Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

How did you use the rubber band like a crossbow if it was inside of the pneumatic cylinder. Also could you fit under the low bar with it?

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

What I believe they did was use that red stick thing to push back an elastic band (probably surgical tubing), and then used the pneumatic cylinder to hold back the elastic band and keep it there until it was quickly released by actuating the cylinder.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

I strongly suspect you haven't tried to add a hanging mechanism to a robot that wasn't designed for one within a 6 hour window before! It's quite difficult. Getting the hook onto the bar is the easy part. Dropping in a winch, ensuring that winch either pulls from the robot's CG or from multiple points on the robot, keeping the robot level on its way up, and programming make this a nontrivial task. I'm sure it'll be done once or twice, but this won't be commonplace, particularly for short robots.

The other reason this won't be seen that often is that your second pick this year actually is really valuable and needs to play the game well, whereas in 2015 you could pick a robot that was a lot worse at playing the game in exchange for a robot that is easy to cheesecake.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

The winch, I think, is the easy part: http://www.gearwrench.com/MagentoSha..._FRNT_MAIN.jpg

I agree that the longest part of the cheesecaking process would be locating it on the robot to align with the CG, though.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

We'll already have a motor/winch attached to the cheesecake version at champs. We had a BAG motor with a 90:1 reduction attached to the spare mechanism we made at Vegas and the entire thing (hook+launcher+winch) weighed in at 3.5 lbs. The BAG motor takes about 6-8 seconds to winch up and scale.

Not shown in the original picture is an eye bolt that goes through the end of the launching tube. If the rope for climbing is run through that fixed location near the top of the robot, there aren't issues with CG.

I honestly don't think it takes more than half an hour to install a mechanism like this on a robot and get it to work. It's tough to do at a regional level since all three teams begin playing back to back elimination matches immediately, but at championships you have a bit more time and a 4th robot.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

We were watching the Las Vegas Regional this past weekend and were wondering how you did that! Congrats on the win and designing an awesome simple yet effective climber! P.S. we might need to borrow that this weekend at AZ West...: :p

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

If you miss, can you retract it back in to use it again?

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

I don't think they can.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

It's a one-shot deal. We have to reload the launching mechanism before each match.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

I strongly think climb is within reach for just about everyone (To the point where I'm thinking about designing a "Climb in a box" cheesecake).With only 3.3 ounces I made a launch tube, hook, and rope that has a 95% success rate. It's shot with pneumatics and if you include the motor, winching system, and the solenoid, the whole system can weigh under 3 pounds. If you have any questions about this feel free to ask and I have some pictures of it here: https://docs.google.com/presentation...it?usp=sharing

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

Woah. That's awesome. It's like a piston, but the extender is the hook. I like that 95% success rate (don't know what the sample size is, though) but it seems a little surprising with that hook design. I would expect it to fall off easily. Do you have video of you testing it?

Edit: Just read the line "Hook is made to rebound off the slant behind the hook on the tower to then be pulled back and grab on." This seems more feasible for the hook design.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

Sample size is out of 40. The idea behind it is the round bar near the base causes it to rotate towards the heavy side (The hook) when getting pulled over. It seems to work nearly 100% of the time if you go slowly. But even when pulled quickly it has a tenancy to bounce off of the tower and center itself onto the bar. The margin of error is pretty big especially when it is shot up close to the wall so even if it hits lower down on the tower it has enough power to ricochet off the slope and over the bar.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

Funny enough this is actually almost identical to my original idea. I'm curious, have you passed inspection with this system yet? Is this mechanism legal, it would appear to conflict with rule R76, specifically
"Do not, for example, paint, file, machine, or abrasively remove any part
of a pneumatic COMPONENT – this would cause the part to become a
prohibited item. Consider pneumatic COMPONENTS sacred."
please let me know if this would be legal, cause I'd love to use a system like this on our own robot

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

It looks like it's a literal air cannon - there are no pneumatic cylinders involved. The fitting isn't modified, it's just attached. Inspection would be easy so long as the housing for the canon isn't PVC, PolyCarb, Fiberglass or other material that is prone to splintering during an extreme failure event.

Re: pic: Simple hook delivery system
 

the question I guess would be if it classifies as pneumatic component, I figure if worse comes to worse it's a pressure relief with a conveniently placed harpoon