What does this setup not power a helve hammer?

[Echo Weaver]

I've had a simple mechanical power setup for my helve hammer for a while, and I wanted to add a pulverizer. It seemed like the logical thing was to set them both up with transmissions and clutches so that both could be connected but only one run at a time. In order to connect two devices to my power train, I understand I need a large gear. So I made a backup copy of my world to mess around in Creative where I could tear down and build up various configurations.

I added a large gear to my existing axle descending from the windmill and built what I thought was a pretty tidy configuration. Then I engaged the clutch, and the helve hammer would not move. I tried a bunch of other configurations, but just adding the large gear and nothing else seems to convert my power train from one that runs a helve hammer just fine to one that can't move it at all, even when the wind is set to hurricane. 

Here's the most recent, simplest configuration with just the large gear and the helve hammer. I even set up the helve hammer pointing each direction in case there was something about the direction of spin.

What am I not getting?

Edited August 4, 2025 by Echo Weaver

[Parenn]

When you go from small to large (i.e. from the power turning the inside of the gear to taking the power off the outside) you increase the speed (the teeth on the edge move faster over the ground than the edge of the axle) but lose torque. This torque loss means that there’s not enough to turn the axle leading to the hammer.

If you do the opposite at the top - feed the power into the vertical axle from the windmill via a large gear (i.e. put the windmill where you ave the angled gear in this image) it’ll cancel out, and in fact be more efficient since the vertical axle won’t be turning so fast and thus lose less energy.

[Krougal]

Screenshots of my setup in this thread: 

 

 

[Echo Weaver]

Heh, so despite trying to search on this before I asked, I made the noobest mistake, and of course now that I know what I did wrong, I can find LOTS of iterations of this question. 

[Krougal]

45 minutes ago, Echo Weaver said:

Heh, so despite trying to search on this before I asked, I made the noobest mistake, and of course now that I know what I did wrong, I can find LOTS of iterations of this question. 

Yeah, I know, the minute after I ask a question, I either figure it out suddenly or I go and search again and typically find the answer.

Although sometimes it does help the thought process phrasing the question for someone else and reading it.