VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

There's been a lot of moaning and groaning about IFI's poor customer service (for good reason, as my team has experienced), but let's leave that for another thread. I'd like to talk about the technical aspects of the new products, and ask for others' input on them. My first impressions are below.



VersaPlanetary Gearboxes

An extremely good product, made even better. VEXPro has added a new gear ratio (7:1) and plastic piloting plates for each type of motor.

Like: The new piloting plates are excellent. With the removal of the first internal bearing, the motor shaft is no longer overconstrained.

Dislike: Still no official support for CIM and Mini-CIM integration. The new plates make using those motors easier, but proper use still requires a few machining steps. Here's a hint: make the motor plate mount holes rest on a true 2-inch bolt circle. Also, there should be labeling stickers for combinations of 7:1 stages. Simply reusing last year's stickers seems a bit lazy.


Hex Shaft

Much better straightness tolerance than last year. Of the six 3-ft shafts we received initially, two were within .020 of true, three were within .050, and one was above .100. (We measured the height of the center, with the ends resting on a flat surface.) From what I gather, the main difference is in the shipping method -- packing in a box this time around. For the future, I would like to see the shaft packed in a shipping tube. In addition, it would be nice if better extrusion methods could be investigated. Last year, WCP sold cold-finished shafts at a competitive price. Obviously, with the recent partnership, these are no longer available on the market. I'd appreciate if VEXPro could bring them back.


VersaFrame Gussets

Like: These offer a lot of good frame options to teams. The design of these was well-considered.

Dislike: The rivet size is very, very weird. Beyond that, though, the biggest issue I have with these is price. When a T-gusset costs us $2.50 apiece, it's much more economical for us to have a sponsor laser us something similar. Such an option is not available for everyone.


Ball Shifters

The flagship VEXPro product, essentially. There have been a few modifications, but not enough.

Like: Last year's construction was robust, and this year's equally so. The gearboxes are still much lighter than anything else on the market, and personally, I greatly prefer the shifting method over dog or friction clutches.

Dislike: First off, the fact that the gearboxes still use the same encoder gear as last year comes as an incredible disappointment. Last time around, the press-fit was absolute trash, and required superglue on more than one occasion to retain properly. I expected better from a company that invites us to "Play with the Pros". This year we are using a different mounting method for our encoders, so the first thing I did upon opening the box was to toss those gears. If they've actually been improved, please correct me; nothing in the ball-shifter literature suggests that they have been.

The R6 and R8 internal bearings of the gearbox have been changed from shielded to rubber-sealed bearings. I suppose the idea is to protect from grease. This would be fine, if they were actually sealed properly. The R8 bearings we received had a visible separation between the rubber and the outer race; I could peer inside the bearing housing.

Some of the hole tolerances are off; a few holes that were intended to be clearance holes needed some force to push screws through.

On the VEXPro website, the option to purchase a pneumatic shifting cylinder is separated from the option to purchase the base kit. I'm sure there could be legitimate reasons for this, but what I see is a blatant attempt to obfuscate realistic pricing data from the buyer. What a poor way to treat your customers. Please prove my accusations groundless.



That's enough from me. Of course, my team has tried but a few of the vast array of VEXPro products, and none of the materials have made it through a season. What are your impressions on the product line? In particular, I'm curious as to how well the new belts/pulleys and wheels work.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Can't be sure of my source here. But I seem to recall someone from vex saying they had made modifications to the encoder gear press fit to make it much more reliable. Might be worth looking into.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I wasn't going to comment on this post, until I saw this. Our team really took a hit on this. We ordered 4 of the 3 stage Ball Shifters and when we got our order, we found out that they had separated the Pancake cylinders out of the "base kit". I guess we ordered the Shifters thinking they would include one of the most important parts of making the shifter work, without the cylinder, the shifters are kind of useless. I thought it was a sneaky and unfair move on their part to raise prices. Maybe next time they could just raise the price of the entire thing without taking out critical parts of the kit.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Regarding the pancake cylinder... A lot of older teams have a lot of pneumatic parts sitting around their shops. It really wouldn't be surprising to want to save money by not getting the pancake shifter and instead making one of your existing cylinders work. I know when we ordered a ball shifter from VEX this year, I found it fairly clear on the website and ordered a pancake cylinder from the start.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I had the same experience. This seemed pretty obvious to me, and hardly a "blatant attempt to obfuscate" or "sneaky". Intimating that the people at IMI are trying to pull a fast one on us is worse than speculative, and hardly helpful.

Regarding product quality, there are certainly good and bad things to say about VexPro products, just like AndyMark and any other COTS stuff we use. Constructive feedback will probably help make better products in the long run; just look how far we've come in the last five years. But if companies like Apple can have problems with supply chain, quality, and customer satisfaction, with their decades of experience, armies of employees, and mountains of money, how can we expect perfection from a small company testing the waters with new products for the nichest of niche markets?

VexPro products have significantly raised the bar in the last two years, and their current issues are largely due to our overwhelming (and probably unpredictable) demand for their products. Keep that in mind please.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

We actually released both the 7:1 and the 9:1 this year.

We manufactured enough VP last year to make it through about 2 seasons worth of sales. As such, there was only so much we could change this year. The input housings, gear kits, output housings, and shafts we are using this year are exactly the same as last year. The hole pattern on the input housing was not intended to mount any CIM style motor. We figured teams would try to modify them so we put the 8mm bore with keyway because it was about the size we needed for the couplers anyway. Looking back, we could have just put the 2" pattern in the input housing mounting, but we used a 35mm square pattern instead. We will change this when we have to make more housings and add official support for CIM style motors after we do our own testing. The initial design intent for these gearboxes was only for the smaller motors and never for the larger motors. We have done 0 testing with CIMs and MiniCIMs so use at your own risk.

We had strong customer feedback in 2 other areas:

1. Motor mounting and efficiency. Although the gears are very efficient, in some cases the motor mounting was putting undo pressure on the motor shaft causing excessive efficiency loss. We solved this problem by making plastic motor mounts and eliminating the input bearing. This gives about a 20% increase in efficiency.

2. Custom configurations. Last year you could order 3:1 and 4:1 gearboxes with a CIM output shaft or 5:1 and 10:1 with a 1/2" hex. Many customers asked to be able to configure their own gearbox so we accommodated them this year.

In order to achieve these two requests we had to disassemble every gearbox in inventory, take out the input bearing, add the plastic motor mounts, and reconfigure the boxes to have the base kits. The stickers were already in the boxes and throwing them away seemed silly. I apologize for not adding the additional ratio stickers for the 7:1 and 9:1. We will do better next time.




The 3' sections of hex stock are actually the left over inventory from last year. These extrusions are done at tolerances much tighter than any regular extruding house was willing to do. The tolerance on this shaft is tight, really tight. The 3' section did not have a flatness specification so some sections are less flat than I would like, but we did not put it on the drawing. Cold rolled hex shafts hex sizes are all over the place. Most times you need to file down the hex just to get it to fit. Our hex stock is all slightly undersized with a very tight tolerance so I am certain the extrusion method is sound. We also have released 18" versions that have a very tight flatness control, so if that is important to you, then I suggest you purchase those.


The rivet size is a 5/32 rivet. It is a very common rivet size that many teams have been using for years. Also, it can be drilled out to 3/16 or 1/4 very easily.

Ask your sponsor how much they would charge someone for one T-gusset if they were not making it for free. Better yet, ask them how much it costs them. I think you will be surprised at the answer.

Regarding the encoders, all Ball shifter gearbox customers should have received an e-mail from us at the beginning of the season stating that if they are using the encoder gears and are dissatisfied with the performance, they can contact customer service and we will send them a new (gray color) encoder gear to replace it. This gear has a much tighter press fit into the shaft. Many customers do not use encoders with this gearbox so sending out a mass shipment to every customer was just not practical. These gears were late because we were not satisfied with the fit so we shipped the initial gearboxes with the gears we had in inventory to not hold up shipment. again, any ball shifter customer from last year or this year can contact VEX and request a replacement gear and we will send it completely free of charge.

We ran out of the shielded bearings and the rubber seal bearings are all we could get in time. FRC application does not require a rubber seal, only a shield so we felt these bearings were fine for the application.


Emphasis mine. Really? Then go buy a different gearbox if you feel this way. I know my PR people are going to be angry with me, but what the heck are you talking about? Have you even compared prices to other products? None of the competitors' products include cylinders. None of the competitors' baseline products include the more expensive aluminum gears. And the Ball shifter is less expensive than any of those products. Your facts are totally wrong. Totally wrong.

Did you even think that some people may not want the cylinder? This cylinder is $40 and is an unnecessary expense if you already have it. We clearly put on our web site that it was not included. With that said, there was a period during the inventory transition that our web site stated the ball shifters included the cylinder, because we included it last year. Customers that ordered at that time (during the order period for the old 2 CIM Ball Shifter) that have contacted us were sent the cylinders free of charge.

Are you stating that you purchased VEXpro items from us last year and they did not make it through last season? If so, then I am interested to know what products you are referring to so we can determine if that was normal wear or unusual circumstances.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

The shipping delays were bad for a lot of teams, but IFI and WCP have had nothing but the best customer service during the course of this season so far. They did everything in their power to get teams their parts as quickly as possible, given the low inventory they had a large mass of orders to tend to, and have been very transparent to teams about the given situation. To blatantly call out their customer service and degrade it (especially in a thread where you claim your only intent is product performance) is not only disrespectful, but also embarrassing to see from one of the top California teams.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

VersaPlanetaries are still the biggest game changer for our team in several years. The improvements this year make it even better.

The large selection of quality aluminum gears are a close second.

The inventory problems are a pain in the you-know-what but they show how the products from Vex and AM have really changed our sport. I'm excited to see what teams are doing with this stuff this year.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

All of this supports my thought that FRC has become too reliant on COTS items. :rolleyes:

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Maybe you're right. Ideally all teams would have access to a mill and lathe and have some ways to slide into Plan B if certain items become unavailable.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

this is a problem why?

Raising the floor makes all the events more exciting, and its nice to see the ability for many teams to more "easily" make a robot that drives, but also has some sort of function.

I think the large array of COTS parts are great. Il add a review of 5031's vex experience once we get the rest of the parts we need to actually use them. (could have been delivered on the weekend, or yesterday, i don't know, haven't been at the school.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Seconded! Vex has been incredibly upfront with the status of everything we've ordered.

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About 2/3 of the money spent on our robots so far this year has gone toward Vex/WCP products. Everything we bought from them last year ran great through ten competitions, and after the game was released, we thought using their part ecosystem was the best COTS chassis option to meet our needs for this game. A team like ours would not be able to be near as competitive without the array of COTS options available by suppliers like Vex.

I really appreciate the responses in the various CD threads and Chance from Vex, Clinton from The Robot Space, and the WCP team for responding to my calls, helping me to properly forecast when items would arrive, and letting me know which distribution hub has given items in stock. We will be providing more business as the needs arise.

Thanks BTW for Build Blitz, it was nice showcase of how to make really effective robots while not neglecting the design process in a very short span of time. I learned a lot.

<offtopic>Is there a good choice of snap ring for the hex shafts on the Versachassis? Maybe a McMaster part #?</offtopic>

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I'm happy with the VEXPro experience thus far. We've had a few hiccups, but all of them due to user error :) (which is all well and good, it's a learning experience, the products aren't supposed to do the thinking for us)

Gussets - The gussets have all been great. We are using a number of them, and the concept has inspired the students to design their own custom gussets as well. They were so enthused about it that they went out and found waterjet sponsors so that they can expand on our VEXPro stock with their own custom additions. We switched to 5/32" rivets this year so that we could cut down on the number of drill bits we needed to stock and generally simplify fabrication (same hole size for #8 clear and 5/32" rivets). The only downside we've found with the 5/32" over 3/16" is that we can't get countersunk rivets for 5/32", which is fine because we don't actually need countersunk rivets for any reason, and if ever we do we'll just drill the holes out to 3/16".

VersaFrame 1x1 and 1x2 - My students have been drilling spectacularly centered holes on their tubes. They are all rookie students so I don't have last year to compare, perhaps they are just all naturally gifted fabricators. I think it's more likely that the etching on the tube is providing enough of a reference and guide to get the holes properly centered on the first try.

No specific comments on the other products yet as we haven't spent enough time with them.

Wait, what? It was stated multiple times in bold font that the cylinder is not included in the base kit. I figured it was because many teams would rather not spend $80 on new ones and would prefer to recycle the ones they had from last year.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Here you go

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Thank you!

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

We're using some VEX products this year, including many sets of wheels and versakey parts, and aluminum gears. I personally am loving the aluminum gears. They sounded great last night when paired with CIM motors and 11 tooth pinions (so much more gear ratio flexibility!)

Last year we ran the W-tread VersaWheels and were happy with them. We went from a much more expensive wheel and replacing the tread regularly (usually once per tournament) to a much cheaper, lighter wheel and replacing the whole wheel at the same interval (it's still cheaper to use the $5 disposable wheels vs plaction wheels and tread and a lot lighter)

In fact, I can't think of very much we bought from AM this year. Mostly pneumatic tanks and pumps and pneumatics stuff. Aluminum gears FTW.


Paul, could you put the gear ratio for the CIMile on the site? I downloaded the CAD model and figured it out from there. It's a fantastic ratio for both motors (29 tooth output gear, 12 tooth 775/8 tooth 550 input gear) (we aren't actually using a CIMile this year but we thought about it)

Also, you should make a shorter shift gearset for the ball shifter (<2:1) and a system to shift with vex motors.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I know this was intended to be somewhat sarcastic, but to those concerned about the impact of COTS on FRC (I'm not one)... these comments remind me there there is still a huge amount of value to building team resources that can machine components and do internal testing.

There is always room for improvement. For example, the VersaChassis tolerances aren't tight enough such that you can just slap rivets on a frame and magically get a perfectly square chassis. We had ~1/8" of runout at 1ft from square after the freshman rivet team had their fun. It probably would have worked, but I had them drill them all out, showed them how to assemble it square, match drill, watch that they weren't twisting the frame as they riveted, etc. Now we are < 1/32" runout at 1ft.

That being said, when the Versa 2x1" was out of stock, our team priced regular 2x1" stock at a local supply house. Same price. Meaning, VEXPro is already beating them on VALUE. Sure they can charge me double for the frame to tighten the tolerances up a bit to make it foolproof, or I can be less foolish.

Same thing goes for other products. I remember reading about motor failures (BAG?) because people were side-loading or thrust loading motor shafts that were never spec'd for those loads. I can either demand VEX make a "more robust" motor that has additional weight and size with internal bearings able to take more abuse... or I can not abuse it.

Another one for us was Delrin washers. We figured out pretty quick that the 1/16" or 1/8" spacers weren't a great value (for us), as we're lucky enough to have a laser cutter that can run 300 to a sheet for 10% of the cost. Not everyone has a 30W laser cutter though. Even then, the thicker ones bloomed too much and the 2" thick spacers were a better value than spanning a several inch gap with a bucket of 1/8" spacers. Same goes for machining, many teams with "free" student/mentor machining time can create parts from raw stock cheaper than VEX. I'm sure VEX would be perfectly willing to sell parts more cheaply to FRC if you will supply them with the parts at a consistent tolerance and free labor to make thousands of them each year.

Back to the OP:
Long story short, if you want to hop on CD to criticize VEXPro (or AM, or any of our other suppliers that cater to FRC)... you would be well off to word your posts more positively. I may share some frustrations, but I also understand what is and is not realistic to expect of both the equipment and the companies at the pricing we receive parts at.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Thus far we have been very impressed with the VP parts we've received.

The 2X1 versatube is just freakin' awesome stuff. I love the 0.100" wall for weight savings and the ability to stuff a pulley inside.

We used several of the 15mm HTD pulleys (24T and 36T), as well as a few belt sizes. The parts are all obviously very high quality. We of course love the black anodize of the pulleys, but the fact that we didnt need to machine off hubs, or broach them ourselves is just a giant PLUS in our book.

The gears are very high quality as well. The drivetrain all assembled very smoothly, and runs extremely smoothly with very little noticeable friction in the system. Our drive train subteam was extremely happy with the setup.

Some photos below showing our implementation.

-Brando

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Having never purchased VexPro parts before, extremely impressed with the Versaplanetaries. Gave one of our with-it a freshman a shipping box and a bucket of grease, told him where the Vex website was, and an hour later we had gearboxes! I love the options you have... ordered stages intending one set of ratios and actually built a separate set of ratios.

The CIM to VP also gave us an excuse to cut down some really banged up CIM output shafts.

There is just something adorable about a BAG in a Versaplanetary... thinking over the off-season we'll have to to purchase some 2 or 3 inch colsons and make a little drivetrain.

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Luckily we had a box of these laying around for ours! (Something that should have been included IMO.)

The 1/2" rings from this set worked perfectly.
http://www.harborfreight.com/300-pie...ent-67655.html

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

We've bought a bunch of VexPro products both this and last year, and have had zero problems with any of it this year. Zero.

The problems we had last year were dealt with quickly and professionally.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

As a mentor of our team, I am very disappointed to see some of the posts on CD blasting suppliers as some have. Is this the example we are wanting to set for our students? If these posts are from students, mentors where are you when the students need your guidance?

If you have such issues, deal directly with VEX. They have been very open to communications with all the teams here on CD and offered several ways for teams to communicate with them.


We are very fortunate to have suppliers who believe in FRC and the opportunities it provides for the students involved. I am certain that the prices and services they provide are not what we would find from other suppliers or we would see more vendors in this arena. AM, VEX and WCP are all veteran FRC'ers who know how the season goes in regards to getting orders in, managing time and completing builds.


Best of luck all.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

1296 ordered lots of stuff from VexPro this year and, like others, a few parts were late arriving. But I dealt with the VP staff personally (since I pick the stuff up on the way home from work) and found them very professional and eager to make up for anything they could. We got varying reasons for the delays but all seemed logical to me - indeed they have all happened to me. And I normally deal with huge suppliers, not a niche market like FIRST. When something delayed my "builds" I had to explain it to an Admiral (I made a big piece of the navigation systems on our carriers). Generally speaking my customers were understanding as long as I made it up somehow. The point is that this happens in the "real world". There are lessons to be learned. I have found that politely but firmly pressing my suppliers and working out realistic resolutions that benefit all parties is a good way to go.

I did NOT find the pricing "devious" in any way. On the contrary I liked the "configuration" approach on the VP web site. It made perfect sense to me.

Nothing we bought from VexPro, this year or last, has ever failed. We used ball-shifters, versa planetaries, motors, shafts, bearings and many pneumatic COTS items both last year and this year.

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I believe T^2 was simply stating that our 2014 VP products have not seen a whole season yet. Besides the 2 stage ball-shifter output shaft loctite issue and the encoder gear issue last year, I believe 1678 was very happy with all the 2013 VP stuff we ordered. In fact, since Versaplanetary's are just THAT awesome, we will be reusing many of the housings from last year, and just buying different gear stages as needed.

Unfortunately, for certain applications, an 18" length of hex shaft isn't long enough for what we want to do. Of course, if we need the straightness, then we can make an alternative method work out. Out of curiosity, does holding a flatness tolerance on the 36" pose manufacturing difficulties, hence why it wasn't specified in the drawing? Just wondering, one thing on my wishlist for next year would definitely be 36" hex shaft with a better flatness tolerance, but I understand if this is economically unfeasible.

Also, I think it worth mentioning that I don't share T^2's view on the pancake cylinders. It was clear to me that the pancake cylinder was an add on, the reasoning behind this decision is solid, and did not seem underhanded in any way. Also, I make half the purchases for 1678, and I think everything VP/WCP does on their sites is clearly communicated and easy to navigate. Non-issue for me.

-Mike

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Mike,

We just forgot it on the drawing. We were so focused on getting the Hex right, we didn't even think about specifying a flatness or straightness. Like I said before, the 3' shafts we had in stock were the remaining shafts from last year's purchase. Our new drawing has the straightness specified for our new purchase order. I am certain our supplier will push back on the straightness requirement for the 3/8" shaft, but at least the specification will make them pay attention to it.

Paul

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

My team is absolutely in love with the VersaWheel DT-- I've never seen our wheel assemblies go together so quickly. Can't wait to see them in action.

As a team that ordered almost all of our drive train components from VexPro, I've been nothing but impressed by how everything "just works." We had some changeover in our drive train group, so products that minimize the amount of time they have to spend adapting and forcing hex shafts into round holes are much appreciated.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Over here on 558 we've been waiting for our VEX/WCP parts just like everyone else. Now that they have arrived, we couldn't be happier. In fact, VEX went above and beyond and drop shipped the hubs to us when we had ordered them from WCP.

The new 2014 VexPro Drive in a Day Chassis looks great, and has already gone under the mill for some modifications. It's exactly what we were looking for, and I really like the improvements from last years design.

In typical fashion we will be running colson wheels with dead axle hubs. This new iteration (based on the original design I worked with WCP on back in 2011-2012) are excellent and everything went together as expected today. We'll share some more images when the chassis is fully assembled.

Attachment 15994

Nothing quite like a fresh box of Colsons...

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Hi Ben!

Here's what we use from www.mcmaster.com ...

e-Clips #97431A340

--Michael Blake

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

While we haven't purchased as much from VEX as other teams, what we have gotten has been great, Versaplanetarys are great and were very easy to assemble.

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Our team buys products from all of the better known COTS suppliers such as AM, VEXPro, BaneBots, McMaster, WC Products, Cross the Road Electronics, etc.

The one thing that stands out to me the most:

The presentation of the VEXPro/WC Products GearBoxes and how you choose your options.
Any person who is new to FRC can figure out what they "really" want by looking at the "Specs for Dummies" like me, especially giving FPS specs on the different size wheels.
In the past, we used our own experiments/experiences to judge what we wanted in terms of torque, speed, and drivetrain setup. We would change a variable or two based on past memory to determine how to adjust for a subsequent game.
It takes the guesswork out of us trying to figure out exactly what we want, saving us precious time and energy during an intense 6 week build season.

After doing 15 years of FRC, having more COTS supplier options is a whole lot better than the days of building your entire drivetrain/gearbox from scratch.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Well said.

There is a teachable lesson here for all FIRST team members. Buying from a manufacturer like Vexpro or Andymark is much different than going and buying something from Amazon.

1. Small suppliers can only keep a small supply on hand. They have to pay taxes on inventory, and over building and surplus inventory is a drag on a bottom line. All too often, that bottom line is very very small.

2. Small suppliers order in batches. They don't call a store two counties over and ask to have some stock sent over. They have to guess demand ahead of time and try to stock up.

3. Small suppliers have a small workforce. AM and Vexpro have one 'big' season. During the rest of the year, they're fullfilling orders but on a scale that is probably a couple orders of magnitude smaller. They can't quadruple their workforce then fire all those people.

Those who work in manufacturing or own a small business understand these things pretty well, but for most of our team members it's a new concept. They're use to retail: Amazon, Itunes, and Mcdonalds. Those people who have been with FIRST for some time have a point of reference in comparing good versus bad suppliers. Those who haven't been around don't have a reference point, and don't understand how excellent the service that we're getting really is.

Back to the original subject at hand - I absolutely love versa planetaries. They blow the Banebots products out of the water.

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Bad? I'm waiting for parts ordered before build season started that were in stock.

However, this is the only bad thing about vp. Their gears are the cheapest, look the nicest and are generally quite good. I'm not a huge fan of the loose fits of the bearings on the dog gears, but that's pretty minor. Another note, the CAD models don't have the exact/real sizes, they have 1.125" for a press fit hole that's slightly under, and they don't always specify the tolerances and concentricity and the fancy datum stuff, but the vex parts do seem to be a step above other suppliers in terms of accuracy.

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Genuinely curious- have you seen another supplier provide 'fancy datum stuff' like concentricity of a gear profile -> bearing hole?

If you are talking specifically about how round bearing openings are in plates, I think you're referring to the measurement known as Roundness.

Either way, I've never seen much GD&T tolerancing appear on vendor specs before, so I'm wondering where the expectation for that information comes from?

-Brando

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

magnets - Please reply to this thread (or send me a PM) with your order number and who you ordered it from (WCP, Robot Space, or VEXpro) and we can look up the status of your order.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Oops, I meant to add that I wasn't upset because none of the other suppliers really have them. I'm not looking for roundness on the bearing holes as they tend to be quite round, but my problem with the dog gear was the diameter was a touch bigger than I would have made it.

Knowing if stuff is really concentric can really help with design to locate features. For instance, the versa pattern thing on vex parts is very accurately concentric, but for instance, some of the recesses for fastener heads in the gearboxes for mounting aren't quite concentric with the mounting hole. In normal use, it doesn't really matter, but if you're using the plates/gearbox your own application, it's nice to know.

I wouldn't mind seeing stuff like circular runout on hubs and stuff. Whenever our kids draw a part in CAD, I have them do all the GD&T dimensions. We've got a great machinist who won't work with kids and drawings who don't have a good understanding of GD&T. As a result, we end up with a bunch of high school kids who really understand dimensioning parts and tolerances for machining and who understand how poor the field drawing FIRST supplies are.

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We agree on this: Good GD & T is essential to make parts that function properly and as required. All of our manufacturing drawings have fully dimensioned drawings with GD & T per ISO standards. Our customer interface drawings will never have them. Why? We believe that is proprietary information. We believe that prescribing total runout (because concentricity in the GD&T world has nothing to do with rotating a surface around an axis) for a hexagonal hole is one of the most complicated things to get right.

So, in general, for VEXpro items, things that are supposed to be locating features (versakey system, bearing bores) will be true and things that are fastening (screw counterbores) will be at the maximum allowable tolerance for the fastener to fit.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I don't think they make great machinists that will work with people who don't have a good understanding of GD&T. Watching people realize how hard it is to really know where something is is one of my favorite parts of the manufacturing phase of FRC.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Yes, I agree, VEX went out on a limb during their super busy VEX season to launch new VEXPro products. :rolleyes: In VEX and VexIQ we don't do that big math stuff, just trying to remember how big a difference in "a couple of orders of magnitude" is. "...middle and high school robotics program globally with more than 7,300 teams from 25 countries playing in over 400 tournaments worldwide." Lets see that's almost twice the number of FRC teams, so does that make it two orders of magnitude?

I'm impressed, my shipments of VEX and VexIQ parts are chugging along, sorry that your VexPRO stuff has had some snags. Kudos to the people in shipping that are making this happen.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Seconded. Call me lazy, but I visited the product page, didn't see a ratio, moved on to something else, and never looked back. It should have the ratio on the product page.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Thanks, but we've already been in contact. We don't desperately need the parts, and the customer service has been really great. Sorry for coming off as harsh.


This I get, and I must say, that all of the vex pro parts are just awesome in terms of tolerances.

You're right about the concentricity. I was going to write about something else, but totally forgot to add it. The GD&T concentricity (average or median location of points on circle, I forget which one) is useful for shafts, as at high speeds vibration happens. We've only seen this being a problem when reusing custom gearbox shafts in high speed applications.

Tonight, out of curiosity, I measured a few parts to check the tolerances. I was unable to measure any runout on a hex hub we got today with some cheapo digital indicator. This is the first time I've ever seen this on an FRC supplier part like this.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I unfortunately don't have PR people of my own, so I can only try to be as honest as possible about my VEXPro experience. Yes, I did consider that some teams may already have the specific cylinders required for the gearboxes. However, I did not and do not know how great that number is. Frankly, I assumed it would be a small minority of teams who choose to purchase a shifter from VEXPro. I'm curious to know if I'm wrong about this.

To me, and to several other posters in this thread, it was fairly clear that we had to additionally purchase a cylinder. I don't think it was clear enough for everyone, though; oftentimes, what instructions are obvious to some can be missed by others. Example 1: the FRC game rules, and the numerous CD threads that follow Kickoff asking for clarification. Example 2: When my team purchased a Classmate laptop last year, the website came with an option to buy an AC adapter for the computer, in such a way as to imply that we needed to buy it separately. Eventually we found that this was not the case. Upon exploring the new VEXPro product pages, I got a similar feeling.

This, I believe, could be easily rectified with a few changes to the website's formatting. First, let the defaults for the parts that need purchase be what most teams actually buy. I'll use the 3-CIM shifter page as an example, because it has the most options. I notice that the default for "Base Options" isn't "none", but rather "3 CIM Ball Shifter Base Kit". Similarly, the default for cylinders should be for 1 cylinder and 1 fitting kit. Second, options should not be completely hidden. Currently, when I change the radio button from "Base Kit" to "Base Kit with WCD 3rd Stage", "3rd Stage Gear Kits" and "WCD Sprocket Options" appear. (I can't select "Base Kit with 3rd Stage" at the moment, but I assume that only "3rd Stage Gear Kits" will appear.) This is a bit confusing for customers who want a third stage. Having the "3rd Stage Gear Kits" and "WCD Sprocket Options" sections be grayed out, rather than invisible, when purchasing the base kit or "None" would be preferable. These are both small changes, but they would make my buying experience better.

I was talking about this year's items, not last year's. I simply meant that no new parts have been in competition yet, hence the "initial impressions" thread.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I think it was as clear as it could reasonably be that the cylinder wasn't included.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

QFT

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Concentricity is the median position of all the points on a cylinder, with respect to an axis. It's extremely hard to properly establish. Total runout is almost always a better callout.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

The CIM-ile ratios are now posted and it is also back In Stock.

Ratio with RS-550: 9:29
Ratio with RS-775: 12:29

Best,
Ricky

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

For those of you that use the other notation (like me), these are speed reducing, torque increasing gearboxes designed to make the motors "match" a CIM motor both physically and speed characteristics.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Can we sandwich a 4" VersaWheel between two HTD pulleys set up for 15mm belts, similar to what is done with the center wheel in the KOP drivetrain?

Essentially it will be pulley-wheel-pulley.

We don't need a versahub in between, correct? Also, what size of #8 bolts do we need? The max on the Vexpro site is 2". This looks like it would be longer.

Thanks.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Paul, is the option of getting the cylinders still open? My team ordered a pair of 2-CIM ball shifters back in December when the website still said they came with cylinders, by the time they got to us though, the website had changed to say they did not, so we figured it had been a typo and did not pursue it further at the time.


Now, getting back to the subject of this thread, I will add a few thoughts...

This is our first year buying VEXPro products (aside from speed controllers); we started with a pair of 2 CIM Ball Shifters we ordered in December, and after being impressed with their quality and ease of assembly, we went on to purchase a pair of 3-CIM Ball shifters, 14 4" Traction Wheels, 24 50-tooth Gears and some Hex Shaft (all of which we plan to use to drive this). Here's my personal opinions on each:

3-CIM Ball Shifters
Pros:

• Lighter than alternative gearboxes
• Seems to drive smoother than gearboxes we've used in the past
• Small profile, given the whats in them.

Cons:

• The assembly instructions were a little more confusing than the 2-CIM Ball Shifters.
• The gearboxes seemed to have been shipped with the wrong size (too long) screws, which stick out through the hex (spacers?) too far and prevents the faceplate from being screwed on tightly. In our case our mounting system worked around this issue so its not a problem for us on our robot this year.
• It would be nice if the 3rd stage versions came with an extra set of hex shaft spacers to allow for face mounting the gearbox while being supported from all 4 corners (We ended up making our own spacers out of AM Churro tube, which works fairly well).
• It was not immediately clear how to properly mount the CIM gears to the motors and the instructions did not cover this step, the gears also appeared to not come with all the hardware to do so (of course this is based on how we're used to mounting motors on AM gearboxes, so we could just be doing it wrong).

4" Traction Wheels
Pros:

• Super Light, less than half of the weight of our previous custom aluminum gears of the same size.
• Very easy to assemble.

Cons:

• Mounting tread with rivets was a bit tricky since you have to use long rivets that also have wide enough heads to hold the tread on. We ended up having to use long rivets with small heads and using washers to keep the tread on. Some instructions on recommended tread installation methods and rivet sizes would be helpful in the future.

50-Tooth Gears w/ VersaKeys
Pros:

• They're so freaking light!
• The versa keys were great for mounting the gears onto the wheels (using VersaHubs). The alignment looks great.

Cons:

• A few of the gears had a hard time fitting onto the VersaHubs (not sure if this was a problem with the hubs or the gears though).
• I'm not sure if they just weren't available yet when we ordered the gears or if we were just looking in the wrong place, but in retrospect it would have been better if we had ordered some of the gears with 1.125" bearing holes instead of hex.

Hex Shaft
Pros:

• Smooth fit onto our hex gears, works much better than hex stock we've gotten elsewhere

Cons:

• It would have been nice if the longer length options were available (in stock).

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

It wasn't clear at all. We ordered 2-CIM shifters on January 7. The bold, red text that you see now was not there. The description of the "pneumatic hardware kit" listed in the kit contents was not very descriptive at all and as a team that had never used shifting gearboxes before, we assumed the cylinders were included. The webpage has since been corrected, obviously.

We ordered early enough that we were able to place an additional order for the cylinders and had no problems getting the shifters or cylinders in a timely fashion.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I mentioned in my previous post that 558 is using a modified 2014 Drive in a Day chassis, attached is a picture of our practice chassis. We added the ability to run an un-equal spaced 8wd and bolted in some of the single reduction single speed gearboxes. We are very happy with how this chassis is performing. Please excuse the quality of the image.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I am slightly unclear on how VPs should be assembled given there is still documentation about the metal plate on your website. (In particular, the user guide which students used to assemble the motors makes no mention of the plastic plates)

Our gearboxes came with the metal and plastic motor mounting plates, they were assembled with the metal motor mounting plates. Is this a satisfactory motor mounting scheme with the absence of the bearing, or should they be swapped out for the plastic mounting plates.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Trent,

I updated the user guide but forgot about the quick start guide.
Please refer to This Guide for motor mounting.

With a BAG or 775 you should be fine with the metal plate, 550 or AM9015 you should replace to the plastic plate.

-Aren

It has a BAG motor so we should be fine.

Thanks

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Did something change with the VersaPlanetaries or were they always so easy to mate together with a BAG motor? We assembled them with RS-775 & RS-550 motors last year and still had some minor binding after several attempts from 4 different individuals. Both VersaPlanetaries went together very smoothly this year on the first try with BAG motors.

The new bearing gussets are very nice. The 'end' gusset is very easy to bend at the same point with imprecise equipment, allowing us to add a long roller intake on top of a plate.

We were happy to find the 7:1 VP ratio. It matched our intake roller speed to our drive train speed very nicely.

One product I'd like to see in the future is a 1/2" hex-hex shaft coupler. We're getting away with a beefy 3D printed Nylon coupler on a low-torque application for now, but an Aluminum coupler with built-in shaft collars would be nice for high-powered applications. The printed coupler went through many iterations for tolerance, strength & brittleness before the final iteration, which works like a champ.

On another note, I'm surprised the teams surrounding the IFI warehouse aren't screaming 'free USPS shipping on a single low-value item if you send us team t-shirts or 3D print us something'. I wanted to order a 10:1 gear kit by itself and the shipping was more than the part. It wasn't a huge deal - we tacked it onto a larger order a week later, but it also meant we got our production ratios a week later than desired.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Now that I've stopped in with a team that has some more vex parts, I thought I'd post my opinions.

Overall, the quality of the parts/packaging/documentation is very, very good. The ball shifter is small, light, and functional. It does a good job of shifting on the fly, and spends almost no time in the neutral position. Many of the products have very neat features, like the two sets of holes for the CIM's to go with different pinions, and the really neat profile shift gears with different teeth and same pitch diameter. These are really neat parts to use in FRC.

There are two parts that I'm not a big fan of, and these are the 40 tooth dog gear, and some of the pinions. The bearings (which come pressed/locktited into the gear) stick out the end, which is a little weird. Once you pop the bearing out to replace it with one that actually fits, you'll notice that the hole is oversize, and you'll need to get some locktite. The dog pockets are also way bigger than they need to be. It would also be nice to see fillets on the 40 tooth gear like there are on the 44. I don't have a vex dog with me, but the CAD model shows no fillets there either, unlike the AM ones. We've found that these fillets make a lot of difference. Those right angles are huge places for stress to concentrate.

The issue with the pinions has no easy solution and isn't a vex problem, but the retaining clip for the CIM shaft has too big of an OD, so it catches on whatever gear the CIM motor is driving. This makes swapping out a CIM pretty tricky.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Saw this today. Anyone else have issues with the VEX mecanum wheels? I saw earlier reports of issues with the 6" wheels.

http://blog.spectrum3847.org/2014/02...days-like.html I hear 4265 had similar issues.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I think this post clears up the 4" wheel problems a little bit.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I agree with the mecanum wheel issue. There's two ways these things fail. The rollers come loose, and the plastic wheel itself shatters. I broke a 6 inch one dropping it on the floor.

One more question for the vex guys, why is the slot in the dog shifting shaft so long? It's significantly longer than the travel of the cylinder.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

You'll find that's the case for most dog shifting gearboxes you can buy. I would assume it just makes the whole setup more tolerant inaccurate cylinder placement. Although I'd be curious to hear what the reasoning is from vex.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

The total width of the vex slot is 0.821 inches. AndyMark uses 0.48", which in my opinion is reasonable. We've used 0.275" in the past. Vex's ball shifter requires perfect cylinder alignment, but it works because they have a nifty coupling, the same that's used here.

The three CIM DS gearbox confuses me. There is 1.316" between the plate and the gear closest to the plate, and there is nothing in this space. I understand why this room is useful if you're looking to add a PTO with a pulley, but I don't see why that extra space is there in the normal model. The could probably sell spacers that are 1.25" shorter, and have shorter shafts.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Sprockets go in that gap (for a WCD team).

There are valid reasons for all the points you're raising, and your assumption that because you do not immediately understand them they must be silly/wrong is unfair.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

These are all super trivial complaints and have no bearing on the functionality of the product. Why would you expect anything other than the bearing that is currently in the gear to fit perfectly (for the record, we loctite every bearing we press)? Why would you want the dog pockets smaller? What if you were going to use this gear for a larger gearbox, say to disengage a winch? Would you want a larger dog?

Have you really seen a dog fail because the teeth didn't have radiused corners? I haven't. The weakest portion of a dog is the threaded hole. If anything the corner that you want radiused is at the base of the tooth, not the vertical edges. We have run unradiused edge dogs with zero issue.

Perhaps you should consider applying to VEX and then you can design their products?

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

How much clearance do you run for a 1.125 flanged bearing? Did this change with the loctite? I seem to recall you using some small fasteners to retain bearings as well. Any insight would be appreciated.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

You're right. These vex people are pretty darn smart, and I'm not saying I think their designs are silly, I just don't understand them. So, I've reworded my thoughts as questions.

1.) We are doing a drive system where the wheels are driven, by chains, so that the sprockets run through the gearbox. We are using #25 chain and we have about 0.75" extra room. I think the extra space is for a team who wants to use a WCD with two 15 mm belts, as the space is slightly bigger than 30 mm.

2.) Why is the shifting slot longer than the travel of the cylinder? Does anybody know the advantage to having this be around 2x longer than a traditional setup?

3.) The traditional dog gear enters into the gear 0.125", so that you can have a 0.125" pocket in a 0.375" gear while keeping 0.25" remaining for a normal sized bearing. The vex dog gear has the bearing sticking out the back a little bit so that there is more engagement between the dog and the gear. When doing this, you loose the advantage of having the flange on the bearing. Does anybody know why this is?

4.) Why aren't there fillets on the dog/dog gear? I'm not talking about the ones on the outline of the dog pocket, but between the face of the gear and the vertical face of the pocket. A while ago, I made some of these dogs out of steel. Switching to a ball nose endmill and getting even a small radius on all the corners fixed our shattering dog problem.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Yes, they do. Having to remove the plate to remove a shaft to remove a CIM motor is a little silly, just because the retaining ring is a little big, but I don't really see how this can be fixed.

Because it's advertised with a 1.125" bearing bore, not with a hex bearing pressed in with locktite. And besides, having a flanged bearing with the flange just sitting out in the middle of nowhere isn't "fitting perfectly" to begin with.
When we bought our gear, it said nowhere that a bearing would come with it. I'm not complaining about our free hex bearing, but we planned on putting a not-hex bearing in the gear.
Normally we use 1.1245 holes, because at that size, there isn't much slop in the fit. The vex bearing bore on one gear was 1.13.

I'm not sure my first post was clear. I'm talking about a radius between the horizontal surface of the dog, and the vertical surface used to transfer torque to the gear.

Yes, our kicker in 2010. The problem went away after using a ball nose endmill.

Do you really use an endmill with no radius to cut your dog gears?


Again-I think vex products are among the best we've seen from an FRC supplier, but I'm just curious as to why some parts are the way they are.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I am slightly disappointed in the 6" mecanums. We bought a set in hopes to get the better traction then the AM ones. But within only 2 hours of driving and testing, we have numerous rollers that the axle/pin have come very loose. The Return On Investment of these wheels are horrible. We have since switched over to a set from AM, but have lost 4 lbs in the process of doing so.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

I can tell you with certainty that is not normal. Something is wrong. Please contact VEX support and we can get you straightened out.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Paul, we noticed the same thing on both of our robots. We kind of shrugged it off to how the wheels "wear in", as it is our first time using the VEXpro Mecanums. For us, I would say it was more like majority of the rollers felt extremely loose.

We haven't noticed any performance issues; but now concerned with the reliability of the wheels if you are saying this isn't normal.

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

If you haven't noticed any performance issues, then you probably don't have the same thing happening that Alex reported, however if you e-mail VEXpro support they can help you determine what is going on.

Paul

Re: VEXPro 2014 Product Initial Impressions
 

Will do, we also ordered 10 jaguars the other week, when we opened the box to use them this weekend. We noticed that 5 were not operational.