A sprocket can be described as a profiled wheel that holds teeth that mesh with a chain, track or other perforated or indented material. There are a number of chains that will utilise a sprocket: Drive chains (also known as transmission chains), leaf chains, conveyor chains as a well as a number of specialist chains such as agricultural chain and special lubricated chain. The name 'sprocket' applies generally to any wheel upon which are radial projections that engage a chain passing over it. It is distinguished from a gear in that sprockets are never meshed together directly, and differs from a pulley in that sprockets have teeth and pulleys are smooth.
Sprockets are used in bicycles, motorcycles, cars, tracked vehicles, and other machinery to transmit rotary motion between two shafts where gears are unsuitable or to impart linear motion to a track, tape etc. Perhaps the commonest form of sprocket is found in the bicycle, in which the pedal shaft carries a large sprocket-wheel which drives a chain which in turn drives a small sprocket on the axle of the rear wheel. Early automobiles were also largely driven by sprocket and chain mechanism, a practice largely copied from bicycles.
These days sprockets are used across industry and agriculture to enable the drive of load across both static and mobile machinery. Sprockets are of various designs, a maximum of efficiency being claimed for each by its originator. Sprockets typically do not have a flange. Some sprockets used with timing belts have flanges to keep the timing belt cantered. Sprockets and chains are also used for power transmission from one shaft to another where slippage is not admissible, sprocket chains being used instead of belts or ropes and sprocket-wheels instead of pulleys. They can be run at high speed and some forms of chain are so constructed as to be noiseless even at high speed.
Leading the way in the manufacture, sale and distribution of sprockets and chains is a company called SprocketsandChain. They supply a wide range of Sprocket and Chain components that can be retro fit to existing machinery or custom and bespoke made for any purpose, Use the links below to review the product range.
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