On your competition robot, do you use brand new motors each year, or do you include motors from past seasons?
- Exclusively Brand New
- Some New, Some Reused
0 voters
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We try and run new drive motors and motors on any super high load mechanisms, but everything else is a mixed bag of new/used.
6 Likes
Brushless motors mean there is no contact (aside from bearings) and no real wear components in a motor. Their performance change from year to year should be quite minimal, enabling long term reuse. We are still using all the falcons we bought the first year they were available.
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Considering the price and availability of some of these competition motors, I have to imagine it would be extremely difficult and costly to only run brand new motors.
10 Likes
We run pretty much exclusively reused motors—new motors are expensive and, as of now, the specific motors we use have less of an impact on robot performance than the overall quality of its engineering.
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Our plan this year (and largely our plan last year) is to run all new Neos/Neo 550s on our competition robot. Spark Maxes will be reused, and used Neos/Neo 550s will serve as spares.
This has been a nice balance for us. It gives us new motors so if the Neos get a little beat up, we are okay. It also gives us confidence that all of our Neos are running like new. There shouldn’t be much wear, but there are always ways to damage the Neo, like running it a little to hot.
2 Likes
We use exclusively new motors even with bldc, partly because we don’t want to risk wear and tear, partly because we don’t strip old bots.
Brand new motors? In this economy?
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“Fortunately, I keep my feathers (motors) numbered, for just such an emergency.”
You are seriously dating yourself here…
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unfortunately, I don’t think anyone who was scratching their head suddenly stopped. 
Something to be aware of: FRC is using motors to their extremes… At one point I had seven NEOs on my bench for service! It was so bad that I invented a NEO/SparkMax test board that allows you to test -everything-. It checks:
Phase Voltage
Phase current
Encoder position
Encoder power
By putting this between the SparkMax and the NEO and running it you can verify that the SparkMax is outputting correctly, the encoders run run, the connectors are all good, and that no phases are open or shorted. Rotating by hand will give you an encoder check.
Yes, I am trying to find someone to help turn this into a reproducible board 
I also built a three phase drill tester for running NEOs; surprisingly easy to do. SUPER useful if you run NEOs! A “spark in a box” powered by a drill battery is also very useful for prototyping.
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His love interest’s genius nephew Egghead always made me think of FRC kids.
2 Likes
We have a mix of used and new motors. We use older brushed motors on low-load mechanisms and other smaller things. We will try to use new motors (if we can buy them 
) on the drivetrain and maybe a shooter if we have it. We do try and keep our robots together for a few years so we don’t have a lot of used falcons or anything. We had to use used falcons on our offseason swerve bot this year.
We try to prioritize this way:
Drive train
Key mechanisms or high force mechanisms
everything else.
We reuse every motor, and try to use the lightly used or new ones at the top of that list and going down respectively.
This poll should be split for brushed/brushless.
I’ve always gone to great lengths to avoid used brushed motors, but am totally fine reusing the new brushless motors as long as they don’t have any assembly related damage/wear (stripped threads, etc…).
The greater efficiency, current limits, lack of rubbing items, and thermal monitoring should allow us to get many, many seasons out of each motor.
6 Likes
Exclusivley reused last year, we were very broke. We’re hoping to buy some new motors for this year, especially for high-load mechanisms/drivetrain.
I’d be curious to see an additional poll for pre-brushless era (2018 and previous nobody used Nidecs don’t even try Marshall ). Very surprised by motor reuse we’re seeing even among CD teams, but I haven’t “built” a robot since 2019.
On your competition robot for seasons 2018 and prior, did you use brand-new motors each year, or did you include motors from past seasons?
- Exclusively Brand New
- Some New, Some Reused
0 voters
The gentleman in the photo can do it. You can ask if he will. He was my team’s real electrical engineer before he moved out of state.
Don