Custom wheel making
 

Has any team here made custom wheels here. If so what was your process. How much did it cost? and did it work they well?

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Yes. CNC Milling. $1.69/lb. Yes.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

what was this wheel made out of and do you have a picture of it? Thank you for responding.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

The best I have is this picture of our whole robot. The wheel was made out of 6061-T6 aluminum round bar. It took about 20 minutes each to machine on a vertical machining center. The majority of the time was cutting the groove for the tread and corner rounding the edges. I could probably cut down the cycle time now that I've learned a bit more about feedrates and material removal rates.

If you search the CD media section, there are several examples of custom made wheels.

Wheels can even be made on a manual mill and/or lathe if you don't have access to a CNC, and if you have enough patience and time.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Here's two better pictures.
http://i.imgur.com/btUmTzW.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/ZUqlDUP.jpg

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Dude. That is one gnarly gearbox. I love the ano, HSM pocketing, and the ratchet. Was it for a lock for a 30 point climb?

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Thank you!

Yes, the ratchet is attached to a spindle, which can be engaged by actuating a pancake piston. It can be used for a 30 pt climb, if anyone decides to actually design it. :rolleyes:

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Yes. We had a friend at Stratasys 3D Print 2 different versions of them (see picture below). The white wheels were Gen1 and they were made from abs m30, we ran into the problem of hubs getting stripped of their hex shape, so we replaced them with the black ones which were made from Ultem (which were about twice as strong) and they seem to be working just fine. For us the wheels were free, but MSRP we have heard (from different people) that they range from about $150/wheel to about $300.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Wow... And I thought AM wheels were expensive. That seems like some really nice stuff. Any reason why the 3D printed one is better then say an regular Alum one (besides the fact it was free :P).

Re: Custom wheel making
 

We didn't have the CNC machine time and Stratasys can print oodles of these for machine tests and demos. We were looking for a one piece wheel that would have been expensive to purchase otherwise.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

How did the cost break down for the 3D printed wheels? Was it mostly materials or simply having them 3D printed? Do you know if a team has their own 3D printer about how much it would cost to print each wheel?

Re: Custom wheel making
 

I believe that with our final set of wheels, the consumer grade couldn't handle the material or the size of the job. It would also take a VERY long time. The shop that we work out of has a 3D printer and even printing wheel spacers takes a good deal of time.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

We're a team that used to make custom wheels every season, and we likely won't ever again.

Just too many solid COTS options, unless you have every part of your robot perfect, it's really a wasted resource to make custom wheels.

Sure are cool though.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Below is a link to some pics showing the evolution of the design we used from 2007-2010. We stopped doing it when the AM performance wheels became cheap enough and available in the right configuration so that we had no real gain from making our own.

The raw material cost on these was less that $5/wheel but not having to worry about the resources to make them is worth paying for wheels to us.
This is the driven version. We also made a live axle version.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/31102
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/31104
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/31105

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Cannot agree more with this entire post.

We made custom wheels for a long time, and when we started looking at COTS options and the time difference between implementing them- it was a no brainer to go COTS.

They make for a fun project, and there are a ton of cool things you can do with them in terms of making them (machining, molding, printing, etc). For us, the effort is just better spent in other places.

-Brando

Re: Custom wheel making
 

I agree entirely as well, but if you have the resources readily available, it can be cheaper to make your own wheels.

In 2008, 2079 needed leather treaded wheels (torque miscalculation required that our swerve drive have very little friction on the wheels). We found a lot of suitable off-the-shelf wheels that were very expensive compared to the cost of raw material, and relatively minimal machine time to create a simple wheel. We were able to create some very cheap custom wheels for our intake in 2009.

I suppose it does depend on what you use the wheels for, which ones are available for purchase that suit your needs, and how you are going to fabricate them.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

I think a great model to apply in situations is WW2056D (What would 2056 do).

Across the board on their designs, they seem to much prefer to buy existing solutions from a variety of COTS sources even though they do have fabrication options.

This lets them finish sooner, and with less work.

We're trying to apply the WW2056D model versus the machine it all because you are capable of machining it all model.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

We started with this idea, but found that our COTS wheels (Colsons) were too small, and no COTS wheels would fit our design after the face. So, we went custom.

By the time we manually machined, knurled, broached, and pressed hubs on the Colsons, we just about could have made our own wheels to the perfect size. And, we can do it in-house, and while we can still get aluminum for $1.69/lb, we might as well.

If there was a COTS wheel that was the same size, weight, and bore that we'd make anyway, I wouldn't bother making them. But I've yet to see something good with a 7/16" hex bore.

I agree though, that you should definitely attempt to buy over building, if the off the shelf options fit your needs. You're not just buying wheels, you're buying time.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

For us, custom wheels are filed firmly in the ANGTFT category.

Re: Custom wheel making
 

Are team custom made these wheels in 07.
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/20329


They are made from aluminium tubes with a aluminium disc welded in the centre. A live axle hub is welded to the disc. It was then sand blasted to give it a nice finish. The tread is riveted to the tube. In this case time was the majority of the cost.