Re: Gears on the floor?
 

I think a 3-4 finger claw mechanism that grabs and then puts in position to score might be good and not too hard, sensor for contact...detect , drop , contract fingers ,hold, raise , place , expand fingers, score look at garbage picker uppers for inspiration.

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

Similar issues were prevalent in 2013. Who's going to be dropping all this gears anyway? It's not like they are being shot into the air. More than likely they will get stuck into the corners of the air ship surrounded by balls that missed the boiler. Sounds like a pain to pick up to me. I mean sure it's doable and if your team can pull it off that's great but is it really a good use of time?

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

18 gears to floor simple by your HP you can dump balls anytime same for gears

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

https://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/portal.php?
I dont think that there is going to be many gears just lying around on the floor and it would be a waste of time to build a collector.

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

Newer team wishes to know more about FRC Design Rule #4. I haven't come across any FRC Design Rules. Where can I find this reference, please? Your rule #4 makes sense and am wondering about the golden nuggets in the other rules.

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

I would say it's one of Karthik's rules, not an FRC rule per se. I don't have a link to Simbot Strategy right now, though... If you get a chance, watch the presentation.

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

I just wanted to share my disappointment after noticing how nicely the gears roll and then coming to the rule disallowing a mechanism to roll gears from across the field. The GDC has made me so cynical that whenever I imagine a winning robot I quickly think, "the GDC likely outlawed it" and usually I'm right, unfortunately. :(

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

Remember 1114's awesome floor pickup in 2013? But seriously, I'm more worried about getting called for herding when there's a stupid gear in the way.

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

Because reasons.

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

Made a wood chassis and a wood apparatus. We can pick gears up off the floor! Prototype human motions are simple 90 degree "door" rotation and a peg that slides forward and back.

Geometry figured so the same apparatus delivers the gear to the spring peg.

With some more work we can add a chute to get a gear from the human at the wall.

2450

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

It's not even particularly good advice. Sometimes you don't need floor pickup of the primary scoring piece. The example cited by others in this thread is 1503's 2011 robot (In this video they are the red robot closest to the camera at the start of autonomous). Note how they made a simple and elegant mechanism and are able to cycle quickly and effectively. I would say they were a better robot than 99% of other teams. Floor acquisition and delivery to a scoring mechanism is a perennially difficult challenge that can be sidestepped by using the predictably placed hoppers/chutes/etc there are on the field. Of course, it's always better to have than not have, but in the context of the monetary, time, and complexity budgets nixing it is something that is certainly worth considering. Two weeks of driver practice, a working autonomous and fewer bugs is worth more than floor pickup to most teams.

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

We actually had luck with putting the intake roller on the bottom (with the polycarb sheet above) rather than on top or outwards. Just make sure the tread or whatever you line your roller with is extra grippy and the roller doesnt have a massive diameter(ours were about 1"). Although, as far as tread is concerned, I think wedgetop worked fine for us....

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

We put the gear on a flat surface, and saw a very tiny space between the gear teeth and the ground. So while the gear doesn't have a large chamfer, it may have a small one. Using a very thin pan worked for us, but sometimes it does get jammed so alternatives are welcome.
How do the gears go in then? Is the whole thing tilted downwards?

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

Yes. Our intake was at an angle downwards, and the roller propelled it up the slope of the intake. With polycord strung across more rollers, I would imagine it would have continued to be guided up the slope

Re: Gears on the floor?
 

I would suspect that it's just faster to let the HP drop the gear on the floor for you. I think we won't be doing gear pickup, but if we were, i'd only get from the floor, and I'd do the picking up while already driving back to the airship.