On December 11th at 7:00 pm Central, we’ll be unveiling new additions and improvements to the VEXpro line of products - along with maybe a few special announcements…
This event will be via Google+ Hangouts on Air. Thirty minutes prior to the event, we’ll have the link to the live broadcast on YouTube. The link will be posted on the Google+ Event Page, Twitter (@VEXrobotics) and our Facebook Page. We’ll also post the link in this thread.
Viewers will have the ability to ask questions live during the broadcast. If you have any questions or items you’d like us to cover, feel free to post them here and we’ll do our best to include them.
We’re excited for 2014 and can’t wait to share what we’ve been working on!
Ahh, you’re killin’ me Ricky!!!
Dec. 11th is so far away!!
I’m excited as well. The experience 2073 had with your new products in 2013 was nothing less than PHENOMENAL!
We now have what we consider our “standard drivetrain”. At it’s core are two Ball Shifters and six Versa wheels. Through 4 competitions and several demonstrations, not to mention all the practicing, we never had a single failure.
In addition, as anyone who got in a shoving match with us can tell you, we never lost there either!
I am looking forward to what you have up your sleeve next!
Vex Pro became our main source for bearings, gears, shafts, and sprockets. Their stuff is really high quality. The sprockets put an end to us having to CNC our own, and their hex bearings/shafts made gearbox design much easier. They are the best supplier for FRC (even better than mcmaster!)
I’m hoping that they’ll have-
Belts - hopefully the HTD or GT2 variety
Gearboxes - 3 CIM ball shifter would be epic, as would something with a power takeoff
Gears - an option to buy gears with a really small hole in the center, so that you could make your strange hole in the center if you wanted to
There’s no way to use a vex pro gear with a 3/8" round shaft. This is annoying if you don’t want to use a hex shaft on your robot. Also, we’ve used spline shafts in the past, and you can’t really broach those holes in the gears after you have a 1/2" hex hole in them already.
I forgot to mention: it looks like the hubs in the picture are a lot thicker and longer, which seems like a good change. They’ll probably press into holes for bearings.
My prediction for the release: all versa erything.
I’m really excited for the new releases. The versa planetaries are possibly the best gearbox ever introduced to FIRST (IMHO). I’m hoping to look into ball shifters for next year. And I really want them to release a 6in versa wheel (I have a good reason for not wanting to use 4in wheels, but I’m not going to bother explaining it here).
How about cheap plastic HTD/GT2 pulleys of varying tooth counts with both round and hex bores and versa-hub attachments?
Pretty please?
Other thoughts: Flanged bearings where the center circle is raised higher than the flange (this really bugs me about the current ones), gears with bores other than 1/2’’ hex (as mentioned earlier), traction wheels smaller than 4’’ (Colsons can be a pain to mount to), spacer stock for hex and round shafts (the delrin washers are nice, but stock material we can cut to size would be nicer).
I’d also like to see someone selling something like a quick-disconnect bushing that works with a standard 1.875’’ bolt-circle and clamps onto a shaft, rather than requiring keystock and set screws or shaft collars.
It’s a pain to sand down if it’s too big (and it often is too big), it’s more expensive, and not every team has access to a hex broach and arbor press.
Past that, you still need shaft collars or set-screws to hold a hex hub in place. You need nothing to hold a clamping bushing in place except for the bushing. In general, set-screws are terrible and failure-prone and I do not use them when I can use clamping hardware in their place.
I personally prefer sanding down hex(knowing that later it will be an easy switch) over trying to make key fit. Even so, if you bey hex stock, bearings, gears, etc. all from one place they generally all fit together well.
I can see how a bushing would be easier to use for some teams. We are able to make spacers and shafts with retaining ring grooves so we don’t run into those problems. I like your spacer stock idea though. I think that would be easier for vex and better for everybody else than quick disconnect bushings.
The speed controllers increased in price back in April, immediately following the 2013 FRC season. VEX has done reduced pricing during the FRC season the last two years.
Will sure be interesting!