Re: Plans for hanging
 

Originally planned a 30 point climb but due to focusing a lot of attention on getting our shooter dialed in, we've come to realize the 30 point may be hard to accomplish with what time we have. We're still trying to find a work around for it but we at least know we can make a 10-point climb relatively quickly if all else fails.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Don't forget... the title of this thread & the poll is PLANS for Hanging, not "where will you hang in competition" :) The teams aren't claiming they CAN do it.. they are just telling you they PLAN to do it. I suspect this poll would be different if posted in two or three weeks.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Truthfully, everyone should be able to 10 pt hang. You can do it with a passive mechanism that requires nothing more than a functional drivetrain.

I'll even go so far as to say if your team's OPR < 10 this year, I'm probably not interested in having you on my alliance.

EDIT: Also, stop to think of it... This year is probably the single best year for OPR as a metric since 2008 when it was popularized.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Right-o. We *plan* on climbing -- building on our success in 2010 (but with lessons learned... evil set screws will not be our bane this year!) -- to 30 points and then dumping in four colored disks... And if it doesn't work, we'll have wasted an enormous amount of effort, energy, and money while settling for much less.

Which is why we have a shooter but no floor pickup. We figured out pretty quickly that we couldn't do it all, so we shot for three tasks:

Drive.
Shoot.
Climb to 30.

Our top priority in designing a climbing mechanism is to maintain stable contact with the pyramid at all times, so in case of a power failure or some such we just freeze in place and nothing... unduly exciting and gravity-related occurs.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Last year how many teams were confident that they could shoot and how many could? How many teams could hit over 50% of their shots, how many 80% and that was a much easier task.

I see a lot of heartbreak this year and also a lot of robots that won't even pass inspection.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

As far as I'm concerned, without posted video, it didn't happen.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

I honestly think that for mid level teams it mostly boils down to either have a good shooter or climbing for 30 pts. I find it hard to actually accomplish both... I not saying it won't happen... It will happen but for a small percentage of team. My team is a mid level team that is why we are focused on building a robot that climbs for 30 pts. If we could add a frisbee dumper that would awesome but it is not our goal.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Our original design was a corner climber with a dumper mechanism. The problem is the dumper mechanism simply didn't fit over our climber in a position that it could also get over the corner of the pyramid in the 30 pt position to dump the colored discs.

Our final design is a corner climber with a small linear shooter at a fixed steep angle. It shoots the discs into the pyramid goal with a very little force that causes them to pop up and fall backward. Ideally the shooter will also be able to make it into the top goal during autonomous. We'll see how much of this actually comes together. At this point, I'm most confident in the climb and less in everything else :)

-Mike

Re: Plans for hanging
 

This is what my team is doing we are in the final process of assembling our practice and competition bot.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

As of a few days ago, we're going for 10. Best effort to reward ratio by far.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

I can tell you team 25 2013 robot will be the most complex we have ever done. Cad drawings look great but we are still in a wait and see. We will be going for 30 but physics might have another plan for us.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Yup, we preferred the dumper solution as well but it just didn't work out for us.
We have a 10 pt design already working on a backup robot. I hope we will never have to use it, but it's there in case we do.
We're in the same boat. We've had to redo the CAD 5 or 6 times now with the final design being figured out on a giant sheet of paper Wednesday night and then mostly finished in CAD last night. Each time the design has run into a new issue. Most of the issues have been around either the top box at the top of the pyramid or the dimensions of the robot. The 54" diameter circle is fine, but the maximum size of the robot (112" perimeter) has caused us considerable problems. Additionally, the minimum edge of a bumper being 8" has ruined many of the workarounds. Very tricky problem given the rules.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Ditto here. The concept for the climbing mechanism isn't the problem to get to the 3rd level - it is the width of the 3rd level bar at that point, interference with the vertical poles sticking out, how close the top horizontal bar is beneath the pyramid goal, etc... It is a very, very tight fit at that level. I think many teams, if they haven't built a mechanism, and tested it, will find that there are a lot of interferences to achieving the top level. I don't think this is something you can "bolt on" after you have built your robot. This has to be carefully integrated into the entire design.

Every time we thought we had it, we found another place where we would run into a bar, get caught on our bumpers, hit the "ceiling" under the pyramid goal, interfer with our shooter, violate the frame parameter, and so on. As of last night, we think we finally have a working solution. Dispite this, we still may not have the ability to hit the 3rd level at our week one regional. The complexity of the mechanism is going to require a lot of programming support to make it work. 10 pts, no problem. 20 pts, probably. 30 pts, possibly not until our week 5 event, if at all.

Despite what this poll says, I'm going to have to agree with what I believe PC said a couple of weeks ago - there will be regionals where no one can make this climb. My prediction: 2% - 3% of the teams will be able to do this.

This has to be the hardest, most complicated game I've ever seen the GDC develop - that's what makes it so much fun!

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Especially true when applied to your (our) own team. We have grand plans, but until I see them fulfilled (and watch our own video) I won't believe it myself. Shooters are easy to mock up. There are lots of videos. We have our own. Climbers (complete functional systems) are hard to mock up. I haven't seen any video yet. Including our own. Perhaps some video will show up in the next week as teams complete their all-in-one "mockup/prototype/competition" climbers. Perhaps not.

As some reporter once said, "The people who are talking don't know what's going on, and the people who know what's going on aren't talking". Maybe we won't see anything until after bag day.

Re: Plans for hanging
 

Perhaps human players will be so dominant that robots shooting discs will be obsolete in the last 30 seconds. Robots needs to do something. ;)

I thought a climb that was ruled illegal in progress was worth zero points even if a legal 10 or 20 point climb was part of the proceeding sequence of events.

3.1.5.2 ... "If a CLIMB is considered unacceptable (e.g. a ROBOT has touched non-adjacent Levels or more than two (2) Levels at a time), a Referee will indicate a rejected CLIMB by turning the offending ROBOT’S PLAYER STATION LED strings yellow. The ROBOT will be ineligible for CLIMB points unless and until it begins a new CLIMB from the floor, Level 0. "

We're hoping to not need a 30 point climb in most matches. Having a robot fall from 90 inches could end a tournament or possibly even a season. Will the robot be capable of a 30 point climb? That's the dream. We're still working towards that dream. :rolleyes: