Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnFogarty
In my research of the 118 press-bearing system they still had some method of tensioning the chain if needed. I'm not a huge mechanical guy. My background is mainly in electrical and programming, but I've started learning this stuff to help my team design better. How would one make sure the chain is tensioned properly without the use of tensioner blocks...I would assume some pretty accurate calculations have to be made.
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This past year we used
this calculator produced by 1640 to space our wheels apart using 35 chain. We CNCed our drive plates, assembled, and haven't touched the chain since. It has stretched a little over the course of a long season with 6 events but it still runs great. We had a plan for tensioning if needed using a round piece of delrin with an off center drilled hole for mounting so we could rotate the piece around until proper tension was re-achieved and tighten the mounting bolt.
However I would assume since your single chain run is nearly the entire length of the robot (assuming you direct drive the traction wheel) the chain slack would be more noticeable compared to teams running an 8wd with C-C around 8in as you have more links to stretch out. A bearing block system might be more appropriate but you can use the chain calculator to help in design so your bearing block starts where you need it and tension from there.