Hi guys,
I dont know where this thread is exactly going but I want share my experience about steel gears. (Its some text)
I can tell I wont go back to POM, ever.
Like some of you know, between vesc repairs, work and modding my coffe machine I got deep into gears. Some of you are sharing my opinion we need more steel gears, some dont. I think it really depends on the application - for some builds POM is more than good. But on the other side I was thinking exactly the same like @b264. The main problem is the hard impacts when landing or changing direction fast.
It wasnt just me having theses problem, there where multiple emtb guys just pushing to far, so all started like this:
It felt so bad having this massive motors, trucks a massive battery with a ton of power under our ass but always have to worrie about the gears. And yeah, in the end my gears broke, everytime. I used the right grease and set up all correct, of course. Didnt help. I was sad and a solution had to be found. Many have said that steel doesn’t make sense. That was absolutely wrong!
I want to ride like a madman, that’s what I have the board for. Jumping high in the skatepark, doing 180s with a lot of speed, drifting, all that stuff without limiting myself because of plastic gears…
So I started to make a Mod for the etoxx gear drive mini, the old gears from the one and only @NoWind were POM and Helical. New ones I created where a mix of c45 and chromosteel straight- the whole thing just had to stay intact, summer was just around the corner.
It took a while for me to get into CAD, calculating stuff and creating stuff for “production” but
it took forever to find a good partner who would make the gears for a first prototype for an affordable price, so I came to Stefan, here 45 minutes of the finest craft on youtube. (Modifying and machining gears - YouTube) I was in his workshop just amazed by all those tools and his knowledge. This is what we came up with, more or less a copy of Jens Gears in Steel changed to straigt gear:
Not cheap, not light in weight, but the Gears 1.0 were ready.
The gears are about 500g each, 40/9 ratio, Module 2. The 9 teeth layout for the small gear was not optimal, more on this in Stefan’s video. However, I didn’t want to make the module smaller at this point so that, as I said, everything lasts first. The weight really doesent feel that much, its fine in my opinion. But getting those even more lighter would be good, of course (yeah, already in the works)
The first tests 1 year ago, extremely loud:
Somehow the sound got much better after some time and under load. A loud but somehow cool sound came up, especially when braking (i bet so many people thought the sound was the motor) here is a video that gives you a good feeling:
After months of extreme tests, skatepark, a lot if 180s even a motor screw came lose while doing decent speed. Wheels locked up, but the gears only had little scratches. I was going so wild in the skatepark even the motorplates got lose (Thats why Iam improving those, too) but gears where fine. Just crazy solid! Nothing broke. Feeling awesome!
I was in love with the Star War Sound but there were also disadvantages due to the large module:
The 9t gear run just wasn’t optimal.
At full speed the axes wobbled very uncomfortably.
I think that was a mix between the unsteady rotating mass and the motor which tried to compensate for this movement via the teeth. Which led to this wobbleing.
After realizing how incredibly stable these gears are, I dared to go to module 1.5, the best decision I could have made. The production was no longer over Stefan (I think he is always looking for different stuff and even much more smaller stuff, but crazy dude) so I was looking for a new partner for a long time, with the background to milling more gears later if necessary. After a long search I found what I need! Version 2.0 was milled.
Gears 2.0 arrived, like version 1.0 still 500g. 12/54. At this point I had already ideas to make the gear even more lighter and want to change some stuff. But this will it be for Version 3.0 in the future.
The first run on the bench was so extremely smooth even without grease and not 1 mile driven in. I could hardly believe it. Here is another video:
(Compare it with version 1.0 Video, just crazy how smooth)
I went on a first test ride, and what can I say. Its just pure awesomeness. Gears are the perfect mix between not to loud and having starship sound. The freeroll, start from low speed feel so freaking crazy, its like having Sensors 2.0 so crazy smooth. No wobbling and so on. Video is dark but listen to the sound:
We now know, these things hold up all the burdens, foolproof, even if there’s a screw in the gear, they last forever, the sound is next level. Weight is ok (already improving)
Unfortunately, the main disadvantage is the price, only the gears (2x large gear + 2x small gear for motor cost me around 400-450)
What I can tell - you guys have to experience that! The extremely smooth feeling, the cool fighter jet like noise thats still not to loud + knowing that the gears won’t break when going completly crazy → worth gold!
Tell me your thoughts! 
Also I will post updates if you guys like!
