Day 5: More Design Work

Most of the day was spent in CAD refining the designs of our prototypes.

We changed the design of the bottom plate of our ground intake to include a moving belt instead of a lexan plate so it isn’t required to ride on the ground.

Our drive train is coming together more and now has the option of adding a center wheel if we end up wanting to switch up our drive train mid season.

Our shooter prototype is close to competition and we should be shooting in the next two days.

We are starting to work through a few more of the details of the robot.

Funneling
There is a big challenge in any mass collection objective of funneling objects through your robot. Make sure you plan your ball path carefully. Passive funnels don’t work nearly as well as active conveyor mechanisms. The Cheesy Poofs 2006 Robot has a very nice active conveyor system. Belts on the bottom of the ball work very well for moving balls back to the elevator.

Capacity
We are starting to think that storage capacity isn’t as big of deal as people are making it out to be. If you are storing more than 50 balls it’s going to take some time to shoot them and in that time you me see a lot more defense. Capacity isn’t a bad thing unless it takes away from the effectiveness of your other scoring elements or the overall robustness of your robot..

– Spectrum

“I confess that, in 1901, I said to my brother Orville that men would not fly for 50 years. Two years later, we ourselves were making flights. This demonstration of my inability as a prophet gave me such a shock that I have ever since distrusted myself and have refrained from all prediction.” -— Wilbur Wright Speech at Aero-Club de France, 1908


Source: Spectrum