Your Versachassis??
 

Our team has talked about to new versachassis but have wondered with all the different parts what exactly which combination we should get. So we are asking you, if you were to go order everything for your versachassis, what would YOU get??

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

This would be my versachassis. We ran a similar setup we made ourselves in the offseason and loved it.

The list is:
- 27" long 2x1 VersaFrame tubing (x2)
- 25" long 2x1 VersaFrame tubing (x2)
- VersaFrame Gussets (x4) (specifically 4 90º angle gussets)
- VersaBlock (x5) (4 for the outside, the two sides of the fifth are used as the outer blocks of the center)
- 4x1.5" Colson Performa wheel (x6)
- WCP Colson Live Axle Hub (x6)
- 36" of 1/2" hex shaft (x1)
- 3 CIM WCP SS geared for 16 ft/s through the 40-34 gear kit at a 5.35 ratio (x2)
- Spiral Cam Tensioner (x4)
- 24 tooth 9mm HTD pulley (x8)
- 120 tooth 9mmx5mm HTD timing belt (x4)
- CIM motors (x4)
- Mini CIM motors (x2)
- 22x27" plywood base 6mm thick (x1) (Local hardware store)

This is literally everything in the picture except for the washers and bolts on the ends of the wheel shafts, and the rivets. Solidworks puts the weight at 34 lbs (I put all the correct weights and materials in for each object). Our driver loved the setup.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

with the versa blocks, the 5th one is split, each half used on the middle outside. What is used on the inside and how did your transmission "connect"?

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

Just kidding around but when I read this topic title I was like what about: http://us.versace.com/

:yikes:

Say versachassis and versace fast.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

The transmission is connected to the inside of the tubing. The holes next to the output shaft are connected to the outer half of the bearing block and this holds the transmission and the block together. Alongside that there are two slightly larger mounting holes on the side of the transmission about 6 inches apart (that number may be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that's it, doesn't matter though) that both hold the transmission together and hold it to the inside the frame.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

I got ya, so im assuming you use pop rivets, what size? We used 1/4" aluminum rivets last year I believe.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

We like 3/16" aluminum pop rivets. Perfect size and not too small while not taking up too much room. I know the holes on the VersaTubing are 5/32, so we're just going to take a 3/16" drill bit and widen them up a bit. Wouldn't take more than a minute or so to do all of them.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

We purchased the 1/4" rivet gun from harbor freight...think that has enough power to pull rivets for a chassis?

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

Definitely.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

Alright we have always used 1/4" bolts and never have used rivets on a drive train so you could say we are "nervous" aha.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

We just used rivets for the first time on our offseason bot and absolutely loved them. They're essentially weightless, extremely strong given a tight and concentric hole, and simple to use. 10/10 would rivet again.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

Do you happen to know when the VersaChassis user Manuel will be released? and we are realy questioning using the Versa stuff because of the shipping date not being till the 15th on a lot of the things we would need. Have you looked into that?

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

1/4 rivets are overkill so I wouldn't be worried. All of our frame was connected with 3/16" rivets last year(no welding, no bolts). Even 1/4-20 bolts are overkill. We switched to 10-32 for everything last year which can save you a bit of weight.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

I honestly don't have a problem with the parts not shipping until the 15th. It gives me time to design my robot in CAD for the game, and since all of the parts for the VersaChassis are available for CAD on the WCP/VEXpro websites I can easily design my drivetrain in an hour at most, and move on knowing I can change my drive at any time because the VersaChassis product line is so interchangeable. So if kickoff is January 4th, that gives me a week and a half to design most of my robot in CAD, I order my parts when I know what I want, then they ship on the 15th, which is a Wednesday, so that I know when they arrive at or before Saturday I have a simple and functional drivetrain model to work off of, and in a matter of hours I'll have a functional drivetrain we can use at the end of week 2.

I'm not sure when the manual will be released, but I'd argue it's coming up within the next week if not sooner.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

Rivets are good. We've used 1/4 rivets which integrate nicely when we use the kitbot chassis. They are overkill for most applications but on the kitbot they are great. 3/16 is perfect for pretty much all FRC applications.

I would recommend that in some applications to think twice about using rivets. We have all too often riveted pieces together only to be stuck having to drill them out when something needs to be changed or taken off the robot. Using nuts and bolts to assemble your robot then replace them with rivets is a great idea when you find yourself designing on the fly. Nuts and bolts are also great when making mechanisms modular or to swap replacement parts easily. We designed our shooter plate this year that with four bolts we could drop our shooter motors and wheels out of our robot for repair or replacement.

Technically you can drill out a rivet faster than taking off a nut or bolt but dealing with metal shavings flying around your robot isn't always the best idea when electronics are involved.

Re: Your Versachassis??
 

I wouldn't worry too much. I think a lot of that is VP wanting to be really happy with their quality before they ship their product, and wanting to be able to say that if they said the 15th, it will ship by the 15th.

Knowing the people who worked on this, I'd bet that almost all of those parts should be ready by (or before) kickoff, but they want to make extra- extra-sure that all their products are really high quality by the date they said they would ship them by. In any case, like Andrew said, the 15th is right around when most people will start to want those parts anyway.