Looking for roller brush

[N7UJJ]

A local rookie team emailed me:

"We are looking for a cylindrical brush something that is about 18” long with a 4” – 6” diameter. Any Ideas?"

All I can think of is a paint roller, but that would be too small. Anyone have an idea where such a brush may exist? They did not mention what material or why the they need such a roller brush.

Thanks.

[Rich Kressly]

http://www.mcmaster.com/
search for "conveyor brushes and/or "round brushes"

[J. Stofflett]

I know in '06 at least one team used hair brushes 4 end to end

[gorrilla]

for this years game, we are thinking about running surgical tubing around pvc to collect moon rocks

[Ice Berg]

Ya, team 694 used hairbrushes to acquire from the ground in 2006. They were about 3" dia. and they worked very well. I'll try to find a good pic to post.

[J. Stofflett]

Good picture in FIRST Robots:Behind the Design from 06 season

[Matt H.]

http://www.mcmaster.com/
search for "conveyor brushes and/or "round brushes"

Specifically look at catalog page 1226 on the lower half of the page. These are a little expensive and I doubt they would effectively pick up the game piece (the bristles are dense and meant for cleaning rather than picking up game pieces), but they are here.

[N7UJJ]

Thanks for all the quick replies. I passed the info on and I'm sure they will register and use Chief Delphi!

The Mcmaster's brushes seem expensive. The hair brush idea is brilliant. That's the one I would make.

[MrForbes]

We also found a neat garage door seal at Ace hardware that might work, if a few of them were attached to a pipe (such as ABS black sewer pipe) so they could act as flaps to move the balls.

And the tan gum type roughtop tread seems to be really grippy on the Orbit balls.

[synth3tk]

The Mcmaster's brushes seem expensive. The hair brush idea is brilliant. That's the one I would make.
We're strongly considering this option. It makes a lot of sense.

[rsisk]

How about a roller brush from a vacuum cleaner?

http://www.rsisk.com/rollerbrush.jpg

[billbo911]

How about a roller brush from a vacuum cleaner?

http://www.rsisk.com/rollerbrush.jpg

Exactly what we are considering also.
You might want to look at Hoover (http://www.hoover.com/parts/?category=brushrolls) as well.

[Matt H.]

The roller brushes from commercial vacuum cleaners don't match the size constraints listed above. The instant this competition came out I took apart an old upright vacuum (for a different purpose)--The component shown above is no more than 1" diameter with 1/2" bristles. An in most vacuums it will be closer to 10" rather than 18" long. I think a teams best bet is to make their own brush using hair brushes or commercial bristles on a piece of pipe.

[Donut]

Vacuum cleaner brushes don't seem like they'll be large enough to be much more than a standard roller when interacting with the balls.

I would suggest investigating how you can use other bristled objects if teams consider this type of design for their robots. I know we're planning to sweep up the competition with our idea ;)

[Japper]

Check out chimney sweeping brushes at menards... they come with plastic bristles and are 6" - 8" diameter with a height of about 10"...

Also, they have a shaft on them that you can attach a motor or gear to...

[MrForbes]

Chimney sweep? what's that? asks the fellow from Arizona :)

(actually a chimney sweep lives up the road from me, I see him driving his old Ford truck to work often, wearing his top hat and towing his little trailer advertising his services)

[JesseK]

We prototyped a sort of custom brush using thin rubber hose and holes drilled into 1" OD PVC pipe. The more rigid the rubber, the better it works. We wanted to use rubber so that it would flex in case on of the 'bristles' impales the ball. Using thin hosing allows us to interlace surgical tubing on the same roller so that the brush leads straight into the conveyor.

[synth3tk]

Jesse, could your team kindly post a picture of this setup? If it's ok with you guys. I'd like to see how this works.

[MrForbes]

How will Rule R05 work with brushes, which have bristles of about .015" diameter?

<R05> Exterior or exposed surfaces on the ROBOT shall not present undue hazards to the team members, event staff or GAME PIECES. Reasonable efforts must be taken to remove, mitigate, or shield any sharp edges, pinch points, entanglement hazards, projectiles, extreme visual/audio emitters, etc. from the exterior of the ROBOT. All points and corners that would be commonly expected to contact a GAME PIECE should have a minimum radius of 0.125 inches to avoid becoming a snag/puncture hazard. All edges that would be commonly expected to contact a GAME PIECE should have a minimum radius of 0.030 inches. All of these potential hazards will be carefully inspected.

[pacoliketaco]

Our team worked today on a similar mechanism, using a rotating PVC pipe with k'nex pieces sticking out of it to draw the cells in. later we changed the k'nex to pneumatic tubing, to see how a flexible bristle worked. this seemed to work just as well, with the added bonus of not getting caught in the cells.

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e82/pacoliketaco/0108091616.jpg

[mbushroe]

You were all looking in the wrong areas. People who make filters for koi ponds use 5-6 inch plastic brushes several feet long to allow algae to collect on them, and they are fairly inexpensive. Check out this link:

http://www.azponds.com/filter_media.htm

http://www.azponds.com/black_knight_filter_brush.jpg
Hope this helps.

Mike

[NOV8R]

Check these monster hair brushes out.....www.adiscountbeauty.com/page292.html

[EricH]

How will Rule R05 work with brushes, which have bristles of about .015" diameter?
I would expect that the inspectors will look very, very closely at the brushes and the rules for a few minutes, and then have a conversation with each other. After about half an hour, someone will probably notice the "should" (not "must") in the rules and pass you.

[MrForbes]

Thanks Eric. I was hoping someone would volunteer to post the question on the Q&A....

[Vikesrock]

Thanks Eric. I was hoping someone would volunteer to post the question on the Q&A....

Done!

[mjgard]

Response from GDC on Brushes.

Rule <R05> would be applied to the entire brush construction, not the individual bristles. As such, as long as the brush was not so stiff that it would cause damage to the GAME PIECES, it is unlikely to cause a conflict with Rule <R05>. There are no other rules that would generically prohibit the use of a brush assembly to collect GAME PIECES.

[synth3tk]

Thanks for the word!!! It came just in time for us to review our brush design.

[M. Gildner]

Check out your local job shop or vacuum store