[dodar]

Originally Posted by Tom Line

I suggest you look to team 1771 in 2008 picking up a 48 inch trackball that weighed orders of magnitude more than a tube:
http://www.thebluealliance.net/tbatv.../2008arc_qf1m1

I'll go a step further. I will bet you a steak dinner (this is the accepted bet on our team, to be collected at an away-regional or competition) that not just 1, but several teams do a vacuum system, do it well, and consistently win matches with their robots.

Nearly every idea we brainstorm in our team meetings ends up being implemented by someone successfully on the field. That includes the ones we've decided not to use because of some perceived technical problems - like vacuum in '08, a dumper bot in '09 (but you'll need to be able to shoot at different angles so a turret is perfect!), and linear-motion kicker in '10 (binding killed ours).

We actually made a 3 pronged suction claw and it worked pretty darn good but we still shot the idea down. But the tubes did stay connected to it while jostling the holder.