A rack and pinion actuator uses a gear arrangement to produce linear motion for sliding gates and doors. It consists of a pinion gear and a rack gear that mesh together to move the driven element. Rack and pinion actuators can be open or enclosed, and they have few restrictions on how far they can extend. They are commonly used in door and gate operators.
A rack and pinion actuator is a device designed to produce linear actuating motion for a secondary mechanism using a rack and pinion arrangement. This type of gear arrangement consists of a flat, narrow strip cut with the gear teeth along an edge known as a rack. A cut circular pinion with matching teeth is then attached to the generator shaft and, coupled to the rack, serves to move it back and forth. Rack and pinion actuators can only produce straight or bi-directional linear motion. They are ideal for applications that require actuating motion along a straight line such as sliding gates and doors.
Rack and pinion gears are one of the most widely used types of gears to directly translate the input rotary motion of a motor into an output linear motion. A rack gear set consists of two parts: the round pinion gear mounted on the drive source and a long, flat rack gear attached to the driven element. Although of different shapes, both the rack and pinion have teeth of similar pitch and shape. The two toothed elements are oriented to mesh so that, when the pinion rotates, they drag the rack in a straight line. To change the direction of movement at the output, the motor is simply reversed.
This basic principle is the driving force for the rack and pinion actuator, which employs closed or open rack and pinion arrangements to produce straight-line outputs. One of the most common applications for the rack and pinion actuator is door and gate operators used in residential and security vehicle accesses. These operators consist of a fixed pinion motor equipped with a long rack mounted on the gate. When the motor is activated, it pulls the gate on rollers or wheels along a track to open and close it.
The rack and pinion actuator used on gates is typically an example of an open type actuator. This means that the entire arrangement is open to the elements with the rack hooked along its full length to the driven secondary device. Enclosed rack and pinion types of actuators have an internal sealed rack and pinion mechanism, usually housed within a cylinder. The rack component is joined to an actuator arm, which, in turn, is connected to the device that the actuator is intended to activate. As the motor rotates, the rack moves forward or backward, thus providing the required activation movement.
While rack mount actuators are limited to producing linear outputs only, they have the advantage of having few internal restrictions on how far those outputs can be extended. As long as the motor is sized to move the weight of the driven device, the only limiting factor of how much it can be moved is the space available. This allows a relatively small motor to open very long gates, for example.
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