Quote:
Originally Posted by Jon Stratis
Without getting into the big long analysis of how to (prevent) trip the main breaker, I wanted to address this from an inspection perspective. For at least the past few years, FIRST has provided a Motor Performance Data Sheet which contains information on most of the motors we're allowed to use, and probably all of the motors we're allowed that you would want providing locomotive power in your drive train.
Why should we measure output power when we can measure max motor power instead? Sum up the max power for each motor on the drive train and you're done. That leaves us with a practical upper limit on speed and power output in a drive train without getting into all of the specifics you mention. Further, with appropriate limits we can pass most teams without question quickly and easily. "4 CIMs on the drive train (like 75%+ of all teams)? You're good to go!" "4 CIMs, 2 mini-CIMs, and 2 775s? We'll have to do the math on that one..." And the best part... it doesn't require any special skills or knowledge from the inspectors in determining if it's legal - just some basic addition. |
But what motors count? If I do a steered wheel system do the steering wheels count for this determination?
Truth, adding arbitrary design constraints like that just seems the wrong approach. I assert that with good game/field design it should be possible to minimize the impact of the increasing motor power. Make it so it's more worth my time to play the game than to ram others. Don't let me accelerate the length of the field into another bot by dividing the field up.
2014 was rough for reasons unrelated to the motor power. Most folks who were doing the worst of the ramming likely only had 4 motors in their DT anyway. It was the ability to accelerate cross field and overworked refs that caused the plethora of ramming issues.