AndyMark Teasing us
 

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Not sure how often Andy or Mark check here, but if you see this, the link for the DS links to the Power Distribution Block page.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

The correct link is http://store.andymark.biz/am-0269.html

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Got it... thanks for catching that.

AB

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

We asked our machinist to make us a long tough box shaft last year that could allow an encoder to fit onto it.... and it looked surprisingly like this

It seems like AndyMark is really leveling the playing field.

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:ahh: Apparently we can build small cars this year. Maybe this is necessary to house all the new electronics.

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Seriously... Two 21" mecanum wheels wouldn't even fit inside the max robot length, unless the sides go up. Maybe AM is moving into fields other than FIRST?

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The 7075 aluminum sprockets are nice; the extra few dollars for aluminum may well be worth the few hours it takes to broach and lighten stock steel ones from other sources.

Edit: Andy, can you post the CAD models for the 12 and 15 tooth aluminum sprockets? Thanks!

Maybe AM got a bid for something like this?

http://www.airtrax.com/

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

ha!

that would be awsome:D

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That is way too cool Art.:P

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About those large mecanums: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...4&postcount=15

Right from the [designer's] mouth.

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Well surely this means we get CIMS this year?

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Not at all. It just means AndyMark is carrying them now.

Remember that AndyMark, while primarily supplying FIRST robotics teams is not limited to solely FRC. They could be carrying CIM's for a number of reasons.

The most likely reason is that it's because AM is going to be the official supplier of kit motors for FIRST, but it would be a mistake to assume so.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Well i did hear Andy talking about stocking for the season maybe he just wanted to let teams know that he has a lot of Cims available.

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Lies. :P AndyMark has all those CIMs in stock for college students' crazy projects. :rolleyes:

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Actually I would say that the most likely reason he is carrying cims is because most of his gearboxes are designed to use them. I thought a long time ago he should have done this so people outside of FIRST could buy a toughbox and motor for it in the same place.

As for Cims in the kit, I would be surprised if they weren't there but am making no assumptions. The CIM motors are ordered and labeled specifically for FRC and it wouldn't take much for FIRST to pick a different motor from the same manufacturer. That being said there are many things that changing the main drive motors effects, such as the electronics, gearboxes, wheels, required field robustness, etc. I would suspect that if a change of the motors occurs it will be a minor shift with little differences like mounting; something like this would be easy to modify existing gearbox design for.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Andy,
When are we going to see photos of the GEM500 gearbox? Way to tease us with a description of the newest toy in the AM gearbox arsenal but not show us what it looks like. Thanks in advance.
-wayne

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

It looks like a picture was just put up, looks slick!

http://andymark.biz/am-0270.html

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The question now becomes: "Can it handle two CIMs and will they sell the adapter?"

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

No, it is designed for only 1 CIM.

Andy B.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Excellent. This makes me very happy and giddy inside for seekrit reasons. Out of curiosity, is the CAD for the gearbox available yet, and what is the mounting profile like?

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I like it.

Looks great, and looks real light and compact for what it does.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

will it fit into a gen1 shifter?

and how do you attach more stages?

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

No it's not like the AM Planetary Gearbox. That is much smaller and made for the FP motors. This is much larger. You could make it fit but why would you?

If you look at the pick you will see the two thinner rings, those are the stages.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

i saw those, more speciffically i wanted to know how the gears from each one intermeshed(like does the output of one just go into the input of the next)?


why would I?
because it would be interesting.and is'nt that kinda what FIRST is about? (that is getting kids interested in engineering and techology):D

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It does look slick.

Modular planetary stages are a cool idea. I have found the ones from Matex very useful for developing new solutions, in my day job. Of course, those don't come with CIM mounting features, so AndyMark's new product will be much more convenient when using that motor.

Which I sincerely hope we will continue to do in FRC. :]

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It does look slick, is most like yet another excellent product.

For me, though with a ratio of 181:1 I wonder if a fisher price motor (AKA Power Wheels) could be adapted to fit.

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I would think the existing AM Planetary would be a ready made soultion to do just this.

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That is a single stage as a understand it with a 3:1 ratio. I was looking for a metal gear box similar or greater in ratio to the plastic one we get for the FP motors.

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Put the FP on the AM Planetary and then put that into the new gearbox or use it with a combo of stackerboxes.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

In theory, if the AM planetary turns a fisher into a CIM interface, could it then be the input for the GEM500? It may not be the most compact solution, but it seems like it could work. Andy, would this be possible?

-Eric

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Yes, this is definitely possible. The AM Planetary gearbox has essentially the same mounting and output geometry as the 2.5" CIM Motor. So, wherever the CIM Motor could be mounted, so could the AM Planetary.

The GEM500 page has been updated with a price ($120), pdf layout, and stp CAD files (see "Downloads" at the bottom of the GEM500 page).

Thanks for all of the input and feedback.

Sincerely,
Andy

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

How much will each additional stacked stage cost?

Chris

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

This was what I was meaning in my previous post. Take an AM Planetary (3.67:1) + a new 3 stage GEM500 should equal the same ~181:1 gear ratio as a 4 stage GEM500. This begs the question: What about a AM planetary + a 4 stage GEM500 (~665:1) driven by a Fisher Price motor? This might be quite handy for an arm application but can the final stage of the GEM500 handle the torque? Andy, have you done any testing along these lines to see how much torque the GEM500 can take? This, of course, assumes we will still be getting Fisher Price motors this year.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Those wouldn't look bad in anodized red or blue either :)

What does GEM500 stand for anyways? I'm assuming the 500 is for the 1/2" output shaft.

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Andy, what is the difference between "S25-66 Aluminum Sprocket" and "S25-66L Aluminum Sprocket"? Are you finally answering the community's call for left-handed sprockets?

Also, you know what'd go great with these new gearboxes? Low tooth count, keyed hub, #25 sprockets ;)

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

$36 (this might change a bit) - This will include all pieces needed to add a stage: 1 carrier plate and sun gear, 5 dowels, 5 planet gears, 1 ring gear, and 1 stage housing

Chuck - yes, putting an AM Planetary into a 4 stage GEM500 will work fine. Past that number of stages, we have not done testing. However, we did design the shaft housing to be able to handle a 5/8" output shaft, and we will have a GEM625 available in the distant future (not ready for January).

We are not sure about colors yet. We may go with a less dramatic black and gray combination. Or maybe bright green or pink.... naa.

GEM = Gearbox Epicyclic Modular (epicyclic is just a fancy name for planetary)

L = large bore (1.1245)

S25-66 has a bore of 0.8745"
S25-66L has a bore of 1.1245"

How about a 16 tooth, 25 series, 500 key hubbed sprocket, made from 7075? It's coming, hopefully before Christmas.

Andy B.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Wow! $36/stage? That's really.... affordable.

So now you guys have a stackable spur box and a stackable planetary box. What advantages, in your opinion does the GEM500 provide over the Stackerbox and vice-versa?

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

How about a whole series of keyed 25 series 7075 aluminum sprockets or even plain bore so we could broach them ourselves

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

For teams interested in different colors, do you think it would be possible to work with you folks to either get the housing without anodizing, or with anodizing of our choice? (I'm thinking 254/968 will also want to know this, but if what you've done for them in the past with the FP planetary holds true, then the answer here should be yes? Ish?)

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

I probably don't understand the market as well as you do, but the predominate purchaser of these would probably be teams doing a west coast drive. I imagine even if they are a smaller percentage of the overall customers, they're buying at least 8 per robot (we would probably buy 20).

That being said, for a west coast they'd probably want a higher tooth count, 18-20 is what I'm favorable to (I've heard some go to 22), and the ability to modify them after the fact for a 7/16" Hex or 1/2" Hex.

It'd also be nice if they were the same overall width as standard hubbed sprockets.

I'd trust your opinion over mine. However we probably wouldn't be buying any 16T #25's, but would definitely buy a whole bunch of 18T.

EDIT: I was just informed why teams use 22T. We'll probably use 22T now, and would prefer that :D

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

We will have some available that have no anodizing. We also do that with the AM Planetary gearboxes. At this time, we cannot provide the custom color anodizing.

Andy B.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Now wait a second...

Didn't AM used to make a planetary for the CIM that got discontinued because no one was using it?

Round gearboxes are hard to mount.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

They had a square base that made them really easy to mount.

The Facemount of these gearboxes make them look plenty easy to mount.

Also, it was just a single very high reduction (180ish iirc) and not as modular as this.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Agreed, we probably wouldn't buy the 16T 1/2" keyed* sprockets either. If they were larger (preferably 22T) and with a smaller bore, we would most definitely buy a ton of them. More important than tooth count is the bore size, however. We could live with the 16T ones but would have a hard time with their 1/2" keyed* bore.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Exactly!!! We could definitely use sprockets in the 16-22 tooth range but we would have no use for a 1/2" bore. I think it would be best to maybe offer a version with a 1/4" bore and then teams could bore them to whatever they need or in our case broach them to either 3/8", 7/16" or 1/2" hex. I am trying to stay as far away from keyways as possible and making the sprockets in a 1/2" keyed bore makes that pretty difficult.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

This is great input. We are looking to make 16 tooth sprockets with a 500 key bore (to fit within an AM Shifter), and then also the same sprocket with a 250 hole.

We are also looking at making the a hubbed sprocket with 20 or 22 teeth. We will start with a 1/4" hole, and maybe have a 500 key bore if our costs are not too high.

Both of these sprockets will only be 0.41" wide, just like our other hubbed sprockets. Since this is 7075 aluminum, the strength is there to handle the stress on the keyway for these applications.

Thank you,
Andy

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

This sounds much better. The main reason I am trying to avoid keys is just the hassle of cutting a key and worrying about losing the key when changing sprockets. Hex stock is just so much simpler in my opinion. I do like the idea of the 16 tooth as a direct replacement in the shifter. Is there any way you could make them slightly narrower since 25-series chain is narrower and thus make the gearbox narrower.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Yes, this makes sense, but this change would require us to create shorter spacers and shorter Small Cluster Gears. At this point, for a benefit of about 0.15, I don't want to introduce more standard parts (inventory issues, production lead time, etc.). So... no, not at this time.

Thanks again for this input.

Andy

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Just to add to the discussion, we're thinking of doing live axles of 1/2" keyed round stock this year...the #25 sprockets sound helpful. Although we're also batting around some belt ideas, which may or may not pan out.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

We only used one sprocket on the Gen 2 Shifters so we went ahead and took the parts out and machines them to fit without the sprocket. The small weight savings and size werent really that significant but you can always do this if you want to.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

oh and by the way Andy,

in regards to the the new GEM500 gearbox,

so the price for the base stage and one stacked stage is $120 right?

how much is it for just an extra stage(if we already have the base and one stacked stage)?

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

--->

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

wow,how did i miss that?:eek:

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Observation: A number of years ago, FIRST had a "fire sale" of Bosch van door motors, the ones used for years in FRC. One of our mentors heard about it and retrieved two Stack Attack style bins full of motors, so that we'd have enough for any eventuality. It turned out that FIRST was no longer shipping the Bosch motors in the KOP, and was looking to clear their shelves. So their shelves were clear, and ours were full.

The good news is that last spring, we heard that another local team was looking for those motors for a charity-related robot project. Our shelves are now clear. :cool:

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Is it physically possible to stack 5 stages in the GEM500 gearbox?

I know this would probably ultimately lead to failure with a CIM, but looking at the numbers a lower powered 540/550 sized motor through an AM planetary through 5 stages would have only slightly more torque on the final stage than a CIM with 4 stages.

Also, heads up, the link to the CIM motor on the GEM500 page just goes back to the GEM500 page.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

He meant the Christmas/Holiday season. :D You know how we all love to get CIM motors in out stockings. :D heh.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

From the new products page on the AndyMark website:

"In late January, we will have some 1/2" hex bore flanged ball bearings... yeah, you heard us right: hex bore bearings (just like FR8ZZ, but with a 1/2" hex bore)"

This brought a smile to my face. Thank you Mr. Baker!

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Wow, I'm surprised to see so many new products coming out from AndyMark recently. I just saw the new AM shifter flat aluminum sideplates, very cool! Face-mounted two speed transmissions could be made with very minimal machining with those. The hex bore bearings sound awesome too... I wonder how well they would hold up?

I can't wait to see what they come up with next.

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

....Half inch hex bore bearings? Andy, I think you just won my loyalty... *opens up Inventor* IT'S GO TIME, BABY!

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Dude, Andy you are the man, makes all of our designs ten times easier. Just ask Craig!:ahh:

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Question Andy
If I would like to build a Gen1 with the output gears on the outside of the trans instead of on the inside could I use the SS small cluster gear, shorten the spacers and substitute the new aluminum side plates?

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Hey Andy,

Are y'all still on track to offer those #25 sprockets with .5" diameter, keyed hubs? :)

Danke,

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Same question, except 0.250" plain bore?

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Yes, and yes... sorry for the delay on these. They will be available right after kickoff, at this time next week.

We had them done, but they were made with too fast of a feed speed, and the chain wrap was not right. So... we are fixing them now.

Andy

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Here is an update on a few of these topics:

FR8ZZ-Hex bearings will be at AndyMark by the end of this week (Feb. 5th-6th). They are currently being shipped to us.

16 and 22 tooth, 25 series aluminum sprockets will be available again by Wednesday (Feb. 4th).

AM Planetary gearboxes will be available again by Wednesday (Feb. 4th).

I have just updated our New Products page, which has some other interesting things.

Sincerely,
Andy Baker

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Didn't see anyone else post it, but the hex bore bearing is now up on AM's site, with a picture: http://www.andymark.biz/am-0279.html

Quite the nifty little bearing, I bet it has a billion different uses! When are we going to see the "hex output shaft" option for the toughboxes?

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Andy,
Any plans for an unflanged hex bearing?

Re: AndyMark Teasing us
 

Or other sizes (3/8" hex)?