How to create a gear like a watch gear!

[Schtefan]

Hi, does anyone know how I can create a gear? Like a gear in a machine or a
watch? mechanical gear. Circle with a center and teeth on the primiter?
How can i do that?
Thanks

 

[Lori Pearce \(MSFT\)]

I searched in Visio 2003 and didn't find a good gear shape, but I could
create a crude one using a circle, a bunch of rectangles placed around the
circle and the Union operation. It's tedious, but with some patience you
can create a decent gear. Once you have a gear you like, create your own
stencil and save it there.

 

[John Marshall, MVP]

I was thinking on the same lines, but I was going to suggest using VBA to
automate the process. Chris Roth wrote a VBA routine that would place a
given shape mutiple times to form a circle (see Polar Array at
www.mvps.org/visio/VBA.htm).

So depending on what type of teeth you require you could select a circle or
triangle and place copies of the shape in a circle. You can then use Union,
as Lori suggests, to make a single shape.

The other advantage for using VBA is that you can make a collection of gears
with various numbers of teeth.

John... Visio MVP

Need stencils or ideas? http://www.mvps.org/visio/3rdparty.htm
Need VBA examples? http://www.mvps.org/visio/VBA.htm
Common Visio Questions http://www.mvps.org/visio/common_questions.htm