June 15, 2021

The Nimble V3 (from now on known as 'Nimble Flex') has a new hob. 

As the Nimble Flex has a different shaft length than the previous Nimbles. We took this opportunity while redesigning the hob to make it even lighter. This new hob has a slightly different structure to the teeth, and because of the new process we were able to make it lighter!

By removing grooves in the sides of the "wheel" we went from an original weight of 6.69 grams to 4.39 grams. If you consider that Lykle has spent countless hours trying to lighten the shell by 0.5 grams, this 2.3 gram reduction is a big deal for us.

Nimble Flex Hob

The hob is now die cast, and after cooling, the bearing surface is turned to the correct dimension on a CNC lathe. then it is then hardened.

We have previously had some hobs hardened as a special order for customers, but this was only a handful really. With the Nimble Flex every hob supplied will come hardened as stock! 

This whole process meant, of course, that we needed to create molds, do extensive testing runs and then commit to a large number of hobs, all now done.

The one big drawback of the new method of production is the lead time. Our supplier has told us they will be ready to ship to us on June 29th. As soon as we receive them, we will start shipping orders.

All the other parts are scheduled to arrive well before that date. 

The new hob is lighter, tougher and will last a lot longer. Overall, we think it is a winner.


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