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Unread 03-02-2017, 10:09
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Ty Tremblay Ty Tremblay is offline
Robotics Engineer
FRC #0319 (Big Bad Bob)
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Re: pic: Spectrum 3847 - 2017 CAD Model: Gamma Ray

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris is me View Post
The primary advantage of an over-the-bumper collector, other than width (which is significant), is that the leading edge of your robot is your collector instead of your frame and/or bumper. If you move your "frame" (hopper) out just as far forward as your collector, you remove that advantage - your frame could contact a wall before your collector contacts a ball along that wall, etc. If your roller still protrudes out farther than your hopper, then you have to at least some extent compromised your hopper space.

Considering even a full length robot can actuate their front roller so that it occupies the space between the frame and the edge of the bumper, this advantage starts to seem limited to making the collector wider. Again, this is a sizeable advantage, but at the same time, the field will have hundreds of balls on it, and I'm not sure the complexity of this solution is justified for this benefit.

It's not zero benefit, and it's certainly worth exploring for many teams, I just wonder if the tradeoff in complexity and / or ball storage will end up being clearly worth it or not. This isn't the path my team took and it certainly simplified a lot of the robot once we decided not to do this, plus we still have the option to switch to a drop-down "in-the-bumper" intake if we really need that little bit of roller to grab balls against walls.
The balls are 5" in diameter. This means you can have a 4" collector wheel/drum, bring your hopper out to the outside edge of those wheels, and still have your collector touch the ball before your hopper touches the wall. If you make your collector smaller in radius, your hopper well be even further away from the wall when the ball gets collected.
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