Can anyone give us some help with our flywheel. It only shoots an inch or to and then falls to the ground. In the pictures below, we have the hood too low, but that is the only way that the flywheel will shoot with any force. Any help would be appreciated. We have a 25:1 ratio with high speed motors. Scroll down to find the full video in another one of my posts.
The mesh at the top might be holding on to the ball too much before it launches, also a 25:1 gear ratio would not be fast enough. try a faster gear ratio and remove the mesh at the top but leave the mesh everywhere else. can you put up the whole video so I could get a better look at it?
I think the ratio is fast enough, A high speed is 160*25= 4000 RPM. I can’t seem to get the video up. The forums don’t take mp4 files.
You can try uploading it to youtube and sharing the link.
Ideally you would want to reposition the actual wheel, but it also seems the metal plate you have has an extra bend/length at the top which might affect the direction of the shot.
Something else that may help is to have extra connections for your hood especially towards the top, since it has a chance of bending.
My $0.02.
A 25:1 is definitely fast enough. From the angle the ball is shot at it looks like it’s just a problem with the hood. Is your hood attached anywhere at the top to keep it from moving (I can’t tell from the pictures)? If it’s able to move even a little bit then the ball won’t get enough conact from the flywheel.
Edit: @Wiredcat Robotics beat me to it 
Try bracing the top edge of the hood. We built a flywheel that hit the flags, and when we braced the top edge, the ball hit the ceiling. It makes a huge difference.
I understand that you mentioned the hood will be properly attached, but that should be where most of the issue is. Also try to use white lithium grease on the gears to help make it easier to spin. Your wheel should be able to freespin for 5-7 seconds for it to have minimal friction.
IMO, we had ran a 3m 1:25 HS flywheel before and have had the same issue that you had, disregarding the hood. Once we moved down to 3m 1:15 turbo, it drastically improved the firing range and force applied on the balls since it has more torque compared to 1:25. Another tip would be to entirely take off the antislip on your hood. Main point being that antislip promotes backspin, increasing accuracy yet drastically reducing speed. Taking it off will transfer more energy to the ball to move it forwards, giving it enough force to toggle flags.
I tried to do two turbo motors, but our team doesn’t have the parts to do it.
One problem I see is compression. The only means of compression you have is the flex of the hood, but you could add further compression by having VEX foam on the hood. Your flywheel looks like it does not have bearing flats on multiple places where axles go through, as well as make sure you don’t have three locations the axle for your flywheel goes through (You should cantilever the 12t gear to prevent friction). One wheel does not provide enough stored energy to shoot the ball, so I would suggest at least 2 wheels, as well as make sure that your flywheel wheel is not supported by bearing flats that are incredibly far away. You should only have an inch of clearance minimum between the flywheel wheel and the bearing flats. Also run the ball through with the flywheel off and get a good feel of how much force you’re pushing through to get the ball out. Tune the hood to follow a smooth path with some compression but not too much. Also, in every location an axle goes through, drill a hole larger than the holes that VEX made. This way you won’t have metal rubbing on metal.
EDIT//: Added more information, also how are you playing a gif as a video?!?!?!?
I got the video turned into a gif, Here it is.
You’ve had good advice here. One additional thing to watch is how much the wheel slows after shooting. If it doesn’t slow at all, you need more pressure between your back plate and the wheel (as Connor said). All you need to shoot, by the way, is one pressure plate or rod right at the point of launch. You don’t want to waste too much energy dragging the ball up the feeder. We built a test shooter years ago for an FRC game, and used a wooden dowel (rod) as the pressure point. It worked fine. You don’t need a long pressure point.
I used an online converter to change my video to a gif and then posted the resulting gif.
A nice YouTube video would be great, unless of course you are at school and not allowed access to YouTube…
Sorry, my parents don’t let me post on YouTube
Yeah that backplate needs some backing. The point is that the ball needs to be pressed against the wheel for the wheel to transfer energy to the ball.
Judging by how I see the gif, I think you need your hood to be more rounded. You can see the hood seriously bend out, which means there’s actually too much compression it’s giving the flywheel a harder time.
Ok, we will try these suggestions, thanks so much. I am still open to more from anyone.
I would highly suggest using lexan instead of metal sheets, as lexan has a much more rigid structure and would be able to give the ball the best amount of compression.
I don’t think using lexan or metal sheets makes a substantial difference so long as it is properly supported.
The hood needs to be supported more on top of your flywheel it looks like and have the hood angled more towards the flags. For this i reccomend using poly carb with mesh on it.