View Single Post
  #35   Spotlight this post!  
Unread 12-04-2012, 16:23
EricH's Avatar
EricH EricH is offline
New year, new team
FRC #1197 (Torbots)
Team Role: Engineer
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
Rookie Year: 2003
Location: SoCal
Posts: 19,827
EricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond reputeEricH has a reputation beyond repute
Re: Crazy robot idea for this year 2

I got the point of your post. I was pointing out that fixed-wing aircraft are entirely impractical for anything FRC-sized, forcing a helicopter to be the default choice.

Fixed-wing planes have spinning blades too. I've been at a field where in 2 years, 2 people lost or just about lost fingers to an airplane's prop. And that's while I was there--I don't know about any incidents that happened at other times.

If a chopper has a problem, it can reasonably be expected to go in one direction: straight down, as far as it can go. It's relatively easy to figure out that safety: don't get under it. If a fixed-wing bird has a problem, you have a glide slope--and that slope can change based on what happens while it's on that slope. Makes it much harder to dodge, especially with an arena-type setup.

However, neither of the two is as unsafe as both of them in a single package...
__________________
Past teams:
2003-2007: FRC0330 BeachBots
2008: FRC1135 Shmoebotics
2012: FRC4046 Schroedinger's Dragons

"Rockets are tricky..."--Elon Musk

Reply With Quote