Belt Driven instead of Chain driven

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by AustinSchuh

This is key. The GT2 profile can take more than twice* the load that the standard tooth profiles can take.

The belts are well documented, and after you figure out what is important, the docs are not bad. You can easily check what belt width, and tooth counts will support what loads.

*It could be even bigger than this. I haven't read the gates manual recently.

As you guessed, it is bigger!

The most relevant piece here is comparing XL belt to 5mm gt2, pretty much identical belts in terms of size and weight. It's amazing the tooth profile makes such a difference.

[akoscielski3]

Im Working on a chassis, and want to put belts on it. Where do I find Belts/pulleys for CAD and how do i buy them?

[Aren Siekmeier]

The SDP-SI catalog has lots of different pulleys of various tooth profiles, pitches, tooth counts, etc. and if you click the part number you can find a CAD download in the window that pops up. At the very least this gives you the tooth profile which you could rework into other pulley geometries (different hubs, flange/no flange, etc.).

However, usually you don't care about the actual tooth profile so you could just create part files with all the other geometry (hub diameter, length, pitch diameter, etc.) and put those in the model. Solidworks has a belt feature under Insert>>Assembly Features that allows you to route an "imaginary" belt (it just shows a line) that you can use to measure the length. I'm certain similar tools exist in Pro/E/Inventor.

[Billfred]

I can't say we've ever done them on 2815, but my alma mater 1293 used them this year on their kit-frame drive system. Twisting issues from their arm tower caused enough issues that they took them out for the connections from their gearboxes to their rear and middle wheels; to my knowledge, the middle-to-front belt run gave them no real issues. I'll try to get someone from 1293 into this thread.

[akoscielski3]

Is it possible to do belt drive with a dead axle? im trying to do this because i have NO experience with live axles and want to try belts. If it is possible is there an example i can see, picture or a CAD i can see?

[EricH]

Originally Posted by akoscielski3

Is it possible to do belt drive with a dead axle? im trying to do this because i have NO experience with live axles and want to try belts. If it is possible is there an example i can see, picture or a CAD i can see?

I've seen it done, but in a superstructure. 330's 2006 robot had a series of dead-axle belt connections in its feeder system, and a dead-axle belt-chain connection in the shooter system. At least, I recall it being dead-axle.

[akoscielski3]

Originally Posted by EricH

I've seen it done, but in a superstructure. 330's 2006 robot had a series of dead-axle belt connections in its feeder system, and a dead-axle belt-chain connection in the shooter system. At least, I recall it being dead-axle.

Thanks, i think i got it. I put holes in it to bolt it to the wheel, than removed the hub part that isn't needed anymore because its dead axle (usually would attach to live axle itself)

[Aren Siekmeier]

Originally Posted by akoscielski3

Thanks, i think i got it. I put holes in it to bolt it to the wheel, than removed the hub part that isn't needed anymore because its dead axle (usually would attach to live axle itself)

Exactly. Beat me to it. It's no different from mounting a sprocket to a wheel in a dead axle configuration. And as you said, you can remove quite a bit of the hub material, making it lighter (you also kind of need to for bearing clearance, depending on how it's set up).