I talked to Neugart today about the PLE40. The sales representative told me that we could get a special version with low temperature oil which will be better for our high input speeds. He says that the PLE 40 can run up to 18k RPM with active cooling. They can offer shafts with keyways or just cylindrical and of course we can chose 1:4,5 or 7 transmission. We can also chose any motor mount.
The best thing. If we order 7-10 units, we get them for 174€ including taxes. Remember there is no tax for shipping within Europe. So if we order together, we get a bunch of them, cheaper and made to our specs. If each of us orders 2, we would get them even cheaper and could sell them to new forum members with a bit of a profit. Win win for everyone.
The gear manufacturers told me that none of them keep inventory due to the big amount of possible configurations. I think this is our hest shot at getting good and cheap gears. Delivery will be end of june though. I could try to get a different manufacturer to do it faster for us if you have any candidates. There are about 7 big gear manufacturers in Germany.
I am from Germany. I really don’t mind. They don’t do specialized output shafts though. At least not for this price. We need thrust bearings anyway, so connecting the prop directly won’t be a good idea.
Hey MaxMaker
I am from Germany too, a friend and I are building two boards in the next months so we would join your order with two gears. The problem is end of June is very late. Could we get them earlier?
Hi Max, I know this is much later than your original post, but if you ever decide to change your design & switch want to go back to the Neugart gearbox, then please let me know. I would also be interested in placing a combined order.
I have also been in contact with Neugart, however the sales rep claimed that they have a 38 week lead time on their complete sortiment!!!
Perhaps if the order quantity was larger then she might be able to accelerate that lead time… hmmm
Dear Windtigertim,
Right now im printing the parts(pacificmeister) and my foil will arrive next week.
I would like to join in for the order as well! Im from Holland btw.
Hi @mikezwgr,
Actually in the meantime I have found and purchased a few neugart PLE060’s (3:1, and 4:1) on eBay which I am currently testing with my setup.
The 60mm series are noticeably bulkier & heavier than the 40mm range of gearboxes. Because of this I
personally I would not recommend considering a PLE090. That’s overkill
Sure, the large ones are more robust than the smaller ones, however they do create more drag & add a lot more mass to the product. Usually the output shaft is much thicker and therefore a suitable coupling needs to be very precisely machined & balanced in order to avoid devastating vibrations caused by the potential shaft imbalance @ relatively high rpm.
@mikezwgr : Look at this german datasheet for the ple series. The number after PLExx is the diameter in millimeters. The gear ratio is an extra number. The ratio is called “i” in the datasheet. @Windtigertim
I have a PLE60, too. Mine is i=8. I did want to use the full power from an inrunner at 50V, but I realise that I am well beyond any reasonable input rpm limit on the gearbox with this. 40krpm is probably too high
@Flo haha yes. I think 40k input rpm would heat things up real quick!!
I am using a certain inrunner which can spin up to 14,500 rpm @ 12S.
For now I have limited the motor speed to 10,000rpm in my VESC6 config.
But I can tell you that even 10k of input rpm makes my PLE60 i=3 gearbox heat up to a point where I can barely wrap my hand around it without it being too hot to touch. I plan on attaching a temp. sensor to the gearbox and making a more accurate measurement soon
Please bear in mind that my gearbox is currently filled with the ‘standard grease’ option, and that my tests have been taken in air. Underwater will of course keep things a lot cooler.
Nevertheless I am considering replacing the standard grease with a more suitable lubricant to handle the high input speed & temp.
@MaxMaker, did the Neugart rep which you spoke to happen to mention the product name/number of the ‘high input speed’ grease?
but the 7-10 untis have to be the same - so we have to define a design.
thx - now i understand the PLE60 or PLE90 means 