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The only caveat of such small wheels is ground clearance. If next year's game requires climbing a ramp or other obstacle, big wheels become valuable.

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Simswerve... always a good thing to bring up, just because there is an obvious solution does NOT mean it is the only solution. With modules this small and light you can really do some cool stuff.

Re: pic: We got bored :)
 

On a similar note, for a game like 04; Why even tackle some problems? Hanging from the floor in 2004 was a negligible (1'?) difference in height compared to hanging from the platform. Always double check that a problem is really a problem.

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I love this. The FIRST community never ceases to amaze me with their ideas which I probably would never have thought of, this idea is one of them. I can totally picture this on an FRC robot, tucked away inside a 3x3 or 4x4 frame rail. It could be an almost "hidden" drive train as it would take up a very small amount of real estate.

As for the wheels, I have heard mixed reviews about the banebot wheels. Just like any traction devices harder wheels don't provide enough traction and the soft wheels wear too quickly. A unique opportunity you have with a 3 wheel design is a mixture of wheel durometer, while I am not sure you may be able to "tune" your traction using different combinations, the one that strikes me as obvious is high traction on the inside and harder wheels on the outside.

A couple of questions:

Any reason you didn't use gears or even #25 on the outside, I would suspect you could play with the geometry a bit and make gears work making assembly even easier.

Do you think you really need ball bearings in the modules? I think you could get away with oilite bronze bushings to keep the space and weight lower.

Did you think about drilling out the hex shafts to reduce weight? you could probably sink a 1/4 hole through your shafts and loose even more weight.

Overall I really like the idea, and don't be surprised if I borrow some of these ideas for a future robot.

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that is #25 chain.....also those bolts are #6's for size reference

and the bearings are the 1/2" hex bore andymark ones enabling us to use the banebots wheels without custom hubs and not having to make spiffy shafts just buying some 1/2" hex stock and adding snapring grooves

we also have always used bearings in all spots on the drive out of just a nagging feeling bushings hurt efficiency we like the bots flying (not quite 254 but close).

Yeah i suppose we could bore out the shafts it would be quite easy, we'd thought of that and it would probably happen on the final version of a real bot. Also the Hex shaft is 2024 alum.

And we went for the orange wheels for the fact our team colors are orange and black and this one is for proof of concept and show, final we'll play around more

another awesome part about this is you can add 1 reduction between a cim and the input shaft and have a reasonable speed, no weight wasted on extra reduction to get to say a 6" or 8" wheel

Piloted and designed by Dillon i was just a consultant

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Any chance of another beauty shot, next to a quarter or ruler or something?

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I go to visit MIT for one weekend and this is what you do, Aren? :yikes:

Great stuff.

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This is like the coolest thing I've seen all summer. It reminds me of a lego version of a big swerve, not that is not usable. But it fits like one aka the notches and I love it (PUZZLE SWERVE). I second Greg, I may use this idea in the future.

Hats off to you guys for the wicked design.

-RC

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how come the wheels are not centered?

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The wheels aren't centerd because in order to make the module shorter we had to offset the wheels from the bevel gear

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WOW. that pic with the quarter totally changed my concept of the scale. that is TINY.

It looks like they might hit the bevel gear if shifted to the left at all.

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Very impressive guys! I have an extremely similar design in development for part of my senior design project. Please keep us up to date on those wheels as your testing. The polypro hubs seem like the big question mark for me. Also, just to confirm...how do you guys hold the vertical miter gear on the shaft? Looks sweet!

Brando

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Very impressive, though I'd worry about wheel tread wear if it's soft rubber.

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The vertical bevel gear is held on by a snap ring.