High speed treaded wheel safety warning

[kingbrandon14]

The other day we were testing our shooter that was direct drive to a CIM motor. Apparently we had forgotten to tighten the set screw all the way, and the wheel literally came flying off and almost hit a builder's face. It then continued to spin around on the floor like a Beyblade for a couple of minutes. Where safety glasses when testing things!

[d.kho]

Same thing as original poster happened to me today. Got away with a bruised hand, but the point still stands. Be careful everyone!

[JB987]

I was just told by FRC Team Support today that there will be a specific warning relating to this issue in the next FRC Blog...

[Johnbot]

Eek! We will keep this in mind while prototyping shooters.

Reminds me of our original shooter design last year. We had two CIMulators driving a chain with a two to one gear ratio, and we got our shooter spinning at over 8,000, and then the chain broke and flew forward...


... luckily, we had used C-channel to make an enclosure to make sure the chain couldn't go forward more than an inch I can't imagine what would have happened to whomever was in front of it if we hadn't had a chain guard.

[dudefise]

Perhaps a further warning, be careful with chain!
One of our prototypes threw a chain at less than half of max RPM. Thankfully, we had been running tests inside a makeshift lexan box and nobody was hurt.

For the rest of the season we will be testing in a lexan cage, and run everything up to max speed and go through max acceleration/deceleration before removing the lexan.

[Wayne Doenges]

Last year we had a chain driving our shooter. Our lead mentor was testing it and the chain broke and hit him. There was no damage to the chain
We later went to a belt to drive the shooter.

[Greg McKaskle]

Granted, foam is safer than rivets, but still...

Yep. It is all relative. NASA has one less shuttle due to a bit of foam that didn't stay put.

This year's prototyping scares me. Not as much as the propellors in '09 that teams were demonstrating running directly off a CIM shaft or wobbly bit of chain -- with no speed controllers in the loop, just powered 100% off the battery.

But please please think about the shooter wheel as a rotating hazard. Also be careful of long hair, loose clothing, hoodie strings, etc.

Greg McKaskle

[cgmv123]

Originally Posted by Greg McKaskle

But please please think about the shooter wheel as a rotating hazard. Also be careful of long hair, loose clothing, hoodie strings, etc.

It would be great if everyone put some kind of guard over their test flywheels. That's not going to happen, but we can dream, can't we?

(No, we didn't guard our flywheel when we tested shooting either.)

[JesseK]

This thread is full of eeeeeeeeeeewww.

But I guess shock value is what it takes these days.