Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

I'd assume that if it was on the KOP chassis it would be available from Andymark as soon as the game is released.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

Count me as a Robot Inspector as disapointed in the fact that bumper mounting brackets will not be included in this year's KOP. While not perfect it did help those low resource teams have a much greater chance of creating a decent bumper mounting system.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

Yes, we plan to have the 2017 kit drive system available on the website immediately after Kickoff. And maybe some other good stuff too. ;)

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

They've had that language in previous announcements about the kitbot opt-out.

https://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/s...43&postcount=1

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

Ugh. We found the KoP bumper mounting system to be so "anti-robust" as to be near useless. One project I may suggest to this years's team is a "Bumper Hospital" to help struggling teams on the Thursday of tournament. Some decent iron on numbers, a double handful of seriously sturdy bumper mounts. I saw too many teams expending effort for poor results.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

125 has typically gotten the KOP chassis and built it with the teams that come to kitbot build day. It is then often used as a testbed for software and electronics.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

I hope it's game pieces!

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

The past language was new last year, and seemed to correlate with how the drive base alone could score points. The implication is that you can get some sort of bonus with just the drive base this year.

Now, that could be as simple as the 2014 "drive forward at all in auton" bonus, in a game without other drive-to-score objectives, but it does imply that a drive base can play some aspect of the game.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

We're getting the KOP drive again this year. We ended up using it last year and I wish we would have had it from day 1. AndyMark does a great job on this drive base and the majority of teams should heavily consider using it.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

We did attach 6" Mecanums to the AM14U2 for the 2015 season, and yes, it was a pain.

That makes sense. Often, some of the teams from the greater Knoxville area will all build the KOP chassis with any rookie teams we have, but my team hasn't done that the past few years.

I really wish we had put together the KOP chassis and immediately started driving on defenses in the first few days after kick-off. We severely over-estimated the defenses, and didn't adjust our design in time to increase our scoring capabilities. Driving a little bit early on might have shown us that getting over the B and D defenses was not the monumental task we thought it was at first.

My team has used the KOP chassis or a modified version of it all four years of our existence. It's worked well for us, but my team is hoping to make the switch to a WCD using the VersaFrame products. Mounting things to our frame has always been a poorly thought-out process for us, and I hope the VersaFrame system will at least force the designers to figure out mounting BEFORE Weeks 5 & 6. Also, I think the process of making a chassis from scratch (sort of) will let the students and designers actually think through how the drivetrain works, and let them have a little control over the most important part of the robot.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

Even if you don't have the code stuff up and running yet, 125 did a lot of testing with a plywood base, an old PDB, and some vic 884s controlled with a cheap 4 channel hobby receiver and a transmitter I had sitting around. Instead of going through a lot of revisions with "precision" methods to find what was catching on defenses simply drive over, if it gets stuck cut it off with a hack saw.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

Or add more CIMs and break some defense pins. ;)

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

Game pieces that aren't overpriced, hopefully!

I'm not sure if 2014 had the drive forward auto bonus, but I think 2015 did. In Arial Assist, it was probably possible to score with just a drive base, as it could push balls into the low goals and/or catch them. With Recycle Rush, a drive-only robot could score a maximum of 2 points at a time by pushing one tote onto the step, though other robots could add to the stack. Defense is an option for a "just drive" robot if possible(no defense in 2015).

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

It did. 5 points, I believe.

Re: [FRC Blog] Veteran Team Drive Base Option and Registration Progress
 

I will say that the versaframe system is very good as well. We used the versaframe style of building everywhere on top of the kit of parts drive last year and it worked out great. Regardless of which one you choose, you still need to think about system integration and that's where doing a bit of CAD upfront really helps.

Even creating a WCD using the versa system from scratch will take a little longer than just assembling the kit of parts drive base. We saved probably 3-4 days last year of fabrication and assembly compared to assembling a WCD. Make sure your time and resources wouldn't be better spent on what goes on top of the drive train.