I was looking at new Groove wheels on the site and…
Whats the difference between these two? The name is the same but the image is not.
The upper one has POM. Implicitly, the lower one presumably doesn’t. POM is polyoxymethylene which is a plastic with a very low coefficient of friction.
looks like one is positive V and one is negative V. POM is the material Delrin is a trade name for POM.
Ah! Now I see it. I had to enlarge the image. When I first read it, I didn’t perceive a difference between “V-Groove” and “V-Slot” since I figured a groove and a slot basically mean the same thing. I think the description could be clearer for people that don’t deal with these things on a regular basis. or better yet, a close-up of a profile of the wheels. That’s one perennial complaint I have with 3DPC: their descriptions often suck. I bought a power supply this morning. I had to zoom in to the picture of the power supply, then google the part number to find out the voltage and current ratings for it. 3DPCs description just said “power supply”.
Is there an advantage to positive vs negative? Different uses maybe?
Yes, detest sites that make you look elsewhere for details. Also, this means people are looking elsewhere and may actually buy elsewhere.
Fruit for thought 3DPC!?
1 Like
One is made to go into a V groove to constrain it and the other is to go on a protruding V shape like if you welded a 90° angle to a rail so the root of the angle is exposed these wheels would travel on that.
1 Like
Actually I take back my comment from earlier. In fact I’ll edit it. One does say “V-Groove” while the other says “V-Slot”. I just interpreted those things to mean the same thing.
2 Likes
Tbh i kinda thought the same thing, i noticed the difference but it didnt register in my mind.
I wonder how many printers make use of the v groove vs v slot wheels?
not many. hehehe I have seen them being used with filament guide projects.
According to this I have never seen v slot wheels on any printer.
My understanding is that PC is not as slippery as POM.
I’ll hose them down with Jig-a-loo 
Or simple green… …
So it appears that there are some kind of rubber wheels, Polycarbonate, Delrin, and Drylin.
Is there a difference other than cost?
What is it?
Rubber could be anything from natural rubber top silicone rubber. without a hardness number, it’s hard to say. Delrin is a trade name for PolyAcetal or POM. Drylin is an Igus product, I think it’s basically POM with friction reducers in it.
Thanks Glenn is one better than the others or does it really make a difference? My X1 now has a working ABL ( thanks to my girlfriends pc) that new throat , extruded gears , and filament sensor seems to resolved all the jams.
The quality is still poor. I know the v groove rollers have flat spots. I can feel it when I move them. I will replace them but don’t know which.
maybe not better but they are for different purposes. POM is probably the best but it’s harder than the rubber (I imagine) So could hold up to being parked in one spot better (regarding flat spots) but it’s heavy and being harder it’ll be noisier. Also, If some dust or a chip gets caught in the track the rubber might roll right over it where a harder wheel might jam solid. there’s always a trade-off and the wear has to go somewhere. If you make the wheels harder then it’s going to wear the track faster, so, which is easier to replace as a maintenance item? Recirculating ball slides will last the longest. hard steel on hard steel with lubricant. Noisey and heavy but capable of great speeds and loads, I think they use these wheels and aluminum because the forces aren’t great and at these forces, the speed is not going to add much wear so they picked the wheel as the logical choice to be the wear part. The Igus materials and bushings are wonderful feats of material science and design and in my business, I’ve really tried hard to find an excuse to use them but they never make it past prototype or preproduction units because of the cost and availability of traditional materials that are 99% as good for what we need.