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Unread 12-12-2014, 13:58
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wait....are you a twin??
AKA: Zach Larson
FRC #2605 (Sehome Seamonsters)
Team Role: Leadership
 
Join Date: Jan 2012
Rookie Year: 2011
Location: United States
Posts: 50
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Re: pic: 2851 2014 off-season design: Bottom view with electronics

Quote:
Originally Posted by cfair View Post
I'll see if our guys can post a CAD. We have two center cross members about where yours are, with the piano hinges attached there by rivets. Our electronics hinges down from the center cross members, accessible from the bottom, with the rivet nuts on the extreme ends of the chassis to hold the hinges closed. We will have a shear plate welded between the two center cross members, and we'll mount our compressor on that. We are also putting small gussets at the corners of the chassis for shear (I think that's more of a concern than torsional rigidity with regards to a belly pan). Also the battery will go in a "cage" and that cage will be mounted in a location tbd depending on access and the mechanisms above the electronics. Our chassis is welded tubular 1x2 for the most part. It's our first time with a west-coast style drive...
Quote:
Originally Posted by cfair View Post
As for the advantages: the biggest advantage of tubular is simplicity. From my point of view, the easiest chassis is an off-the-shelf chassis, the next easiest is one the sorta off the shelf (like ours: we're using versablocks), the next is a custom one using plates or tubes (what we usually do), and the most difficult is sheet metal. Just so you know, we routinely find 1/8" wall 1" square tubing bending dramatically because of hits to our front and rear bumpers.
If you guys could post some CAD that would be great. I absolutely agree with your ranking of easy-hard. We have used 1x2 tubing, 1/16 wall for the past two years with mechanic with great success. It was easy to put together, we used gussets and self-tapping screws to assemble it all in about two hours. However the self tapping-screws really loosened up after so much contact and hitting last season, and welding seems like a better option as far as durability goes. We are also looking into a 8 wheels drive for the first time, while we know how to make a stellar mechanum drive, we are delving for the first time with a "west coast" style.
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