[Peck]

Originally Posted by Adam Freeman

I think what Chris explained here is one of the biggest reasons why many teams bridge manipulators do not function as well as required.

We saw lots of pneumatic manipulators at Waterford that originally did not take into account the breakdown of horizontal and vertical components of force being applied to the bridge.

Also keep in mind that:

• the torque created shifts as the bridge moves. This formula happens to provide a built in quantity that partly allows for the shift. However, It dose not accommodate a shifting contact point (having the same point of contact for the entirety is hard to design and have strong enough to take the abuse of FRC).
• your motors/pneumatic won't be a constant force for all times used and will become weaker over time. The greater the buffer amount built in, the slower It will deteriorate and the easier It will be to compensate.