Re: Do Totes Land Flat From Feeder Station?
 

We made a "team version" tote chute. Totes slid very slow and landed on forward end.

We added smooth plastic to the chute, like in the actual field, and they slid faster and bounced onto their bottom. Though they were never straight.

Re: Do Totes Land Flat From Feeder Station?
 

To those teams that have made their chutes more closely resemble the official FIRST version: What is your confidence level that the human player can make a stack of 2 totes that is either nested or close enough to call it an effective 2 stacking option?

Re: Do Totes Land Flat From Feeder Station?
 

We played around with this on the official field. You won't be able to make a two stack without robot interaction. The first tote always takes a nose dive and lands straight up. Once a robot gets it upright in front of the feeder the human player can send another down the chute and it makes a pretty decent two stack but it isn't perfect.

Re: Do Totes Land Flat From Feeder Station?
 

Try this....Load the Tote into the Chute, release the Tote, open the door handle, and as soon as the leading Tote edge exits the field side of the door edge of the chute, release the door back down onto the Tote, it may hold it up on the rear long enough during the sliding exit that the free end does not dive as much (and land on the Tote end that often), and therefore, lands so that the bottom of the Tote is flat on the carpet a bit more often.

It appears from the videos I have seen of actual field Tote chutes in use (testing), that holding the door up too long actually inhibits it from working as originally designed. Go back to the video of the actual field elements being used during the game release and watch it very closely. (Then practice, practice, practice).

Re: Do Totes Land Flat From Feeder Station?
 

This hasn't been our experience actually. We have seen about 80% landing on their bottom. Our difference though is that the chute bottom is made out of polycarbonate, not HDPE. Everything else is very close to the field specification. We are trying to figure out what is causing our results to be so different.

Re: Do Totes Land Flat From Feeder Station?
 

Did you include the aluminum angle to constrain the bottom of edge of the totes?

We totes do not come out of the feeder fast since there are multiple surfaces it is encountering on its way out. We found making sure the tote was touching something on all four sides as it came out gave us closer to field like results of them taking the nose dive.

To everyone please make sure you are planning ahead for this. Do not expect totes to land flat on the field.