Re: ball cannon???
 

I think the discussion between dumping and shooting should be heavily skewed towards shooting.

After all, a well-made shooter should be able to "shoot" balls in VERY quickly from a foot or two away, nearly rivalling a "dumper".

Re: ball cannon???
 

Uh oh:yikes: beware of flying Pi's.

Re: ball cannon???
 

This is a good discussion, thanks for the videos.

Re: ball cannon???
 

Great work guys! I'm always impressed with what you come up with.

I'm not sure I understand the need to shoot 3~4+ feet. I mean, its not like in '06 where we couldn't get right up to the goal. Why not just drive right up and squirt them in?

If you think you can score from 8~10+ feet away why not just use the HP's? They'll have better accuracy than the bot.

Re: ball cannon???
 

Mostly because of the Regolith. With the new playing surface and wheels, robots won't be nearly as maneuverable. Additionally, it'll take more time to get up to speed than it has in past years, and turning will be much more difficult - especially with a trailer. When you add all that up, chasing after another robot to dump (or short range squirt) can become challenging. They'll hit the wall first, and have added traction from the carpet to get going in another direction before you can get in range. Plus, all the time spent chasing someone down is time you spend with a full hopper of balls, unable to collect and shoot more. With a longer range cannon, you're much more likely to be able to constantly fire balls, and just worry about gathering them and staying away from other players.

All that being said, our prototype shows the potential range. If the other alliance's robots are evenly distributed across the field, then there will be one within 10 feet of us a vast majority of the time.

Re: ball cannon???
 

We expect them to see us coming, and run away as fast as they can!

(always the optimist)

And we do expect to get a lot of scoring help from the PSs, but it is also going to be a bit of a challenge for them to score when the goals are over 8-10 feet away. Every bit helps!

Re: ball cannon???
 

I think there is no way that a human player can outscore a well designed turreted shooter. Think about it. A shooter can keep a constant velocity and launch angle unlike a human. Also a shooter is more consistent in calculating distance. Finally, a shooter can fire balls much more rapidly. We are aiming for ~3 balls per second.

Squirrel how much compression are you guys running. We were doing 2" and it was working very well

Re: ball cannon???
 

We've got about 1" compression at maximum. The distance is set up so that when the ball is being contacted on the holes, it just touches. If you haven't yet, try experimenting with tread on the support side of the turret in addition to the wheel...

Re: ball cannon???
 

2081s concept will be a combination between dumping and shooting. It will be able to shoot medium to short distances, however we are going to make the angle of trajectory changeable so that when we get near an opponent, we can shoot the balls at a slower speed, still unloading them quickly and aiming them horizontally, if not downwards

Re: ball cannon???
 

Our team is going after a somewhat similar idea with a cannon.
Does anyone have any idea what the angle of the camera image is?

Re: ball cannon???
 

Isn't a more elegant (and mechanically simpler) solution for range to change the speed of your shooter, instead of the angle of the shot?

Patrick

Re: ball cannon???
 

It can be very mechanically simple to change the angle. A number of teams in the 2006 Behind the Design book (and some that didn't make it) changed their shooting angle to adjust for their position relative to the target, in ways that made the rest of us say, "Why didn't I think of that?"

Re: ball cannon???
 

Sure thing -- the big winners locally in Aim High did one or the other, too.

I just noted the large team number and figured there was probably some inexperience there, so I thought I'd suggest another possibility. I think either one could work well, depending upon implementation.

Patrick

Re: ball cannon???
 

you could make the the balls feed from the back, have a large opening and have the lazy susan(or turntable) on top. Useing a shaft run up from the plate attached to the turntable and put a sproket on the shaft connected to a motor.

Re: ball cannon???
 

not at all, there is absolutely no way for a human shooter to be accurate enough to design a bot around them. if you have done any testing at all you would have realized this, unless you have some crazy good shot on your team