Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

I was thinking the same thing. However, What if the "hinges" were in opposite corners, the center of each side, or even if there were more than two hinges? While I, too, would wonder if the complexity gives you a distinct advantage over other designs, this is certainly inventive and interesting.

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

It would be interesting to see a robot with two sets of these, effectiving spreading your drive wheels to a wider and longer wheel base when open

and changing the 'front' of the robot by 90º

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

In 2005, 648's robot could extend to give it more stability. I don't remember the exact stats but it almost doubled it's short side. How we got it to do this was just lock the back wheel and power the front two wheels and then it would lock into place with servo actuated hooks. When we when back to get into the box all we would have to do was lift the hooks with the servos and squish back together.

This concept made me immediately think of that robot.

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

I personally think that it is a very innovative idea which can amaze some people if properly designed and built. This design doesn't have to be used particularly for a FIRST robot, but can be used for demos and offseason projects.

As far as the rule <R08> goes (after the start of the match the robot may expand up to a maximum volume of 60 inches by 60 inches by 60 inches)... there have been teams who have made their base shorter than 38x28 (bot had riggers and so forth but after full extension they were in the size limit). The problem Ben pointed out earlier is one of the very important component of this design (if you are building this chassis for a FIRST robot according to last year's rule) but there are ways to avoid the chassis extending more than 60". I do agree with you Ben where you said it's a very complex design, but how cool would it be to see something like this on a FIRST field.

... keep going Cody, show us your next step to this design.

p.s. - I am still waiting to hear from Baker, Neun, and Copioli about what they think about this design.

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

I'm not trying to crash your idea but I think that it would have to be thought out just a little bit better. I am a fan of creating new drive systems. It would be hard to convince me that this would work, and what are the advamtages to having this over a typical swerve drive? :)

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

Well that's interesting!

If you had a particular design problem you were trying to solve, I'd say you might want to open it up to other possible solutions. But it SEEMS like you are floating an idea to see what other people thing - which is great! Being creative for creative's sake is great - you don't always need to be engineering a solution to a problem.

Let's say this never becomes a FIRST robot drivetrain - I bet it still gives you ideas on some other FIRST mechanism. Or - it made me think of this... an unpowered cart to carry stuff (maybe a FIRST robot) that folds up for easy shipment and storage in the pit. BAMN - already a use for FIRST.

Thanks for sharing!

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

While Creating concepts for the unknown Rules of the FUTURE. One can not limit themselves to the rules of the PAST.

Clearly Cody thought of this as a pure elemental idea not tied to any competition robot team competition or set of rules. it is simply an idea. I say go for it Cody. don't worry about any rules, you don't have any. just make it up as you go along and just Tailor your ideas to your needs when you chose to pull it out of your arsenal and use it

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

one possible applicaiton of this winged-drive train idea

in several seasons we had to pick up objects/balls from the floor. Making a robot that is open on one side leves it vulnerable (you cant have an opening and a bumper at the same location) and you have a tradeoff between the footprint of the robot, and the max possible size of the opening

but if your drive train swung out into a wider footprint (on all four sides) you could have a significant advantage

plus, after you collect objects from the floor, you could close up again, to make the robot more robust, and compact, if there was an advantage to that configuration.

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

hey, fin
What about a ball caster? They reduce the movement that a normal caster has. Page 1224 of Mcmaster Carr is a threaded stem ball caster.

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

Team 108 used them back in 2005, I didn't like them too much because that robot was used on the field as well as outside to do programming. All the sand and stuff from the carpet got stuck with the ball and later on the ball started to get jammed. Mike, I thought you knew me better, I don't like to use casters.

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

I love that Idea with mecacums.


Imagine this scenario. There is a similar style goal with a light that you use the camera to track. You open up to the right angle based on the distance you calculate from the camera, and the robot squares of for you. All you do is hit left and right on the joystick to move in an arc around the goal. If you move forward or back the robot will adjust the angle and square off again, pretty much guarunteeing a perfect arc around the goal. Also, you would have the ability to drive in all directions normally.

I wish I could convince my team to try this :/. But I can barely get anyone to listen to my idea of doing team 25's wheels.

Keep it up, I'm really interested now.

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

all castors can pivot or roll in any direction. Thats what a castor is.

If it cant go sideways, its called a wheel! [ºiº]

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

This may be true, but a ball caster doesn't have to pivot before it can roll (something we found out the hard way when our autonomous kept just missing the mark in 2004). It's just one less thing to have to worry about in programming; we've had enough to worry about this year!

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

There is really no need to create such a complex drive system. It would create so many more problems in the weight catagory as well as for your team programer. Another problem is during a match your robot will be extremely voulnerable to be redirected and trapped. If anpohert teams robot is next to yours while you are switching modes your robot will be spun around using its own power from the motors opening then closing the hindge. If your in the open possition and something gets into your robot while your closing it will jam up your robot and make you waste preciouse time to fix the problem. If you are looking for high manuverabiliy then i suggest using mechanum wheels.

Re: A new drivetrain Idea?
 

Are you talking about the design that uses omni wheels, or the 4 wheel mecacum design? The 4 wheel mecacum design seems better because it will always be omnidirectional and still be able to travel in an arc.

Imagine: Locking onto a goal, facing it, adjusting to the right arc angle. Then hit left/right on the stick to travel on the arc. Hit forward or back to move closer (mecacums remember) or farther, the angle readjust automatically. You can juke forward, back, left and right instantly without looking away from the goal. I doubt next years game will have the same situation though :/