coupler is named for John Oldham who invented it in Ireland, in 1820, to solve a paddle placement problem in a steamship design. The middle disc rotates around its center at the same speed as the input and output shafts. Its center traces a circular orbit, twice per rotation, around the midpoint between input and output shafts.
The two rotating shafts are aligned but not centered. Three disks link the two shafts. The center disk has two perpendicular convex projections, one on each side. The disks mounted on the axis can slide into these projections, compensating for the eccentricity. This coupling passes the rotation in a uniform manner to the outgoing axis
