[JVN]

Also...
Think about your robot pushing against a stationary object (like a wall).

In this case, if your robot has more traction than torque at the wheel, the wheel will stall, the motor will stall, and it will draw a lot of current. Probably bad.

In this case, if your robot has more torque than traction, the wheel will be spinning, and the floor will be acting as a brake on the wheel. You know exactly how much this load is, because you know the force of friction between your wheel and the ground. The motor will be loaded at some amount, depending on your gear ratio, and will draw some current depending on this load.

In FRC, if we're designing robots to get into pushing matches with other robots, we design them such that when they're pushing against a wall -- the motor draws about 40-amps continuously.

This way, we know that even when we're pushing -- we won't pop circuit breakers.

This is another reason to design for increased torque.

-John