Gears Explained

Gears Are Machines

Gears are also important simple machines. A gear is just a wheel with teeth, sometimes called a cog. To do any work with a gear, you need to have at least two cogs with their teeth fitting into each other. Because the teeth fit together, when you turn one gear, the other one turns too! Gears come in many different sizes, which help them do work. If you connect one big gear with a small one, you can turn the big gear slowly and it will make the little gear turn quickly. Since it takes less energy to turn the big gear slowly than it would to turn the little one quickly, you are saving energy and making work easier by using gears.

One gear can make another one turn faster, but it can also make it turn in a different direction. When you turn a big gear to the right, the little one will move to the left. This is good for many machines where the direction needs to change in order for the machine to work.

When two or more gears are connected, it’s called a ‘gear train.’ The gear that you turn is called the ‘driver’ and the last gear that you are trying to move is called the ‘driven’ gear. Sometimes there will be several gears in between the driver and the driven—those are called ‘idlers.’