Quote:
Originally Posted by GeeTwo
- Are there any documents which show how the versaframe blocks come together?
- It appears that you must drill large holes in the tubing for axles to pass through. How large they should be? Where they should be centered? What are the tolerances?
- Are the clamping gearbox, clamping bearing and WCD bearings alternatives for or must they be used in conjunction with a face bearing mount? I can find pictures of the pieces either completely isolated or completely integrated, but nowhere in between.
- How do the various gears, sprockets, and wheels say on the shafts - is it strictly shaft collar based, or do I need some more hardware?
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For the clearance holes we've used a one inch hole saw in the drill press (by hand would probably work too as long as you're careful that it's straight). We usually just put them vertically centered on the tube. It doesn't need to be super accurate, off the top of my head +/- 1/8" feels like it'd be plenty, but I'd have to run some math to verify that; I don't recall vexpro publishing a number for it anywhere. If you end up drilling the hole a bit off it's pretty easy to feel if the shaft is rubbing against it and a little bit of filing will fix it.
The clamping gearbox and clamping bearing blocks do everything needed to hold the bearing, just stick them on a piece of 2x1 with a hole for the shaft to go through and you're good to go. Do be aware if you're using the plastic ones that it's easy to over-tighten the bolts on them and strip out the part that stops the nut from spinning, at which point removing it is basically impossible without destroying it in the process. Additionally, you'll need to make sure that you have something in place to stop them from sliding along the 2x1, the friction from just clamping them on isn't enough to keep it from sliding during heavy use; they have four holes to go through the tube for doing this, I'd highly recommend marking out these holes with calipers or some other nice measuring tool and doing them on a drill press. Be aware that while they do come with bolts to go through the clamping holes, there are not enough for all of the other holes, so you'll want to either buy some to the right length, or be ready to cut down a bunch of bolts.
Versablocks go on about the same as the plastic clamping bearing blocks, but don't have holes for bolts going through the tube (although I suppose you could put a few through the pattern that is on them). The WCP Cam works quite well for them if you need to tension chains—the hole for it doesn't need to be particularity high precision either.
I don't have any experience with the WCP bearing blocks, but it looks like you might need something to hold the bearing in it; I guess that could be done by just having spacers on the shaft hold it in, but there might be a better way to do it.
For holding everything on the shafts together all you need is collars. Vexpro's delrin spacers are nice to have around in a variety of sizes. If it won't be under significant load 3D printed spacers can work too. We will sometimes drill and tap the end of a shaft and hold everything on with a bolt and a washer; this can be a bit of a pain to do, but it holds everything on the shaft more securely than collars (we've occasionally had collars slide off of shafts if there's significant load along the length of the shaft.