A professional who sets up and operates one or more gear-shaving machines that utilize gashed, gear-shaped cutting tools to shape and smooth gear teeth or to correct distortions remaining from roughing (gear-cutting) operation, following machining instructions and knowledge of gear-shaving methods. Respnsibilities include:

• Reads blueprints or machining instructions to determine machine settings, fixtures and cutterheads to use, and gear dimensions and tolerances.
• Presses gear on arbor and mounts it between centers, using handtools.
• Mounts cutter on cutterhead.
• Moves controls to set feed rates, cutting speeds, reciprocating action, and angles of cutter and gear.
• Turns handwheel to feed gear to cutter.
• Verifies conformance to specifications, using micrometers, measuring wires, and involute checker. May compute gear dimensions and machine settings, applying knowledge of shop mathematics and gear formulas.
• May work on nonmetallic gears.
• May be required to have experience with custom or production work, or with particular material, kind of gear, or machine of particular type or trade name.