Quote:
Originally Posted by Hawiian Cadder
I hope we will see a slide drive on Einstein, but other than that i don't think anything on Einstein will be mechanum, crab, or omni, simple reason: speed, although Mechanums can be geared to the same speed as a tank or other drive, 4 shifting gearboxes would be a little bit of weight. anyone who has a shifting gearbox up near 16+ feet per second is going to score more.
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By crab, I'm assuming you mean swerve. If memory serves me correctly, there has been at least one swerve drive on Einstein in 5 of the past 6 years, 67 in 2005, 71 in 2007, 16 in 2008, 111 in 2009, and 1625 in 2010. (I believe there was one in 2006, but I don't remember off the top of my head).
In any case, I doubt we'll see some sort of pure Holonomic or Mecanum Drive on Einstein just because more often than not, they aren't driven as well as most skid steers - though there are a lot more factors than just drive train that determine a teams success.
I wouldn't be surprised if we saw some sort of Octocanum, or other Hybrid drive on Einstein this year since some extremely high caliber teams are working with them, which means that they should have the practice, strategy and end effectors behind them to be successful.
On the subject of speed of omni-directional drive, Multi-speed Transmissions don't have anything to do with success, neither does top speed (assuming you're fast enough to be competitive, I'd say minimum of 9/10fps). You can have a top speed of 16fps, but the game will dictate if you can ever actually go that fast. Assuming the field is unobstructed - Which it NEVER is - the faster robot would always score more if all other things are constant. Add in some minor obstructions that need to be maneuvered around, and the top speed may as well be 12fps. (also, it seems that many people are underestimating "threading the needle" to get to the feeder station. It's not all that hard to do with some practice, I was able to do it at around 11/12fps after playing around after a minute or two, but there's no way you're flying in there at 16fps without rubbing the tower or wall.)
But, if multi-speed transmissions are truly the determining factor, then a multi-speed swerve, which isn't unfeasible (118 has built a few), would have some advantage.