Screw Thread - Applications

Applications

Screw threads have several applications:

• Fastening
  • Fasteners such as wood screws, machine screws, nuts and bolts.
  • Connecting threaded pipes and hoses to each other and to caps and fixtures.
• Gear reduction via worm drives
• Moving objects linearly by converting rotary motion to linear motion, as in the leadscrew of a jack.
• Measuring by correlating linear motion to rotary motion (and simultaneously amplifying it), as in a micrometer.
• Both moving objects linearly and simultaneously measuring the movement, combining the two aforementioned functions, as in a leadscrew of a lathe.

In all of these applications, the screw thread has two main functions:

• It converts rotary motion into linear motion.
• It prevents linear motion without the corresponding rotation.