Good #25 chain breaker?

[Joe Johnson]

It is hard but if you are careful and go back and forth and back and forth you can make the standard chain breaker the OP discussed work but it is definitely a "you have to be patient and you have to develop the knack" type skill.

SO... ...of late, my chain breaker of choice is a Dremel. Seriously. If you take a paint pen and mark the link that needs to be cracked (which you should probably get in the habit of doing anyway) and then you get that link clamped in a vise and then grind off the pins (and part of the plate), you can use a screw driver to pop off the plate and then you're in business.

It ain't elegant but you get a nice clean cut with no risk of damaged chain going back on your robot.

YMMV.

Dr. Joe J.

[Bruceb]

ya Dark Soul all the way
you will never look back

[jimwick]

We don't use a commercial chain breaker.

We made a jig to hold the chain in place. The jig is a flat plate of aluminum and has several holes that correspond to the pin spacing.

We position the chain and then use a fine point nailset to drive out the pins. Requires a little practice but works well.

I would send pic but I'm not at the shop.

[Spirator]

Originally Posted by Joe Johnson

SO... ...of late, my chain breaker of choice is a Dremel.

I agree with Dr Joe.

It's quite difficult to find ANSI chain tools in Australia so we use our trusty disc sander and a nail/pin punch to get the job done. It usually takes around minute the break the chain.

[hectorcastillo]

We used a tetrix (FTC) chain break and widened the slots with a band saw. But that was because we didn't have anything else, and we like to steal stuff from our FTC teams when we can.

[arc25565]

At the beginning of the season we purchased a chain breaker very similar to the one you found on amazon. I was very disapointed as it broke after a couple of uses. We then switched to using a dremel to grind off the pins and it has worked very well.

[HighlandersFRC]

Here is a team created #25 chain break (our commercial one did not work well, bent the chain and was very difficult to use).
Picture one shows it in action. Picture two show a .1" hole about .75" deep in a 3/8"-16 bolt with lock nut inserted in a 1 1/8 long nut. The cut out in the nut is 3/8" long and 3/8" deep (cut on mill). Picture 3 shows the other 3/8" bolt with a .900" hole drilled about .5" deep with a piece of .900" HHS (like the back of a small drill bit) Loctite in place. We TIG welded a handle on and use this in a small vise. Takes about 20 minutes to create.

Works great and fully supports the chain.