2011 Dewalt Supliers.

[Hawiian Cadder]

after witnessing poor performance and reliability with my teams staple BB planetary gearboxes, i want to gather some information on the Dewalt gearboxes for my team, i was wondering if there are any suppliers. we will be buying the parts before this school year ends. if the XRP gearbox has been phased out, is there anywhere we can buy them, or something similar, in order to use these gearboxes.

[Greg Needel]

most if not all of the parts are still available from www.dewaltservicenet.com additional options are to see what parts exist at your local service center. You can also go the other route and buy drills, there are places online that you can buy complete refurbished drills. http://www.toolking.com/dewalt-dc930-factory-reconditioned-14-4-volt-cordless-1-2-inch-drill-driver-bare-tool-with-case

The xrp line that the NBD was based on was discontinued a year ago the new drills can be modified in a similar manner with some experimentation.


If you do plan to go the route where you take drills apart, be aware that you actually need more parts than 1 drill can provide. Additionally if you are going to do a machining setup to bore the sun gears for pressing on CIM motors I recommend making as many as you can all at once. Trying to find a WIRE EDM will be very helpful as powdered metal does not machine well.

[Gary Dillard]

Trying to find a WIRE EDM will be very helpful as powdered metal does not machine well.

I think you mean EDM, not wire EDM, for boring the holes. Holes are made with an electrode, versus a wire which is used for cutting. SPAM was able to bore all of theirs with standard carbide tools; I don't know how difficult it was (they have a "real" machinist on the team) but as far as I know we didn't ever break any. Still, EDM for powdered metal is probably preferred if you have a choice.

Love those NBD's

[Tristan Lall]

I think you mean EDM, not wire EDM, for boring the holes. Holes are made with an electrode, versus a wire which is used for cutting. SPAM was able to bore all of theirs with standard carbide tools; I don't know how difficult it was (they have a "real" machinist on the team) but as far as I know we didn't ever break any. Still, EDM for powdered metal is probably preferred if you have a choice.Actually, a wire EDM machine can do this job too. It works because there's already a hole in the sintered gear (through which you can feed the wire). (188 has occasionally used this method for cutting gear bores.)

[AdamHeard]

Actually, a wire EDM machine can do this job too. It works because there's already a hole in the sintered gear (through which you can feed the wire). (188 has occasionally used this method for cutting gear bores.)

Yeah, and it may be preferable for sponsors who want to make an electrode the size you need.

[Bruceb]

Anybody used the toolking referbished dewalts?
Thinking of playing with dewalt transmissions this summer.
Also, what kind of carbide tooling do you need to drill these holes if you don't have an edm available?
Bruce

[Bruceb]

Greg, you said If you do plan to go the route where you take drills apart, be aware that you actually need more parts than 1 drill can provide.

What do you need other than a servo?
Bruce

[Jim Zondag]

Anybody used the toolking referbished dewalts?
Thinking of playing with dewalt transmissions this summer.
Also, what kind of carbide tooling do you need to drill these holes if you don't have an edm available?
Bruce

We have made these NBD drill assemblies by hand without an EDM in our shop several times. We used lathe with a small carbide boring bar to carefully open up the center of the cluster gear which goes on the CIM shaft. No problem. We used a solid carbide 1/8" drill bit to bore the center of the pinion which goes on the Fisher price. I put a little red Loctite on them when we press them together, just to be sure.

[Mr. Lim]

One of our team's mentors, David Edwards, has a fair amount of experience modifying the newer DeWalt planetary gearboxes for use with the Fisher-Price motors in the KoP.

Here is a thread describing the process he used during the 2010 season:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?t=80933&highlight=new+dewalt

[JamesCH95]

I've drilled a couple of the powder metal gears with regular jobber drills, just go slow and make liberal use of coolant. Sharp drill bits go a long way and don't forget to center drill.

In my experience the DeWalt transmissions can handle far more abuse than any motor can dish out. In 2005 I made a transmission that used two FP motors, it snapped a case-hardened Thomson drive-shaft without even trying. They are capable of 50+ lb*ft of torque reliably.

[Chris Hibner]

There's a guy on these boards named Josh Murphy, who is the king of the NBD. He can turn a Dewalt into a robot gearbox in no time. Send him a PM (his user name is Josh Murphy).

[Hawiian Cadder]

thank you for all the help, we order d a couple of transmissions today, and we hope to test them out before we order many more.

[Bruceb]

Picked up one of the toolking referb dewalts. The first thing I noticed was that the shaft that the chuck is screwed to is held into the gearcase on just a standard taper. The experience I have with taper fittings is that if you put a continuous side force on them they eventually loosen up and fall out. How do you keep this from happening on the dewalt?
Bruce

[Tristan Lall]

Picked up one of the toolking referb dewalts. The first thing I noticed was that the shaft that the chuck is screwed to is held into the gearcase on just a standard taper. The experience I have with taper fittings is that if you put a continuous side force on them they eventually loosen up and fall out. How do you keep this from happening on the dewalt?
BruceLike a Jacobs taper, except on the gearbox end rather than the chuck end? The old XRP (from the original NBD) used a straight (well, stepped) shaft with two opposing flats on the gearbox end.

In any event, the one year I used one of these on the robot, to avoid trying to deal with the standard shaft and an adapter for the drive sprockets, I just removed and replaced the entire output shaft with something else that interfaced with the gearbox output. (And then, because it was a weak steel, the torque promptly twisted it around until it deformed and failed. So if you go that route with an old XRP, harden the shaft—maybe some tempered O1 steel would work well.)

Maybe DeWalt switched to the taper drive in order to avoid breaking shafts?

[JamesCH95]

+1 to the heat-treated output shaft. An alloy steel like 4130 or 4340 might work very well, and they can be heat-treated to very high strengths. Watch out for warping during heat-treatment; you may want to machine 95% of the part, heat treat it, then finish machining it if you find that the additional strength is required. Titanium (I know it's expensive) would do very well because of it's relatively high shear strength as compared to steel or aluminum. It would be a smart place to use titanium, not just to say "we used titanium."

[Bruceb]

So you are saying this is something new? The old ones had a fixed shaft?
Bruce

[Tristan Lall]

So you are saying this is something new? The old ones had a fixed shaft?A picture would be useful here, but I don't have any...so I'll try to explain.

The old DeWalt XRPs had a cast metal housing that slipped partially over the gearbox, and extended forward to the chuck. It contained the drive shaft, and retained it with two dissimilar ball bearings (looked like conventional ones; no angular contact or fancy stuff). We (188 in 2006) deviated from the standard NBD plan by removing the shaft, and replacing it with a different shaft that fit within the same housing, but which had a Ø0.5 in keyed shaft instead of the chuck thread and left-hand retaining screw. On the gearbox end of that shaft, we milled two opposing flats on the cylinder (so it looked something like the Ø0.375 in portion of the Globe motor shaft). Those flats interfaced with a little sintered steel coupling on the front of the gearbox, providing a positive connection that was not susceptible to small axial misalignment.

If I'm understanding you correctly, they've replaced the shaft-with-flats with a taper. That ought to work too, as long as you make sure (as we did) to let the shoulder on the shaft transmit the axial loads to the housing, so that the taper doesn't disengage.

[Bruceb]

Well, maybe they didnt change it after all. The shaft, after I took it all appart, is press fit into the bearing and then trapped buy a steel ring behind it that is about .375 wide and looks for all the world like just a piece of steel tube but it only fits on the shaft one way like it has a mating taper behind the bearing.
Tristan, did you use hardened steel for the shaft that you made?
Bruce

[Tristan Lall]

Well, maybe they didnt change it after all. The shaft, after I took it all appart, is press fit into the bearing and then trapped buy a steel ring behind it that is about .375 wide and looks for all the world like just a piece of steel tube but it only fits on the shaft one way like it has a mating taper behind the bearing.
Tristan, did you use hardened steel for the shaft that you made?
BruceThat's how it worked on the old drill. The retaining collar was a press fit, and though the inside may have had a taper (I never checked), the shaft itself was straight.

We didn't use hardened steel for the shafts, and that was a mistake. The steel we used (AISI 1018 first, I think, then AISI 12L14) was weak and ductile, and the torque of the drivetrain caused it to twist at the interface with the planetary gearbox after repeated back-and-forth cycling. In retrospect, we should have just used AISI O1 drill rod, and then hardened and tempered it.

[Bruceb]

O.K. I'm not a machinist so how do you harden and temper drill rod after machining it? I think that is what I would like to do as the shaft on the Dewalt does not exactly fit my application.
Bruce

[JamesCH95]

Here's a Datasheet on AISI 01 Steel: http://www.act-on.ca/acton/Steel/Images/PDF/AISI%2001.pdf

It outlines different heat-treating procedures. Usually one would send parts out to a heat treating shop.

Look at this hardness-to-strength conversion chart for steels to chose the hardness you would like to achieve through heat-treating: http://www.engineersedge.com/hardness_conversion.htm
You'll pick a range for the heat-treater to aim for. My experience with 4130/4340 steel (which is commonly used in high-performance driveshafts) has been that Rockwell C 25-30 is plenty strong with good ductility. If you harden the part too much it will crack before it yields much, and I would much rather have a part yield and still be functional than crack and be useless. If the shaft is experiencing frequent impact loading, a more ductile or less-stiff material would handle those loads better.

@Tristan: why did you (your team) go from 1018 steel to the somewhat weaker 12L14 steel? :confused: EDIT: I guess it depends on the grade of each steel, one could be stronger than the other, depending on heat-treatment and cold working.

[Bruceb]

James, is there a steel that would replace the dewalt driveshaft that I can machine and not need to be heat treated? Going to power a swerve drive with it?
Thanks
Bruce

[JamesCH95]

What motor are you planning to connect to it?
What gear (1st, 2nd, or 3rd) do you plan to use?
Depending on your expected output torques it might be impossible to have adequate strength without heat-treatment.


I would consider 6-4 Titanium, 4130, 8620, or 4340 steel.

"But Titanium is so expensive!" -- It's lighter, stronger, and IMHO very appropriate for this application. And you could get a 0.500"ODx36"L titanium bar from http://titaniumjoe.com/6al-4v%20round%20bars.htm for ~$60, from which you'll be able to make many output shafts. It will be a little more difficult to machine, but still very doable.

4130/8620/4340 are fairly inexpensive, not terribly difficult to machine well (get some carbide insert lathe tools though) and has good strength (8620 is the strongest). They can also be welded very easily (ER70S-2 TIG wire is good for these low-carbon alloys) so you could weld on an output gear or sprocket without much difficulty.

[Bruceb]

Sorry all gears using a CIM. Can you lathe turn titanium with a carbide tool?
Bruce

[JamesCH95]

Yes you can. I wouldn't use anything other than carbide! I personally love 3-point carbide insert tools, $20-25 for the bar + 1 insert, and $7 for extra inserts. And each insert has 3 usable faces, so each insert lasts quite a long time. I have also machined titanium with standard carbide tools with good results too. Heavy feeds, slow speeds, and lots of cutting fluid, similar to SS.

[Tristan Lall]

@Tristan: why did you (your team) go from 1018 steel to the somewhat weaker 12L14 steel? EDIT: I guess it depends on the grade of each steel, one could be stronger than the other, depending on heat-treatment and cold working.I originally recalled that it was AISI 1018, but thinking about it some more, it might have been AISI 1045 (turned, ground & polished stock). It was a while ago, so I'm not sure what we actually used.

The AISI 12L14 was used because we had it available, and didn't have too much time to make the replacement shafts (it's a free-machining leaded steel). It was even more ductile, and twisted before failing.

A good alloy steel or titanium alloy would probably work for this application too. Those may well have sufficient strength, without having to deal with hardening—but at a somewhat higher raw material cost. (But hardening O1 or an alloy/tool steel will give even greater strength, if needed.)