Very nice. I couldn't tell from the pics but is there any device in the wheels that act as tiny differentials to help them turn?

About the arguements here. I've been known to be harsh and sarcastic to people in the past so I don't have a problem with that. However when it comes to the pics, CD has asked a number of times to post pics in the galleries only and to link them here.

Wow. Very very nice...complicated but if it works then my hats off to you....
WBI tried crab(swirve) drive 2 years in a row and we got it working pretty well in our first attempt then had a whole heap of problems with our second...

When it works its amazing...when it doesn't its the most frustrating and hard to drive system i can think of.

Great looking bot!


One question: It would appear you have to reach under the chain to shut off your bot...isn't this a bit dangerous?

What do the pneumatics on the bottom do?

you should have used electromagnets operated by a nuetrino drive powered by cold fusion. Silly mortals using chain :p

Great job. Just tensioning all of that chain is a feat in itself

btw... how did you tension all of that chain?

i still say an antigravity device would be the best way to stack things!

I gotta say I like the implementation. We tried (and failed) to do this last year. You obviously did it right from the start.

As for bins popping chains off. I doubt it. The tension should hold them on just fine.

I would like to also chime in for any video. I like watching these things move.

See you in Seattle

I can only picture what happens when you find a spare master link under the robot...

Nice job, how did you turn the power to run a horizontal shaft since all the sprockets make it vertical? We tried bevel gears last year but they just got munched so badly...

I don't know what to think about drive systems like this, 217's this season , and 360's last season. While it's really easy to make this change this to act like what I would call a "true swerve", a la Wildstang 2002 (1 drive motor per wheel, and a minimum of 2 independently rotated module systems), and even easier to integrate a gear switching mechanism (Which I believe would be the first swerve to switch gears in the history of FIRST. I don't know if 217 is switching gears in their assemblies this year.), it has a draw back that keeps me away from this type of system. If you want to rotate the direction of the wheels, and not move the drive wheels you have to drive the wheel itself to cancel out any rotation of the vertical module shaft with respect to the vertical wheel shaft. This sucks, but I guess you could take care of this in programming. I would rather avoid that if at all possible. It'd make our programmers' lives a lot easier.

But yes... Kudos to 998 for being the first Alaskans to implement a variation on the swerve drive system. I hope it works well for you. Good luck this year! :)

So now that the comps are over, how did this swerve drive work out for you guys?

Cory

Both this year and last team 247 had a 3 wheel swerve-style drive with Shifting. Last year, shifting the drills via servo, this year shifting the Drill and CIM's respective gearboxes with pnuematics.

I'm a fan of that bot. And really, its not that much chain. There are only three loops of it. So only three master links, pretty easy to find and fix.

I mean, they used chain, and chain is heavy, but the obviously minamized the amount they need and then went to great lengths to make sure that there is no way its going to fall off (except on the off chance of a bin to the middle of a long stretch as its moving . . .)

Really, I mean, they are using less chain than a lot of teams did, the only thing is that it is all on top. I bet that thing can do some crazy maneuvers.

I love it.