pic: Input Stage Wear

[Sohaib]

Originally Posted by Andrew_L

Could you elaborate more on this? Specifically what the failure mode was, when and how it happened, and whether or not you contacted WCP regarding the issue?

I unfortunately don't have any pictures of this. However, it looked like it was a gradual wear of the thread on the gearbox plate. The threaded holes (when they failed beyond the point at which they could hold the gearbox to our frame) were oval shaped generally in the horizontal direction. (with typical orientation of mounting) In fact, after drilling out the holes for a 1/4-20 tap, the holes were still not perfectly circular, that's how much damage had occurred. We noticed this issue right before eliminations at Fall Fiesta.

We haven't contacted WCP, but plan to do so, along with all of the other issues we have experienced with the SS gearboxes, namely with the CIM mounting.

Something with these gearboxes and oblong shaped holes

Edit: The gearbox on the other side had the same issue shortly after, and has not been repaired yet. When it is disassembled, I will be sure to post a picture, however cannot comment on the failure of it yet as I haven't seen it, it'd be reasonable to assume it is the same failure method however.

[roboruler]

As a general rule, talking to the company directly is going to get you further in having your problem fixed/helping the company fix the problem( if there is one) then simply complaining about it on ChiefDelphi.

WCP works very hard to bring good valve and good quality products to the marketplace, and it doesn’t seem right to talk about your problems without a bit more specific detail about each use case and failure mode. Not giving enough detail in the circumstances, could cause teams to get a bad impression of the gearboxes when it was really you pushing the boundaries with how you used them.

If you have enough time to write a post on CD you have enough time to send an email to WCP.

[Sohaib]

Originally Posted by roboruler

As a general rule, talking to the company directly is going to get you further in having your problem fixed/helping the company fix the problem( if there is one) then simply complaining about it on ChiefDelphi.

WCP works very hard to bring good valve and good quality products to the marketplace, and it doesn’t seem right to talk about your problems without a bit more specific detail about each use case and failure mode. Not giving enough detail in the circumstances, could cause teams to get a bad impression of the gearboxes when it was really you pushing the boundaries with how you used them.

If you have enough time to write a post on CD you have enough time to send an email to WCP.

The gearbox mounting holes are an issue RC has already indicated will be fixed for next season, along with the bearing retention (which was not an issue we had) My intent was not to complain, except to demonstrate the issues we have had with these gearboxes.

You're right, there was not one problem with this gearbox, there were at least two that WCP has accepted, and indicated will be fixed for following seasons.

What is it that we were doing to push these "boundaries" which you failed to demonstrate us pushing in our implementation of this gearbox in a West Coast Style Drive train with 8 wheels? - For the record, that is our drive setup.

I will concede not being clear about the setup, and will explain it. We had an 8 wheel drive with 8" (~7.85") Pneumatic wheels. The gearboxes directly drove the "rear" two wheels. The rest of the wheels were belted together using 15mm HTD belt on 42T pulleys. The wheels immediately in front of the gearbox were driven with a belt from the gearbox itself, (the pulley was placed on the inside of the gearbox ie. between the two plates)

The post I made was simply to alert teams about the problem we had, and if any teams had similar experiences to make posts in the time during which I was able to gather more information about the failure and pictures, rather than making a somewhat incomplete post about the details of our issues.

It's pretty easy to criticize a team for improper implementation of something from an anonymous account without detailing how the implementation was pushing boundaries of the product.

I will happily send you pictures and video (if you like), of our setup along with answers to any questions you may have of our implementation so you can demonstrate how we have pushed the boundaries of this gearbox, we're eager to learn!

For the record, expect a supplementary post with pictures of the failure on our other gearbox, and that a report to WCP has infact been in the process of being prepared, and has not yet been sent as we are still getting pictures of the failure and find it mindless to send a company a primitive report with not enough information about the issue, and would rather send something they can use to fix these issues.

[wilsonmw04]

Originally Posted by roboruler

As a general rule, talking to the company directly is going to get you further in having your problem fixed/helping the company fix the problem( if there is one) then simply complaining about it on ChiefDelphi.

You must not regularly check these sorts of posts much. In my 10 years on CD, I have found the vast majority of these "hey, here's what i'm seeing with my XYZ product. Can anyone help me out." posts are VERY productive. Most, if not all, FRC suppliers have a strong CD presence. It allows suppliers and the community to have discussion and resolve problems quickly. Very little "complaining" happened on this thread and that's par for the CD course for this type of post. CD has lost some of it value for me the past few years, but it still working well for posts like this.

[nuclearnerd]

It's not just WCP gearboxes. Our vex 3cim ball shifter had a similar failure last weekend. See the attached photo of the 1st stage gear.
https://goo.gl/photos/reZTDqnVX9bdwFac7

I'll buy that it's a motor mounting issue. We may not have had the cims bolted tightly, especially as we were fighting screw lengths and the cimcoder on one. This hasn't helped my engineering distrust of aluminum gears though.

[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by roboruler

As a general rule, talking to the company directly is going to get you further in having your problem fixed/helping the company fix the problem( if there is one) then simply complaining about it on ChiefDelphi.

WCP works very hard to bring good valve and good quality products to the marketplace, and it doesn’t seem right to talk about your problems without a bit more specific detail about each use case and failure mode. Not giving enough detail in the circumstances, could cause teams to get a bad impression of the gearboxes when it was really you pushing the boundaries with how you used them.

If you have enough time to write a post on CD you have enough time to send an email to WCP.

This post is unnecessarily hostile. You're essentially saying, Chief Delphi users shouldn't share experiences and technical information, because it might make your preferred supplier look bad. There is zero need to scold and chastise someone for this. Putting a damper on this kind of discussion on CD will actively lessen the flow of useful information that gets posted here.

To be honest, the post comes across like you are in some way invested in the success of WCP, and are calling out users who say negative things about the product. I really don't think this is the case; the people behind WCP are really professional people who work very hard to produce quality products and to solve user issues. But that's how it would come across to me, if I didn't have the prior knowledge of WCP and the people behind it to know they wouldn't attack their customers.

[MichaelBick]

Originally Posted by Sohaib

I unfortunately don't have any pictures of this. However, it looked like it was a gradual wear of the thread on the gearbox plate. The threaded holes (when they failed beyond the point at which they could hold the gearbox to our frame) were oval shaped generally in the horizontal direction. (with typical orientation of mounting) In fact, after drilling out the holes for a 1/4-20 tap, the holes were still not perfectly circular, that's how much damage had occurred. We noticed this issue right before eliminations at Fall Fiesta.

Iirc the bearing block is geometrically/mechanically locked in position in reference to the gearbox plate. Aren't those screws only being loaded in tension to clamp on the tube?

[R.C.]

Originally Posted by Sohaib

I'd like to add, that during our off season, we had issues with the two 10-32 bolts used to attach the bearing block to the gearbox (through the tubing) Namely, the thread stripping, and us having to tap it to a larger bolt right before elims, resulting in us missing a game.

Originally Posted by MichaelBick

Iirc the bearing block is geometrically/mechanically locked in position in reference to the gearbox plate. Aren't those screws only being loaded in tension to clamp on the tube?

Sohaib,

I'm curious about what happened here. Similar to what Michael said above, you shouldn't ever have an issue with this. Also the bottom bolts holding the gearbox along with the geometric feature of the bearing block is holding most if not all the weight of the gearbox. The #10-32 bolts holding the bearing blocks together aren't doing much work.

Questions:

1. Do you have pictures of the plates?

2. Did you guys use loctite "gluestick" or "liquid" form?

3. Were the bolts ever loose during operation?

4. Did anyone crank down on the bolts till they stripped.

5. Was this component properly installed?

I'm curious about hearing more about this, as this specific area shouldn't ever fail. Again please email me directly at rc@wcproducts.net. I'll try to get back to you when possible.