Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

If slip rings were permitted, could this design be modified to be a true Unicorn drive ?

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

This year, team 1640 had 4 pods, each driven coaxially by its own CIM and each steered by its own Window motor.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

That sounds like a true Unicorn drive, no?

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

Could you provide some context for this name?

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

It's unatainable.

Like a unicorn you can never attain it.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

4 wheel swerve with independent steering and drive is called "King Crab."

It may have been coined that by Kaptain Krunch.

Chiefdelphi had this setup in 2001....plus it was a climbing swerve with triangular treads. Making it truly difficult was the motor selection. They had two drill motors, two FP motors, two window motors and two seat motors. :( I believe this exhausted their motor supply forcing them to deploy pneumatics for the first time since their inception in 1996.

That's tough.

Team 857 built the first "Kiwi" drive in 2002. They also coined the term kiwi....originally to disguise the Killough Drive Base origins. Design secrecy was a little more common back then.

Full disclosure, I was on 857 and coined the term kiwi with my fellow team members.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

So Unicorn would be King Crab with coaxial drive (or slip rings) and US MA3 or Austria Microsystems AS5030 encoders

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

1640 did 4 wheel independent steering with each wheel independently driven and continuous rotation on all wheels with no gaps in the absolute rotary non-contact sensors and implemented a least distance algorithm to determine whether to reverse direction and rotate a little or make a longer rotation in 2010. It was a major effort but it worked and has amazing capabilities. However, we still need to work on the presentation of all those degree's of freedom to the driver. We call it the " PIVOT DRIVE". To any other team that wants to go down this path I would ask them to seriously evaluate their resources to accomplish it. A page with a little description.
http://wiki.team1640.com/index.php?t...VI_Drive_Train

Yes, I am very proud of the group of students that made this happen.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

And for good reason! 1640's technical achievement is both underrated and can't be understated. Especially impressive is their extensive documentation - often more valuable in engineering than the design itself.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

Team 1124 had swerve drive in 2010. There was a front and back window motor steering with four independent drive motors. It supported swerve, traverse, car drive, and 90 degree swerve drive. It worked pretty well, as it won us Rockwell Innovation in Automation at Hartford and Hartford Regional.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

team 159 had one around 2001, although it was not co-axial and it did catch fire during finals.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

Flaming Unicorn Drive!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

^that would make a good signature.

^ yes, I am aware that this wouldn't be true unicorn drive, but still.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

I believe 1334 had a Unicorn drive in 2010. It had 4 independently steered units, with independent speed control on a per wheel basis (IIRC).

1075 has only ever done 2+2 swerves, where the angular position of wheels is controlled in pairs. We did however invent DSSwerve.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

Did it also have :

- unlimited rotation of the steering mechanism and the wheel angle sensor

- no "dead zones" in the wheel angle sensor

? if not, it was not Unicorn.

Re: First team with swerve drive?
 

I believe so.