[Mike Schreiber]

Originally Posted by happyWobot

Yes I have. Generally I've been very pleased with the VP. Through 4 events they held together running a shooter that worked outside the robot perimeter. They took unbelievable punishment. But they have one potential flaw. We saw the shaft fly out of the VP twice this whole season. Mind you right before the second time the case was making a rattle we couldn't identify. It was trying to tell us something. And then it flew out during a match.

We eventually settled upon the theory that the C ring holding the shaft in place had become worn or weakened. We replaced the ring with one from a soare VP case when putting it back together and it went for another 2.5 events.

It was frustrating knowing that it could do that. For a case that disassembles so easily just didn't make sense that a better design that prevented that from happening could not have been used. But like others, I agree that the output end to the VP gearbox is severely underutilized from a design and function perspective. There is a lot of potential there. Longer shafts, angled output, greater variability of shaft lengths, etc. I could even imagine a U transfer case directing the output back towards the motor for space critical uses.

I've seen this occur because the snap ring is over stretched when being installed. It is easy to deform these if you're not careful. Don't open up your pliers too far, just the bare minimum to clear the spline, this should ensure a nice fit when they spring back.