[sanddrag]

Originally Posted by Peter Matteson

I would like to know what drives your make buy decision on a part like this?

We switched to just buying wheels a few years ago due to cost and freeing up machines to make other parts, and I'm curious to know other teams rationale for making that type of decision.

Good question. We evaluated the same question kickoff day. Here's what we came up with.

• Custom wheels let us do a 7/16" hex, to use 1/2" round bearings. (Primary reason).
• Over 15 wheels between two robots and spares, we were able to save a significant amount of money (about $350) by making our own.
• These are significantly lighter than a wheel such as the AndyMark Performance Wheel. With other wheels, our robot would be overweight.
• The hub on the back of these is set back about 1/8", so the wheel actually encompasses the bearing block. This let's our robot frame be 1/4" wider.
• Since we had the capability to do this ourselves, we figured we might as well. We want to teach our students to be designers and fabricators, not just catalog consumers.