Robot climbing times
 

Ok whats you guess on how long it will take to climb to the top of the tower?

Re: Robot climbing times
 

If our lead drivetrain/ climbing device mentor's idea works like he says it might, below 4 seconds.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I would really like some insight on that idea.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Our current textbook strategy allocates ~40s for "end game", which includes the time it takes to drive to the feeder station load 6 alliance discs, drive to the pyramid, climb it, and place them into the goal.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Dont miss one of the six beacsue it will cost you if you do

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I'm sure we'll post after either a successful or a failed prototype.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

If you are successful you would be nuts to post this advantage until after build is done.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

You might get yellow/red carded for this intentional rule violation.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Similar idea, but we would rather carry 4. No risk of negative points if you miss a disk, plus you don't have to design for carrying 6, whereas the rest of the match you would be carrying 4 (assuming you are using the same mechanism for white and coloured disks, which may be a big assumption, but hey, what do I know?).

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Last season (and I don't know if there was a similar rule off the top of my head about repeated violations) teams would use the strategy of taking a 3 point penalty in automomous to hold and score the extra basketball from the bridge. They were net +3 points. It wasn't considered to be an "intentional" rule violation, but a strategy. It wasn't malicious or damaging, which is what I think the yellow/red card rule applies. If someone intentionally broke the hitting people while in the protected zone rule every match, to cause them to misfeed, that could be considered intentional rule violation.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Like who?

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I believe 341 and/or 67 might have used this strategy last year in autonomous.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Since we went off topic pretty quick. 341 did it and were IMO the best all around robot in 2012.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Okay, I'm curious now. Got any video? :D

Re: Robot climbing times
 

None of the competitions I watched or attended allowed this (then again, they may not have had it happen). I saw teams that shot the balls in their robot and then picked up additional balls afterwards, but that is not a rule violation. Regardless, last year's rulings have no bearing on this season's so I would not rely on that as an argument for why it should be legal. If a team is serious about this strategy I would ask the Q&A about it.

Indeed, a robot that could climb in 4 seconds for a guaranteed 30 points is an assured 1st pick if they aren't the top alliance captain. Most teams will have trouble lining up to hang from the bottom rung in 4 seconds!

I'm thinking more like 30 seconds to climb the top for an average climber. Most teams won't be able to climb so that still puts you in the 95th percentile

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Most Teams: Can't climb to the top
Average for teams that can: 40-30 seconds
Above average: 15-20 seconds
Out of this world 5-10 seconds

4 seconds? Please.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I disagree. It's completely possible. Not easy, but definitely possible.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I, for one, can't say I would choose a robot which climbed at that speed unless their mechanism was absolutely rock.expletive.solid.

As gabriel pointed out in the other thread... a single bad fall could damage the robot to the point of requiring hours of maintenance to fix... something you just don't have in finals.

Caution never killed anybody. Lack of it however...

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I'd think any team building a mechanism to climb that fast would have the know-how to design it in such a fashion to not break.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

My bet: more often than not, robots will not be able to climb the tower. Those that can will easily take 30 seconds. The best teams in the world will get under ten. I seriously doubt that anyone will even approach 5, even if you don't count alignment time.

Remember, the hard part of deploying minibots in 2011 wasn't getting them up fast enough. It was getting them deployed quickly. A fast (and reliable) deployment was far more important that a fast climb.

Here's some more food for thought: the first seeded teams would much rather pick a slower team to climb that could always do it (low standard of deviation in score), than a robot that climbed slightly quicker, but couldn't do it sometimes (high standard deviation). Don't worry so much about speed, make a robust and easy to align lift.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I'm not so worried about the climbing part breaking, but a bent axle or sheared off wheel on a West Coast Drive is no fun to fix.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

If somebody climbs the pyramid in <5 seconds I will eat my tongue. Climbing 100" inches of tower in 4 seconds would require a robot to travel at a ludicrous 2.08 ft/s VERTICALLY WHILE CLIMBING. Ridiculous. The only way I could see something even remotely close to this is if you dedicated your robot to climbing, in which case you made your robot a box on wheels and on which your bumpers and battery weigh more than the robot itself. I'm sorry if I'm coming off harsh, but I don't think it's possible to climb a 9' ladder in 4 seconds unless you're a living organism.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Because of not only the need to be careful not to climb past two zones at once but also to be careful so not to have a catastrophic fall I say at the least it'll take a minute at best to make it to the top.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

As long as it is under 2 minutes does time really matter?

Consistency... now that matters.

another factor is if the mechanism auto climbs or requires driver interaction.

4 seconds??? trolling???

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Just going to speak my thoughts alloud, but I suppose that a robot with a drivetrain integrated to climbing up the corners could be super effective... like charzard fighting treeko

Re: Robot climbing times
 

We have a conceptual design that will be easy to automate. We're in the process of proofing it now. Taking away driver hesitation between tiny repeatable movements should easily shave off 5 seconds, no matter what the final motors/gears are.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Most of the time, 341 would shoot the two preloads before getting the two from the bridge. However, when against another robot who went for the bridge in auton (27, 233), they would go to the bridge first, intentionally taking the penalty.

Also, 365 would take the additional ball in auton too.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

If we assume that the 4 seconds is a goal:
150 Lb robot = 667 N
60 Inch=1.5 meters estimated change in CG height
Time = 4 sec
667N*1.5m/4 sec = 250 Watts.

Assuming 50-75% efficient mechanism your power draw would be:
333-500 Watts.
That is a lot of power draw, but not unheard of.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Re: Robot climbing times
 

To be clear, we always hoped not to take the penalty when we did this. A lot of the time, one or more balls would not happen to roll into our intake and we'd leave the bridge loaded with 3 balls. But sometimes all of them did. We were never carded for doing it, but on a couple of occasions people expressed some displeasure that we were setting up the bot to incur a foul.

What choice did we have though? Risk a 3 point penalty and then score 6 points with the extra ball (EV +3)? Or don't go for the bridge at all, and give our opponents 12 free points (EV -12)?

IMO, a game mechanic that makes it mathematically advantageous to just eat the penalty is (a) designed to be exploited and/or (b) poorly thought out.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Running some quick numbers to put a lower bound on time:

Assume the simplest possible lifting method, winching yourself from the floor to the 90 inch bar straight vertically (yes, I know this is illegal). Power the winch by two CIM motors left over after using 4 in your drivetrain. To get max power from the motors, they run at 1/2 speed, producing 1/2 the stall torque.

For a CIM, stall torque is 21.5 in-lb and free speed is 5310 rpm.

Torque/Force used to select gear ratio:
Two CIMS running at max power produce 21.5 in-lb.
Assume a 1" diameter rod (smallest practical size, ish) to reel the cord onto.
At 1:1 gear ratio, line tension would be 43 lb.
For a 150 lb robot, need ~3.5:1 gear ratio.
Select motor pinions with 12 teeth engaging a winch gear of 40 teeth gives a robot weight of 143.3 lb

Gear ratio used to find lifting speed:
The CIMS are running at half speed = 2655 rpm
After the gear reduction, the winch speed is 796.5 rpm.
Multiplying by the rod circumferance and converting from minutes to seconds gives 41.7 inches/second.

So, with the most optimal lifting mechanism, operating at the optimal conditions, not accounting for acceleration and deceleration, lifting 80 inches, would take about 2 seconds.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Consistency absolutely matters, but time not spent climbing is time that can be spent scoring disks, transporting disks for an alliance partner, playing defense, or whatever else isn't related to climbing.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Stupid questiin I guess -- What happens if you try the Simbotics-in-Breakaway route and use all 6 CIMS? Or do you just blow a breaker?

Re: Robot climbing times
 

That is correct, for a CIM pulling 133 amps.

What kind of 40 amp circuit breakers are you using?

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Which number matters for your application depends on how long you will be drawing the maximum current during the lift. You can pull 133 amps for a couple seconds without issue.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Im assuming that you are accounting for the fact that you will be awarding the opposing alliance 6 points for carrying two more discs than the allotted 4

Re: Robot climbing times
 

The realistic power requirements to climb aren't that crazy for the motors we have available. Just for grins I calculated that using max power from two CIMs (~674W) a 150lb robot could be lifted 60in in 1.5s. Assuming a 50% drive loss that's still only 3s. So, unless you botch the gearing from 6 CIMs, I doubt there will be any issues.

I don't think that the power requirements are the challenge of climbing. The actual mechanism will be the challenging part (to state the obvious).

Re: Robot climbing times
 

You say this like it's a bad thing.
2012 saw many alliance captains that could only balance on the bridge.

30 points in this game is nothing to sneeze at, and neither is the feat of designing a robot to do precisely the strategy you're belittling.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

No one has posted a climbing idea like what one of our mentors proposed so I'll keep it under our hat for now until we get it prototyped. With that said, it's just dead clever. It would provide for a self-aligning, automatic climber that could get to the top in seconds. The math says just a couple of seconds, though I'm skeptical of that. I feel safe in saying if it works anything like intended, it will be less than 10 seconds for sure.

-Mike

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Add in the use of hybrid mechanisms (use pneumatics, motors & constant-force springs through the use of creative cabling) and the instantaneous electrical power requirement is greatly reduced.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

As far as holding extra game pieces goes, having an extra ball roll into the intake while shooting other balls is not very obvious, and could easily be missed by the refs. However, driving to the intake and having the human player feed 6 frisbees into the robot one at a time, then taking 30 seconds to climb up the pyramid with them will be extremely obvious. A robot that does this will definitely have the two fouls called against them, and doing it in several matches would likely draw a card at some point.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I see that power all the time - in the drivetrain. Hmm... :rolleyes:

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Trust me, we saw it last year. Deliberate 4+ ball possession in autonomous was called at least twice at every event I coached or reffed, and sometimes more on the same team. The lack of carding last year* was not related to overlooking the illegal actions. It was no different than deliberately taking a Lane violation penalty in 2011 in order to complete a logo. As Jared said, it just makes sense.

*This post is not intended to provide direct insight into referee rulings for 2013. Hopefully the Q&A will inform this. If not, remember history, but (as always) execute entirely at your own risk.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

OK, I am going to call it right now. No way is anyone under 5 seconds. In 2010, some of the best robots took 2 - 3 seconds using power take-off from the drive train.

All I can say is ... Nessy 2013 is the 4 second legal climb.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Actually I would be surprised if anyone climbing didn't try to keep their weight waaaaaaaayyyyy under the 120 limit. A fast, light weight, utility climber might be a solid partner in an alliance...

Re: Robot climbing times
 

That's our plan - light as humanly possible. Sure wish we could use brushless motors w/lipo batteries like I do on my personal projects. Could get the whole robot in the 10-20 lbs range tops for what we are planning on doing.

-Mike

Re: Robot climbing times
 

it will be like the minibots

some will be sub 5s and others will be much much slower.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Like said previously, I'm calling out sub 5s climbs as impossible.

I'm going out on a limb and saying that it's not going to happen. Feel free to prove me wrong, I really do.

EDIT: Team 217 has not deemed it impossible. It is simply highly unlikely.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

For clarification, Team 217 does not deem it impossible, I personally think it is like Nessy, some people will claim it, but none will prove it.

But I said the same thing last year about the triple balance ...

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I've learned not to underestimate FRC teams...

I have a design that could make a rather smooth ~4-second climb, but we've deemed it beyond our ability to manufacture to desired specifications.

That said, I think well more teams will have ideas that could do it than teams that will have mechanisms that will.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

It's possible from a power standpoint, but I agree the time will still be above 4 seconds due to the multiple grip handoffs.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Just to be clear here, if you stall your CIMs when you're trying to climb, you're not moving anyway. You'll want to design your hanger so it runs at 30-some amps (or less) under load to get as close to the max power as you safely can. A little under is a good idea since your battery voltage will have dropped during the match.

You can generally safely run 1.5x-2x the breaker current for a few seconds without trouble. It's how most single speed drives begin pushing matches.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I'm really interested to see the value proposition that the elite teams take. Every year, there seems to be a killer design component that the elite figure out early, and the rest struggle to implement after seeing the effectiveness.

see: 2012 stingers, 2011 ramped minibot launchers/minimalist minibots, 2010 ball magnets/hanging on the vertical bars

I have a sneaking suspicion that there will be a divide amongst the elite this year. Some will have 30pt climbers that are effective, and others will have a corner based 20pt climb thats ridiculously fast (like some of the stupidly fast hangers in 2010 [~2s])

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I think we may see a sub 4-second climb by 1 or 2 teams once or twice. I don't think those teams will be able to do it consistently without major repair work.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I would tend to agree, but I feel like there may be "elite teams" that actually choose not to concern themselves with climbing and instead focus on shooting in the end game to make up for the points. It's important to remember that when that signal comes at the last thirty seconds, the human players will be going berserk trying to throw frisbees onto the field to make shooting easier for their alliance. So the shooting opportunity is very real in the last thirty seconds

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Right-o. If you can shoot seven three pointers and make a ten-point hang on the lowest bar in the same amount of time, you just one-upped a "thirty point climb". Ten three pointers and no hang and you tied it.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Unless their team's number is 1717*, I don't think even the elite teams can consistently score 30 disc points in 10-20 seconds by themselves. 20-21 disc pts + a 10-pt climb may be more feasible, but 30 disc points is tough.

Plus, elite alliances won't have any discs left to huck at the end. (edit-- this doesn't account for the possibility of a higher-accuracy score of 4 colored discs into the pyramid goal either).

So I definitely think that high-caliber teams want a 30-point climb as an option for endgame.

*Of course, the kids who built an 18-shot bot last year aren't on that team any more

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I expect as always that the average team will struggle to score 7 3pters in the entire match.

The elite will be able to, but the best will 30pt hang in under 15 seconds also.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Do I see a return of the Loch Ness Monster stickers from last year??

67 better get on this!

Not that I think it is possible to get up the pyramid in 4 seconds or less.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

so do you think the hightest score will be like 98? im thinking 30pt hang, 7 discs 35pts, auton 18 for the "Elite Teams" extra 15 points?

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Miss Daisy, I have the utmost respect for your team and all that it is. You're consistently one of the best robots out there and play the game in ways 2537 could only dream of emulating. But if I asked Miss Daisy to find a way to climb the pyramid in 4 seconds, how realistic would it be? I don't see a way to do it unless you literally dedicate your robot to climbing. And you know just as well as I do that 30 (or maybe even 40 with dumping) is probably good enough for a regional but not good enough for the Newtons, Curies, Galileos, Archimedes and Einsteins. No disrespect, MD, but personally I think 4 seconds is simply ludicrous.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Wasn't a 1s minibot ludicrous during week one of Logomotion build season?

I wouldn't make such a bold statement, it's certainly in the realm of possibility. Some teams may have designs already that can do it.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I can envision a pretty darn fast mechanism for this, but you'd be dedicating your robot to a super-fast climb. Here's my thinking:

Common Sense Climbing: Most of us are thinking of a climber that has a moving grabber and a stationary grabber. Moving grabber latches on, pulls you up till you engage the stationary grabber. Then you extend the moving grabber, latch on again, and repeat till you get to the top. Doing all of that rapidly enough for a 4 second lift seems difficult. Plus is that this is (relatively) uncomplicated and light.

Superfast Climbing: You've dedicated your robot to climbing, so your climbing mechanism can be as heavy, bulky, and power hungry as necessary. So you make a climbing system with three different moving grabbers. Drive up to the pyramid, first grabber latches on and starts lifting. When it's done, your second grabber is perfectly positioned to latch on and start lifting, so it keeps pulling you up with very little pause. Ditto the third grabber. So you get nearly continuous lifting at the cost of building three moving grabbers instead of one. And powering them of course. My specific implementation of this would be a corner climber with three pairs of telescoping poles with spring loaded hooks to grab the rungs. You'd want some kind of shock on the idler wheel that's running up the pole, of course. And even then it'd be a pretty wild ride going up the corner that fast....

Re: Robot climbing times
 

From a rappelling exercise I did a long, long time ago, I know that you can rappel down a knotted rope without losing speed and without falling off when you hit the knot, using a rotating zip-climber that mechanically rotates itself around the knot without allowing a cantilever on the part of the climber.

Such a device is feasible for an FRC robot on the corner post -- clamp it on and power it, and then just drive up! (You'd go to half power over the knuckles -- compensated by momentum but detracted by gravity -- but full power elsewhere).

What it isn't is possible for 1551 to properly develop and test over a six-week period. ;)

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Three hanging and dumping specialized bots on an alliance could easily get 120+ points. 3 hangs, 90 point total, 6 pyramid dumps, 30 more, auto dumps, up to 8 more, and then any dumps for 1 point goals from autonomous to hanging. Easily 120+pts, depends on if one bot can easily do all pyramid discs, while other 2 spam 1 point dumps.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Your math works, but I find this to be perhaps the most interesting use of the word "easily" I have ever seen. ;) I wonder if you mightn't have confused it with "IRI".

Joking aside though, in most any situation where you could get 3 such robots on the same alliance [barring a very weird qual schedule], you are quite likely to be up against some beastly shooters + 10-20pt (maybe 30) hangers yourself. They'd give the hanging alliance a run for its money, particularly given the time they'd have unrestricted and the defense you can lay down against dumpers. In fact, with the strategy you just laid out, you'd be lucky to execute fully at all. My #1 priority would likely be keeping that colored-disk loaded bot away from their pyramid, and anyone running around loading and dumping before they hang will be in for some very tough driving. Their might be fouls involved (maybe even a technical), but even a 20pt technical is worth it if it prevents a 30-50pt hang. Nothing's ever as easy as it sounds.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I hate to spill the beans on this design, but since we almost certainly won't be using it, I might as well.

Minibot up the diagonal of the pyramid. This was the first thing that entered my head when I saw the challenge. Use a large pneumatic wheel to get over the crossbars, or an innovative wheel arrangement. Put two levels of idlers behind the pole, and be able to switch them over the crossbar quickly. You would clip onto the pole with your idlers, and just drive the pnumatic wheel up, and when you got to the crossbar, unclip your first idler, and after you've driven high enough to get over the bar, reclip it.

I think this is the only design that could get up in the under 10 range. Kevin, I don't think three arms is the way to go, or even possible for all but the best teams (who wouldn't want to go all out on it in favor of a shooter anyway).

If this such a good design, why aren't we going with it? Because it would be really hard to package with our shooter, and because climbing fast isn't all that important anyway.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I'm not proposing that as a sensible solution. Just as a method of ascending pretty much as quickly as possible.

Also, I'm having difficulty picturing your proposed solution. Specifically how you get the idler out of the way of the crossbar. If the idler is behind the crossbar, you'd have to move it outwards to disengage the pole, then sideways to clear the bar. Unless an idler is actually two idlers that come in from opposite sides and wrap around the pipe to keep you from sliding off sideways or something.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

This might be treading on thin ice. Depending on how you plan on "preventing" their hang, the judges might automatically award the 30 points anyway and give you a technical foul.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Interfering with Andy's strategy has almost nothing to do with directly preventing their hang. With three 30-point hangers running around the field trying to pick up colored disks and feed/dump, there would be plenty of opportunity for 'forced preoccupation' without putting a defender anywhere near their pyramid itself. (The only technical on the horizon would be a last-minute long pin.) If you're actually that good at 50pt climbs, you're going to have your hands full of people getting in your way any time you stray from the pyramid.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I see a lot of sentences that start with "most teams will be able to..." but I think the sentences mean to read "most powerhouse teams will..." or "most teams that are playing in the finals will..." or "Most teams in the eliminations at the world championships will..."

based off of my memories of the 2004 and 2010 games, I believe this thread greatly underestimates the difficulty of climbing and overestimated what truly most teams, meaning more than 50% at any given regional, will be capable of. In 2010 I'd argue less than 50% of teams were able to climb 12" effectively, of the teams that could, at least 50% of them spent a significant amount of time just lining up to do so.

So I'm answering my opinion for the Average team, meaning the median team at any given regional, and the upper 10% powerhouse teams at any given regional. These numbers include time spent aligning, not just climbing.


10 points
The Average Team - 35 second

The Powerhouses - 8 seconds

20 points
The average team - 50% of teams will not climb to the 20 point range. Those that do will spend half the match doing so.

The powerhouses - 30 seconds


30 points -
The average team - Only the ones that build a bot dedicated to only climbing the tower, and spend the entire 2 minutes doing so.

the powerhouses - less than 50% of the powerhouses will *attempt it or **succeed. Average of those that do - ***40 seconds.




***before I get backlash, keep in mind what an average is. Yes some will do it much faster. Others will do it much slower, and many will spend a lot of time attempting it with no avail.

**Robots fall, things come loose and dangle... if a robot makes it to the top tier quickly, but its bumper fabric peels off and dangles 29" off the ground, it is still will only be worth 10 points. For my estimations, this is considered a 10 point climb.

*I believe most powerhouse teams will combine shooting and climbing for their strategy. I am expecting them to spend a long portion scoring many frisbees, then with 30-40 seconds remaining they will have a fast mechanism to get off the ground, and another to pull them above 30".

Re: Robot climbing times
 

While I haven't looked into the specific engineering yet, I was envisioning 4 pneumatic cylinders, two on each side, and actuating at a diagonal. When they would move back, they would both retract from the diagonal, and clear the crossbar.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

A single 2" bore (or dual 1.5" bore) pneumatic cylinders can do a 10 point hang (mounted vertically with a hook). This is also a buzzer beater.

This should be;

Almost Every Team - 3 seconds.

The powerhouses - 1 seconds.

Teams, you can 10 point hang; do it ;)

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I agree with you more on level 1 than Barry, I will think it will be a tad more than 3 seconds, but a good average.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Why?

It can be as simple as this;

Drive robot into bar at 30". You have some sort of hard stop to facilitate this.

Actuate the cylinder, this raises the robot and if it's a double solenoid the motion can all happen after the buzzer.

The above hardstop could even be a sensor automating the process; the driver just rams the pyramid at full speed and can't miss.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Well I'm taking this as the whole time to line-up and lift. From my years watching FRC end games, many teams will spend the extra 5 seconds to make sure they are 100% locked on. Some will miss a first try and then. I said 3 is a good average, but you will see teams spend 15+ seconds on a 10 point hang.

With your method it is easy to pull off a quick 10 point hang, but not all teams will go that route and will try something innovative.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Let me ask this in a different way. Assuming there are roughly 2,500 teams competing this year:

What will be the average time to both line up and hang of ALL of the top 250 teams? (10%)

Of the teams that are not in the top 10%, being 2,250 teams, what would be the combine average time it takes to align and climb of all of them?

Re: Robot climbing times
 

Honestly, a 10 pt hang is just so quick and easy that I'm having difficulty finding a reason anyone not to do it, unless you had 4 discs you knew you were going to make in the last couple seconds. Every team that can hang should bring a "hanging kit" they could install to a partner's robot in about 15 minutes if a partner robot couldn't hang (provided they are under the weight limit by enough).

Re: Robot climbing times
 

I don't think anyone is claiming it to be hard to hang from level 1, it's just the time to do it will vary.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

A 10 point hang doesn't even require an active mechanism. An inverted wedge, a moderately fast drivetrain, and the right center of mass will do the trick.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

For teams that can 10 point hang, the average should only be 3-5 seconds. But I don't think it will be, because asking teams to build a mechanism robust enough to lift a 120 lb robot is still a challenge (not to pick on the design mentioned here too much, but a 1 foot cylinder with a hook being rammed into a pole is a decent lever arm that teams may not have braced all that well). I think a lot of mechanisms will jam, miss, be damaged beyond repair, etc. and that's ignoring lining up correctly (what if the hook spins and faces the wrong way?). I see the average being more like 20, with at least a third of attempts failing.

I'm taking a pessimistic view here, and I wish 95% of teams could at least 10 point hang because all alliances scoring 30+ a match would make for a really exciting competition. I've seen too many 0-0 or 0-2 matches to think it will happen though.

Re: Robot climbing times
 

The first thing that will prevent 10-point hangs is, in my guess, robots that are sufficiently tall that very small deviations in their center-of-gravity will torque the robot just enough so that it touches the ground while hanging from the lowest bar.

If the hooking device is directly above the robot's center of gravity, a hook with either a sufficiently fat pneumatic cylinder or a ratcheting winch should be sufficient for a ten-pointer, and very fast.