Gear Puzzle
Logic
Level
1
If the final arrow is rigidly attached to the center of the gear, and the first gear begins to turn counterclockwise, which letter will the arrow first point at?
A
B
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Once the first gear rotates the other gears will rotate in the following fashion:
Thus, the arrow will point towards the letter A.
Note: The chain which connects the third and fourth gears changes everything. If there was no chain, the system would have pointed to the letter B. But what happened? Why didn't the chain reverse the direction of the fourth gear?
The answer lies in the tooth's of the gears, these tooth's when joined to each other, create a reverse in the direction of the next gear.
But a chain cannot do this, it just couples the parallel axles without reversing the rotation direction, it transfers the motion of the first gear to the next. Observe that if you turn the third gear counter clockwise, the chain also turns in the same direction. Which makes the fourth gear turn in the same direction.