The year robots stand still
 

Everyone is calling this the year of the mecanum wheel but to me that sounds like teams who are not prepared to program for mecanums are going to use them and end up not moving much. What do you guys think?

Re: The year robots stand still
 

Well, seeing as how there is built in libraries to drive a mecanum robot, I don't think that will be a problem.

Also, teams have 6 weeks to build and program their robot. (Okay, the programming is usually the last week or so...) I have confidence that 99% of the teams attempting mecanum, will be able to move.

Re: The year robots stand still
 

Move, maybe. Move well, not so sure.

Re: The year robots stand still
 

Most of the teams with mecanum drive will be able to move, but few will use the strafing ability effectively and frequently.

Re: The year robots stand still
 

Pretty much par for the course, then.

Re: The year robots stand still
 

Ditto...especially in light of the higher than normal potential for unbalanced weight distribution.

Re: The year robots stand still
 

Even if teams can't get omni directional code working, you can still put normal tank drive code on to drive around normally.

This is why we decided not to use mech wheels this year. We were confident that we could get the code to work, but with the potential to be heavily off balance front to back ( loaded and unloaded) we figured the chances of getting strafe to work well weren't good enough to chance it.

Re: The year robots stand still
 

I thought this thread would be about robots designed to stand still.

Holonomic and field-centric in LabView took us less than two hours to program. Needed a gyro to work well, but a strong team should be able help get a rookie moving.

Re: The year robots stand still
 

Practice makes these omni drives useful. A good drive train is only as good as its driver. Practice, Practice, and more Practice. The weight will be more undistributed this year and the possibility of one wheel leaving the ground if you go over the ramp.

Re: The year robots stand still
 

The proportion of mec bots that can't move will be similar to what usually happens with tank; I'm guessing roughly 30% will move poorly if at all.

I also thought this would be about robots designed to not drive. Will someone please start that thread?

Re: The year robots stand still
 

Well, there's one here about non-mobile conveyor-belt robots.