I’m enjoying watching REV release new products, and am looking forward to seeing what WCProducts, AndyMark, and Vex have up their sleeves. I would love to see an inverted CIM gearbox from somebody. What are you all looking for?
Im looking forward to the new motor controllers, and looking for a replacement for the 550 and 775 motors.
I would Love to see a West Coast style Ball shifting Gearbox from VexPro, and Some really grippy Rubber Wheels to replace the Banebots wheels that we are so rapidly running out of.
They already sell a WCD ballshifter attachment. The third stage functions as one.
I want to see more GT2 belts, lightened 32P gears (the WCP ones are solid and heavy), a more efficient/ less noisy versaplanetary, cycloidal gearboxes, a built-in versaplanetary encoder stage, a 16t, 22t, and 26t gear, more ballshifter gears (perhaps smaller than 34t?), cheap encoders (please?), and more rangefinders (IR and unltrasonic mostly).
SDP-SI should have any GT2 belt you could possibly need.
I’d love if Vex had a 28t gear in 1/2"Hex, 3/8" Hex, and 1/2" round.
Often out of stock and takes weeks to ship. We used them this year, but I would prefer a more reliable supplier.
We’ve used BB-Man and they’ve been pretty fast. But again we just use the 15mm wide pulleys and belts from VEX/WCP to make life easier.
Really? I’ve never had a problem with their shipping speed, definitely got products within a week the last two build seasons. I’ve designed around what products they have in stock though, the product lookup tied to the center distance calculator makes that pretty easy to go up/down a size at a time.
Has the efficiency of the versaplanet been causing issues for you?
It’s very noisy compared to the custom gearboxes that other teams use, and was especially noticable on our elevator this year. Most of the noise of our robot running came from the versaplanetary and the compressor fan. I need to get around to testing the actual efficiency one day, but at the moment the noise alone makes me wish for a change.
I can second this, they’re so loud that I’m always worried that something’s wrong with them. On that note, I’ve seen far more failures of versaplanetaries than of any other stock FRC gearbox. They’re a really nice idea, I just haven’t had good luck with them.
I’d rather have a noisy gearbox then one that doesn’t work as well, but maybe that’s just me…
Especially considering the VP isn’t as loud as common COTS gearboxes in the past.
I’d love to see an electronic pressure controller or electronic variable pneumatic regulator.
I think the only issues we’ve ever had with VersaPlanetaries have been related to misuse or improper assembly.
40A 2 wire slip rings.
Same - I’m surprised to see so many comments about failures in here. We’ve had nothing but great experiences (with the ones we put together correctly… 
)
I used to think that too. With a little research I found two types of encoders that are <$30. You can get CUI 10X-V encoders for ~$24 dollars on digikey. That is a quality incremental encoder but some time you need absolute value on things. While after doing a little research I discovered this ~$28 magnetic encoder](AEAT-6012-A06 Broadcom Limited | Sensors, Transducers | DigiKey), have not used it but it is on my list if the need for absolutel positioning arises.
We have nothing but great things to say about the Versaplanetary gearbox line.
We only had one failure all season and it was completely our fault - we abused the gearbox well beyond what it should have stood up to while prototyping our elevator. Even with 4 totes slamming our elevator carriage to the ground the gearbox still stood up to the shock loads we were repeatedly putting on it. It also made us realize we needed a disc brake at the price of just putting a new gear stage into the gearbox - a very valuable and cheap lesson when time is a factor during build season.
Versaplanetary gearboxes & the versa chassis products have changed the way we design robots in a really good way.
If you have any issues with VersaPlanetaries or other VEXpro products please let me know, I’m happy to help out. (See email in signature)
-Aren