[parthivshah88]

As everyone has said already, it takes a bit of experience to figure out where the weak points on the robot are and how to strengthen them. I do suggest that if you have the funds and capability you try and build a practice chassis during the summer and test it out.

However, here are some pointers that you should consider while designing your robot especially your chassis:

1. Forces: You need to anticipate where the forces are going to be exerted on your robot. In terms of the chassis, you can either be hit from the front, back, sides or the corners. The front, back and side collisions cause the chassis to compress whereas the corner collisions cause the chassis to twist.

2. Stiffness: Once you have figured out where the forces are going to be on your robot you need to determine if physical members can be added to strengthen or "stiffen" your chassis. For example, consider a traditional 6-wheel drive that has front and back bars, inner and outer rails on the sides. The wheels are located in between the rails. Now if you make sure that the front and back bars are connected to all for rails you will have successfully supported them from collisions (they may still bend but not as much if you only connected to 2 rails). Next if you are hit from the sides the outer rails will bend; you can add bars in between the wheels connecting the inner and outer rails. Now if you are hit from the corners the whole chassis tends to twist. you can mitigate this by connecting the two inner rails with what I call a "cross-member". Also if your belly pan is connected to the front, back and inner rails you will reduce the twisting of the chassis.

3. Force transfer: This is often ignored. When you get into a hit the force from the hit needs to be transferred to ALL members of the chassis. If is not the weakest parts will fail. Some of the most vulnerable parts of any mechanism or chassis are the joints. If you are using rivets or bolts ensure that you have more than one holding the members together. Remember more fasteners you add, the more you make the chassis/mechanism act as one but be careful of the weight! Use triangular plates to hold members together in places where members "butt" against each other.

4. Electrical Components: You don't want to put any electrical equipment on a member of the chassis that takes load. Again you need to anticipate where forces will be encountered in your chassis and put your electrical components in a "safe" spot.

If you keep these things in mind and use good judgment you should definitely may able to build a robust chassis or mechanism that will last through many competitions.