Haha...how about just constantly lobbing the crates against the opposing teams players station? :D Scare the hell out of them and knock their radio off every 3 seconds.

Gracious professionalism! Pfft!

When you're in anything but a vacuum, something slightly less than 45 degrees is usually better.

I'm going to be terribly frightened of anyone launching boxes like that.

launching boxes
 

well, as for launching boxes at the players' stations, I speak for myself when I say my team as had enough problems at the players' stations in the past that we don't need boxes flying at us and scaring the hell out of us. :yikes:

hehe, well anyways. I agree with whoever said 45 degree angle for max distance, according to the laws of projectiles or whatever, but if you want height, go with something above 45 (duh)... (wow, it's amazing what you can learn in physics class when you're not sleeping)

yeah but also ya dont want too much height because you'll end up breaking the boxes :\

don't forget if you constantly crack, break or pop the boxes open the refs will make a rule about that for you that would render your design USELESS

I believe the optimal angle is around 37 degrees in our atmosphere for most objects, especially ones like these boxes with a relatively high drag coefficient.

Launching boxes
 

Well, launching boxes was a cool idea for my team at first, but eventually we decided not to. Mostly because our head of drive systems, the guy who will probably be in control of the robot most of the time, can be a complete idiot every once in a while and probably would launch a box at a ref or two on purpose. Granted, this would be extremely funny (provided death and/or permanent injury is not the case) for a little bit, it would also get us DQ'd. Oh yeah, launch boxes into our driver station at your own risk!

LOL that definately would be... hmm... what word am i looking for..... counter-productive... LOL

FLING!
 

for anyone who was at the Pacific Northwest Regional last year and played with us as alliance members you'll remember how we had one of our hamsters (the dancing one that sang Kung Fuu Fighting) sit at the player station with our alliance mates. Forewarning for those chuckleheads out there who think it'd be funny to fling boxes at our player stations: those hamsters can be MIGHTY vicious, specially with those mini-numchucks! MUWAHAHAHA! :D (trust me, I've been hamster-whipped enough times to know these things!)

But as for any more injuries... well, many burnt mouths on scalding hot cup-o-noodles that someone brought in (I might add from my previous post that not only did it take them 15 minutes to get the microwave set up, we all still can't figure out how to use it properly! OY! Instuctions? Who needs instructions?) Anyways, enough of me for now.

Re: FLING!
 

we wanted to mount one of those on our bot this year!!! LOL

Hehe. We bought several of those at a Cracker Barrel in Fort Wayne, IN on the way down to IRI this summer. They're high quality.

We at Team 64 have trained our singing Gila Monster to press the cactus on our control panel (which is our secret box launching button.) We used a cactus as a button because we didn't want anyone accidentally launching a box. We sure hope no one from FIRST witnesses Gila pushing the cactus. After all, it does free up both drivers to try to see over the wall.

Ken Loyd
Team 64:yikes:

just for s**** n giggles
 

Wow, I like that idea! It seems... sinisterly evil... yet ingenious! I LIKE IT! MUWAHAHA! I would also think it'd be good from keeping newbie-chuckle-heads from playing with the button. Anyways.

(in reference to dancing/singing hamsters)

And as for that, we're gonna do that this year, actually. Dancing/Singing hamsters are our mascot, HAMSTER PRIDE! :D We're gonna make a protection cylender out of plexiglass or something to keep it from being harmed by boxes being flung by our dear friends team #84 ;)

I think being in the front of the audience is going to be slightly more dangerous this year. I have a feeling the "Play of the Game" award from at least one regional will go to someone who threw themselves in front of a small child in the audience to save them from a speeding bin.

......Sucessfully blocking one bin from hitting the child, only to have another bin knock the poor kid to the ground seconds later.