Upgrading a VFC VR16. Seigeteks?
 

So, I had a full build going was running great then the other day it decided to blow up on me so yeah. My build was SHS 12.1 gears, SHS aluminum piston with steel rack, Lonex anti-reversal latch, Stock Cylinder, Stock Nozzle, Ace 1 arms silent piston and cylinder heads, Tienly GT45000 motor, Tienly Pinion, AWS stealth fet, Gate warfet. Long story short stuff decided to stop meshing when I added the timely motor and the thing self destructed causing mass gear stripping, piston stripping, scored cylinder, stripped pinion etc... My stupidity. So my question now is what should I do for awesome trigger response should I consider a tougher gear seigeteks possibly? Are they worth the $175? Or stick with SHS 12.1's? Looking for ideas. I also have a chimera coming in the mail from BTC. Let me know your thoughts!

Did you correct AOE on that metal piston?

Probably why they stopped meshing if you didn't.

Switch to plastic or half metal teeth and shave off the teeth so you have proper engagement.

Measure twice cut once.

Blah blah blah...

Lol yeah after this happened i realized why people use the piston as the so called "fault point" Should have went plastic and will be going plastic for the build thinking sorbo as well.

Can you say without a shadow of doubt, that it was part failure and not installation error?
Because if the latter, you may want to re-visit using cheaper parts to nail down your workmanship/process before throwing money at problems.

Sounds like a generic case of user error rather than quality of parts.

You can't just stick 12:1 gears and a Tienly45k into a gun and expect it to be a drop in 50 RPS setup. You can stick a set of Siegetek 10:1s in there, you'd get 60 RPS and a stripped piston in 5 seconds if you have no idea what you're doing. In most cases, parts that are "good enough" in terms of quality are as good as the person installing them. If you have a set of Siegeteks, you can still break them through improper installation. I've seen it happen. Same with your piston, and it sounds like you've made a very poor piston choice for a high speed setup.

Here is a sample of a high speed build I did for a client, prices removed.

Base gun: VFC 416

BTC Spectre
Siegetek 10:1 Gear set and pinion
Tienly U30000 Long Motor
SHS 14T Ported Piston
Lonex M4 Cylinder Head
Sorbo and Neo pad combo
ZCI steel full cylinder
Lonex POM Piston Head
SHS M4 Nozzle
SHS V2 Tappet Plate
Ace1Arms M120 Spring
Modify Shim Set
Reinforced Steel Tappet Spring
Piston Head X-Ring

PDI 6.05 285mm barrel
Lonex M4 Hop Up Unit
R Hop Installation on PDI

-R-hop installation on PDI barrel
-Lonex hop up unit assembled, modified, nub installed
-hop up shims added
-hop up rubber modified
-mock bolt modified to prevent hop up interference

-pinion installed
-sector gear short stroked
-piston rack glued in
-sorbo installed, AoE adjusted
-piston head thread locked into piston
-all air seal surfaces lubricated with silicone lubricant
-gears lubricated with PTFE grease
-BTC Spectre installed, selector shimmed, trigger pull shortened
-gears shimmed bevel-pinion
-tappet plate modified for better air seal
-anti-reversal latch modified for Siegetek gear set
-nozzle cut to length

See thats what I'm considering too in all honesty I'm not ashamed to say it I believe it was 1. My shimming job. 2. Parts not meshing mainly contact due to the shimming job but also the Tienly pinion not liking the SHS bevel. 3. AOE which was my fault. So my question is what should I try parts wise I'm more than happy with SHS gears so maybe I should try them again but bushings or bearings etc.. Brands to try etc.. Also i should mention this happened at about 45rps I did a quick burst and big failure.

Also I was running a lonex anti reversal latch that I believe killed the bevel as well.

Pesto in all honesty your builds are incredible I'm very much aspiring to get to the level of excellence and craftsmanship you have. So I'm glad we've established my user error I'm not ashamed to admit that I literally started Teching last year. So maybe you guys could give me some pointers or methods you use to shim/correct angle of engagement like. Do you shim bevel to pinion what gear should i shim first should I use bearings or bushings? How many teeth can you safely remove on a piston to correct AOE etc...

Use a lighter piston. There is absolutely no need for an aluminum bodied piston. SHS 14T 7 hole piston is the best general purpose piston. Use a lighter piston head, a POM one such as Prometheus or Lonex. Avoid metal ones, avoid mushroom style "silent" ones. AoE is good, but it is not critical. I've never seen an AoE related failure aside from it being over "corrected", so that is likely not your cause of failure.

Your setup likely failed due to piston pre-engagement, which is caused by feeding issues. Use a pie shaped sector delayer with the SHS gear set, and short stroke from the release side to prevent tappet plate pre-engagement. 2 teeth if you are sub 40 RPS, 3 teeth if you are above 40 RPS.

As far as shimming goes, shim bevel-pinion. Do not use the internet guides that tell you to start from the spur gear, also avoid the guides that instruct you to shim using the top (right) half of the gearbox. That will result in the bevel gear being shimmed too far away from the pinion.

When you shim, make sure every gear is as tight as possible without inducing friction. That means you should be able to wiggle each gear shaft slightly, ideally <0.1mm. As far as spacing between the gears, sector-spur doesn't matter a whole lot, those only strip from piston pre-engagement and if you have D-Boys guns lol. Give a good amount of contact, but leave enough clearance to be 100% sure they are not rubbing. People often shim them as tightly as possible and the result is not pretty. Bevel-spur spacing is important. If you shim too far away, the bevel is more likely to strip.

Thanks so much now one issue i noticed with my last set up is there were lots of shims up top is there such thing as using to many shims without inducing friction?

Yes, if the column of shims is what is supporting your gear shaft rather than the bushing then you have issues.

And yes, you should use bushings.

Ok wicked I really appreciate your help guys gotta order some parts now!!

GT45K is a speed motor. Using it with 13:1s or other lower ratio gears is like using a formula 1 racing engine in a tractor pull.

It's well beyond it's rated torque load and now you're just trading exponential amounts of amperage to get minimal gains.
GT30k with 10:1 is going to be much more efficient, and won't risk melting anything.

According to you what would be the appropriate gear ratio for a 45k then?

slower gears.

The motor will work with those gears but it's a high power consumption motor on a set of gears that requires more torque to efficiently turn them. That setup is likely going to draw 26-30 amps on a constant if pulling 10:1s probably 24-26 on 12:1s. Burst draw is probably closer to 100 amps, so the likelihood you kill battery packs will be higher. A better motor to use in a low ratio gear set would be a shs torque or zci torque motor. A zci will draw closer to 15-16 amps and you can run it on a stick lipo if you are space restricted... though I like bigger batteries for larger margin of safety. What you give up in top end speed in full auto you retain in your semi cycle speed. It will complete the first cycle much faster and much more efficiently.