Quote:
Originally Posted by MrBasse
Kids always stress over the need to have ten tanks on the robot and then they complain that the compressor runs for the whole match. When we reduce it to three or four tanks, the compressor may run twice a match, but for only 15-20 seconds each time. Unless you need to dump 80 cubic inches of air at a time, you rarely need 80 cubic inches of storage.
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This.
When designing our pneumatic system this year, our first focus was on actual air usage - how often would our "ideal" system be able to actuate. From there, we worked backwards to determine how much air was required at working pressure. This helped to directly inform us of the required storage volume - how many times do you want to be able to activate your mechanism before you run out of storage? How much airflow do you need to support the system over the entire match? Can the compressor handle it?
In the end, our math showed that we could handle the load at our theoretical top actuation speed (a speed we'll probably never actually hit, but it's good to have a bit of a cushion in these calculations). It also showed us the affect we would have if we had 2 tanks for storage, or 4, or 8. Doing the math to figure out how much the storage pressure drops with each activation is critical!