mecanum wheel intake test
 

I haven't seen any videos yet of mecanum wheel intakes, so I thought I would share our test from last week.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFU...M-n0wSA/videos

We have improved our bumper "mount" since then. ;)

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

Holy smokes! We might just add some of those to our bot now. :P

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

Wow! That is actually really ingenious. Is there any issues when pushing the ball out of the robot as the mecanum wheels will be forcing the ball out to either side?

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

Why mecanum? It seems like you could do this with any wheels. What is the advantage?

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

They have a component of motion that direct the ball to the cutout, which regular wheels do not have.

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

Watch closer. It scoots the ball sideways along the bumper before feeding it into the cutout.

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

Look back at 180 in 2014 and 179* in Recycle Rush. Both used mecanum in their gatherers and worked amazingly.

*Used on their can claw

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

180 used them in 2014. The 2012 World Championship robot was a simple piece of PVC pipe painted red.

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

You are correct. Got the years mixed up.

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

1986 in 2014 comes to mind

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

As long as our wheels are equally spaced, we have never had any problems shooting the ball straight out.

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

Linear motion parallel to the rotation axis of the wheel. This is the advantage that these wheels give.

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

Cool! Good job guys!

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

What is your spacing between mecanum wheels? We are finding some dead zones if we space them out too much.

Here's a picture from a few days ago. I'll try to get a video the next time we run it.

Also, we are heavily considering printing hubs and using the purchased Vex rollers... It will bring down the cost a lot but not sure how this will hold up at competition.

Re: mecanum wheel intake test
 

1619 used these in 2014 as well. I know other teams did too; I mention 1619 since their 2014 robot has inspired about half of our design for this year (including the intake).