pic: Team 449 Hex Drive

Originally Posted by 449_PeterPeng

The angle of between front and side frame is 112 deg and between the two side frame is 137 deg. The odd angles are the tradeoffs from making the frame length whole numbers (24" and 15").

The extra verticle beams in the hex frame is not necessary but good to have. One it can diverge the side impact force from the gearbox. Second, it can serve as superstructure / mechanism mount.

As for the wheel, we choose colson in the center for its durability. But our drive subteams needed more traction. So we decided to use Versa Wheel on the side. However, it's always possible to swap on other type of wheels, onmi or performance.

While it does add a secondary (yet redundant) mounting interface, strength-wise it doesn't displace much of the force. In our tests as long as you had sufficient backing from the diagonals to the main 2x1 frame, there would be no need for anything else to be done to displace force (especially useful considering it takes out a lot of unneeded weight).

Were you not getting enough traction with colson wheels before? We've had nothing but fantastic traction with them when needed. The Versawheels (while grippy at first) tend to wear a bit quickly, even if just on the edges of the drive.

Originally Posted by Chris is me

Can you elaborate?

Like I said above, the extra framing around the hex is nice, but redundant, and adds more weight than you need to accomplish the job.