pic: west coast products teflon coated gear wearing

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[mman1506]

did you grease them with a sticky grease (white lithium)?

[Cory]

I see no evidence of damage to the gear. You will often see discoloration of the coating.

You should be greasing them though.

[Jimmy Nichols]

We tore apart our gearboxes from last year after only greasing them at assembly and saw little to no wear on the Teflon coating on the Cim gear.

[AlecS]

dandaman,

What you are seeing here is run-in of the ceramic coating. This coating will often discolor as you have shown, and this is a normal occurrence that does not affect the gear. The profile of the gear is still in excellent condition. As others have said, these gears, and ones similar to them routinely run full seasons with little to no wear.

That being said, all WCP/VEXpro gearboxes should be greased before use, as noted in the user manuals. Failure to do so will result in excessive wear of the gears. White lithium grease, available at almost all hardware stores is an excellent choice for this. For the WCP gearboxes, you can also use a dry grease, (Mcmaster #8710T35), which is a less messy alternative to the white lithium.

Let us know if you have any other questions

[IndySam]

I know everyone likes the white lithium grease but we have been using Lucas red 'n tacky for three years and we are still using gears we purchased three years ago. Love the stuff.

[Paul Copioli]

Originally Posted by IndySam

I know everyone likes the white lithium grease but we have been using Lucas red 'n tacky for three years and we are still using gears we purchased three years ago. Love the stuff.

Yep, that's the same stuff 217 has been using since 2000. We love it and have a whole vat of it.

[Travis Hoffman]

Originally Posted by AlecS

For the WCP gearboxes, you can also use a dry grease, (Mcmaster #8710T35), which is a less messy alternative to the white lithium.

We've used the dry grease on WCP aluminum gears the past two seasons, including this one. This is our first year using the grease in a drivetrain gearbox, so I wanted to know, how do you know you have a proper coating of the grease on the gears? We applied the grease after the boxes were assembled.

[DonRotolo]

Travis,
In general, a thin film of grease is sufficient. If you were to put a glob the size of a pea or raisin on each meshing gear pair it will self-distribute evenly after a few minutes.

[Travis Hoffman]

Originally Posted by DonRotolo

Travis,
In general, a thin film of grease is sufficient. If you were to put a glob the size of a pea or raisin on each meshing gear pair it will self-distribute evenly after a few minutes.

Don - thanks for the good info for the wet stuff, but I was referring to the dry grease, which dries to a milky white waxy film that is hard to notice (for me, anyway) on the WCP gears. I'd like to know if there's a simple way to determine proper coverage and film thickness. We sprayed the snot out of both gearboxes and turned the drive wheels several times to get it into the teeth and then let everything dry overnight. Is that sufficient?

We've driven the drive base several times without noticing any wear on the gears - it's just unsettling to see what appears to be uncoated gears when you're used to globbing black, red, or white gunk into your gearboxes for lubrication!

[AlecS]

Originally Posted by Travis Hoffman

We've used the dry grease on WCP aluminum gears the past two seasons, including this one. This is our first year using the grease in a drivetrain gearbox, so I wanted to know, how do you know you have a proper coating of the grease on the gears? We applied the grease after the boxes were assembled.

We typically spray them after they are assembled. We give them a light spray while rotating them by hand . Look for an even coating of the spray, a little extra won't hurt anything. Once it dries wipe off the excess with a rag. It sounds like you're doing pretty much the same thing, so you should have plenty of grease. It takes a little getting used to not seeing the typically messy globs, but once you do you'll never look back.

[theawesome1730]

We use moly grease. It smells nasty, but keeps things moving freely

[DampRobot]

Unless you actually see the tooth profile start to wear (which we have seen in 11T alu pinions in some non-standard conditions), don't worry too much about the coating wearing off. The grease does far more than the coating in FRC applications.