two drrivers at once?

[travis.calhoun]

can we have two drivers doing seperate things at once on the same robot?

[delsaner]

Our drive team consists of two drivers. One to actually drive the robot, and the other to operate the various mechanical portions (a kicker, hook, arm, etc.) This year, I predict one will drive, and one will be operating our arm, for picking up tubes and hanging them as well.

[Dominator1619]

Technically yes. You have 4 members of a drive team. 1 human player, 1 coach, and what can be described as ethier 1 driver and 1 operator or just 2 drivers. Although generally teams have 1 driver ( controls movement of hostbot ) and 1 "operator" to control what manipulator you have for the given year.

[gbrettmiller]

From the glossary in section 1 of the Game Manual:

DRIVER - a pre-college student team member responsible for operating and controlling the HOSTBOT. There are two DRIVERS per TEAM.

[Creator Mat]

It is very common to have to people driving the robot at once. One tends to focus on the actual driving while the other focuses on the control of the other robot functions.

[thefro526]

Yes, you are allowed to have two Drivers at one time - in fact nearly 99% of teams control their robots with two drivers.

I'd suggest that you follow Deslaner's advice and have one Driver for the Base, and one Driver for the other functions of the machine. You should make sure that the two Drivers work well together so that they don't argue mid-match.

[SirTasty]

Yes, you are allowed to have two Drivers at one time - in fact nearly 99% of teams control their robots with two drivers.

I'd suggest that you follow Deslaner's advice and have one Driver for the Base, and one Driver for the other functions of the machine. You should make sure that the two Drivers work well together so that they don't argue mid-match.

Or just make them take all of their orders from the coach. The last thing you want is to drive the robot by committee.

[Chris is me]

Or just make them take all of their orders from the coach. The last thing you want is to drive the robot by committee.

(my opinion only)

You don't want drivers that are useless without a coach telling them every single move to make - they can work but there's a lot to lose doing that.

The Coach should always have final say over what happens - but if the Coach has to watch the team's robot for more than a little at a time there's wasted potential. You want your two drivers to be able to intuitively work together and execute basic tasks - i.e. if they're told to "score that tube" they can effortlessly get in position, grab it, raise it, release. This way the Coach can focus on the clock and the rest of the field to figure out the next moves without having to micromanage a drive team.

[J.Warsoff]

We have an entire drive team. This consists of the following:

-Driver: Controls movement of robot; steering, speed, etc.
-Operator: Controls external "limbs" or parts of the robot; minibot deployment system, tube-grabbing/placement system, etc.
-Drive team Coach: Usually a strategy team member, oversees what both the driver and operator do and acts as a navigator and another set of eyes to watch the events on the field.

So to answer your question, yes, you can have more than one driver. Also, I recommend you do because it takes a lot of stress off of just one person and divides the jobs required for controlling your robot.

[thefro526]

Or just make them take all of their orders from the coach. The last thing you want is to drive the robot by committee.

It's not that simple. I've done every position on the Drive team in my time in FIRST from Human Player, To Operator, To Driver, To Coach and there's a lot more to putting two People together and telling them to listen to the coach.

Those two people need to build a bond and learn how one another think and react. A lot Coaches including myself tell their Drivers where to go, but not how to get there. I tell them to score, and where to score, but they decide the path and how they want to do it. I've found that this leaves the drivers to find the most efficient path since they know the robot and it's capabilities.

A little anecdote, if I may: My Senior year in High School I was the Team Captain and Driver. All of the members of the Driveteam were close friends of mine and many of us knew one another since before HS. My operator knew how I thought that year and he and I would drive without speaking. He would know what move I would make before I made it and that allowed us to drive as one cohesive unit.