Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

You two are too much! ::safety::

Paul: Posting any drawings/white papers/etc. would be most appreciated!

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

We got our P60's last week. But we also ordered very early in the build season.

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

I hope this doesn't start a run on AM's planetaries. We started with banebots, and started engineering from there (all the while nervous, but knowing we had two other options if banebots fell flat on their face yet again).

Once we gave up on the banebots (no way to get enough for the comp bots), we've moved on to dewalts. Unfortunately for those that don't know, the standard Dewalt stuff is OOS until mid March. Unless you're very familiar with the Dewalt drills, you'd be guessing if you purchased any other than the one in Nothing But Dewalts. Not to mention a very high pricetag if the one you buy doesn't fit, and we don't have time to try twice.

Finally we've turned to Andy Mark as a last resort. I sure hope they get those planetaries in fast, but the snow storms aren't going to help. This is not a pleasing situation to be in - we're more worried about basic functions than we are about playing the game.

PS - the modification to mate the two is quite simple. Mill out a pocket in the panetary motor adapter plate so the banebots sits flush with the 4-bar-pattern already there, and open up the center hole to accept the motor hub. Clearance holes for the M4 fasteners, then push on the pinion the correct distance (measure with your calipers to get the proper gear depth). I drew it up tonight without much trouble. I had the advantage of having a planetary in front of me to measure though :)

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

In the back of my mind, I'm also having the thought of using some generic chinese cordless drill gearboxes. Might not be the strongest out there, but they're cheap, and likely come with a plain-jane 550 sized motor. The only trick would be pressing the pinion off the existing motor, or perhaps you'd get lucky, and one of the planet gears (from a second one) would be the same as the pinion needed.

Here's another good link http://kamocat.com/robot/planetary.php

Of course, this wouldn't be like a CIM, but still would be rather useful.

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

Sorry John ... won't happen again.

All,

Here are the two drawings. Please make sure you measure your RS775 shafts as they do vary a little.

Paul

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

"Houston, we have a problem"...........

Out in the 'real' world manufacturing / supply chain operations get something called a 'forecast'.

At some point the forecast is poured into concrete and cast into iron and that triggers events that allow the manufacturer to meet a delivery schedule at some future date. For example the clothing industry designs and makes your clothes 6 months to a year before it hits the stores.

Either it seems like BaneBots didn't get a forecast, or they just don't stock enough raw and semi-finished material and and or have enough work center capacity. Even then it is tough to accomodate a twelve billion percent increase in business.

The capacity problem isn't limited to FIRST robotics. A few years a go a glue factory in Japan caught on fire and burnt down. It was going to take months to put it back into operation. Problem was the glue from the factory was used to seal most of the worlds supply of integrated circuits. The event risked bringing down a good chunk of the planets electronic manufacturing and computer industry.

Cool minds, calm nerves, good thinking, hard work, and excellent planning solved the problem and the world hardly noticed the blip.

.

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

I think for the time being as my team ordered our CIM-U-LATORs late I am going to suggest just substituting an old CIM in for the applications where they will be used to get a benchmark of performance. It won't be exact nor competition legal but once the swap is made once we have the gearboxes it should be legal come our regional. It will essentially be a prototype till we can get the real things in there. I mean that's what the CIM-U-LATORs are for aren't they?

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

Off-season project: How to integrate Banebots (and various other) motors with readily-available gearboxes, such as those attached to drills purchasable at Home Depot, Lowe's, etc.

A bit late for this year, but absolutely necessary for next year, methinks.

This is ridiculous. According to my tracking number, I should have our Banebots order tomorrow (it left Rochester today, and we're only 50 miles away) -- after ordering on the 17th. (Some of those items at the time had a 3-5 day lead time. Others had none.)

Were this a project I was working on myself for fun, I'd simply get over it and move on with my life. As this involves "my kids", I'm quite furious about the whole thing, and will do whatever is necessary to ensure that we do not have to rely on Banebots for ANYTHING EVER AGAIN after this season is over.

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

For what it's worth, Banebots just sent me an email that our CIM-U-LATORs ordered on Jan 19th PM just shipped today (Feb 2nd). That means, at least at that point, their 10 business day lead time was on the money.

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

Seeing as we continue to have a hard time even getting game pieces every year, I think this will continue to be a problem for quite some time.

It is bad for business to keep a large inventory. That money isn't very liquid, and you have to store the physical product, etc. If you take a look at BaneBot's building, it is not particularly large. I assume since this generation of gearbox is made in the US, that building contains both the offices & production floor.

It's hard to guess the relative company size, I can't find any guesstimates online, but they obviously aren't huge. They also offer their gearboxes in a wide variety of sizes, so it would probably be unwise for them to assemble 1,000 64:1 boxes before the season, only to find that teams order only a few of those and 1,000 of the 132:1. I've never worked in gearbox assembly, I don't know how much it costs them to produce one. But if we use $50, then producing 5000 gearboxes costs them $250,000. That is a pretty large capital outlay. I would imagine the real demand is higher than 5000 units.

As a relatively small company that I imagine deals mostly with hobbyists, they have a lot riding on their reputation. If they say they are working 24/7 to ship these puppies out the door I definitely believe them.

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

At the date of order, there was a 3-5 business day lead time on p60s, and no lead time on p80s. That was 1/17/11. 3-5 was changed to 5-10 was changed to 10-15 *AFTER* we had ordered... And the p80s were rolled into the p60s as far as lead time was concerned.

FWIW, what it's worth is nothing.

At this point BaneBots doesn't even fit the criteria as a VENDOR according to the rules -- though for our sake I hope that FIRST overlooks this little hiccup.

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

The CIM-U-LATORS were always listed at 10 days out by the time you could order them which wasn't until the 17th or so. I'd love to know what the timing was of FIRST's decision to allow teams to mix and match the Banebots motors. Anyone could have easily foreseen, for example, that you'd sell a LOT of CIM-U-LATORs. I can see why they have a hard time keeping up with the P60 and P80 orders since those are largely built to order. Things like the CIM-U-LATOR, though, are one size fits all and should have been kitted and ready at kickoff.

It's possible BaneBots didn't know until late in the pre-season that they'd be supplying all those 775s and hence was late getting ready. This may have been a FIRST problem, we may never know.

On the conceptual level, I love what FIRST is trying to do here ... not insisting teams use weird motors that you can't get from other sources. I like the flexibility of teams being able to mix and match between an array of COTS motors. The idea just falls down when the source of these parts is single a little company with limited market and which isn't in a position to stock mountains of pre-built transmissions in dozens of different configurations.

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

We didn't order any CIM-U-LATORs, but I can confirm that the P60 gearboxes for the RS550 motor are not vaporware. We ordered two on 1/17/2011, and received them on 1/29/2011.

I think part of the backorder problem is that BaneBots was probably expecting a level of demand more like what they experienced in 2009 and 2010. However, I speculate that the demand for the BaneBots motors and gearboxes this year has far exceeded that of 2009 and 2010. I think the increased demand wasn't as much due to the presence of 4 BB motors in the kit, as it is due to fewer *other* motors in the kit which could be used instead of the BaneBots motor. In particular, the removal of the "5th CIM" and the "2nd FisherPrice" in the 2011 KoP (as compared to 2010) along with the removal of the "Globe motor" in 2010 has left very little in the way of other motor/gearbox choices for game piece manipulation, presuming that most teams use 4 CIMs in their drive base. If there were still a "5th CIM" and "2nd FisherPrice" in the kit, I bet a lot of teams wouldn't have placed BaneBots gearbox orders at all, but would have instead used a CIM or FP motor.

We have used BaneBots gearboxes every year since 2006, and have been pretty happy BaneBots customers. We've surely never encountered previous backorder problems like this.

That said, even though we've been happy BaneBots customers since 2006, we're left scrambling this year, too, as we've been wanting to get more BaneBots gearboxes, too...

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

I don't agree with much of what you say, but I really don't feel like having a discussion about it as theres not much either of us can do about the situation.

I don't think BaneBots is lying when they say they are working 24/7 to get these out, but what that tells me is they were very unprepared for the situation. This could be for several reasons, most of which could probably have been better prepared for.

As a sidenote, AndyMark is not a large company by any means, yet they seem to do a pretty reasonable job of keeping up with demand through the build season.

-Brando

Re: CIM-U-LATORS
 

Yes. I think in future years if they were to stockpile just a few sizes (for example: 1:4, 1:16, 1:64, 1:128, 1:256) and let teams know that there were a large number of these ready to ship immediately they would be in a much better position.

Even the happy customers will be very wary next year...