Wow - did this thread get out of hand.
1st off - That table didn't weigh any where near 500 lbs. No way - no how. (comon Eric - even if the engineers did say that, use some common sense. Even if that whole table was made out of lead, I don't know if it would weigh 500 lbs.)
2. Please, everyone, don't argue. Eric just thought wrong. People make mistakes. Back off him. The engineers may of said 500 lbs, but they meant something else. (Comon - we ALL have had those moments...)
3rd - The co-frict (like my nick name?) was pretty high when the "plastic" was not dirty. At Pittsburgh, a robot ramming us at full force (~130 lbs at about 10 fps) could not move us. At Nats - there was sssssoooo much dirt that the co-frict went down. The foam we used was very-very soft to compensate for some of that - but it just over-loaded the foam.
Jnadke -
To throw a little monkey in your theory - what is the trajectory of a robot coming UP a ramp? (it's not straight up, when you are at the edge of the plastic - you gotta take that into account)
Now enough with the arguments - just everything be. Eric just wanted to show what we created b/c he is proud of it.
Remember - FIRST is not about bashing people even when they are stubborn...
Never argue with an idiot - he may be doing the same.
Now back to the fun - Thank you for all of your praises on our vacuum plate. We had fun trying to think of ways to attach our selves at the top of the ramp - and we thought this would be great. (We did account for some dirt at the top of the ramp - but dang, how much dirt was up there? Maybe we should of hired some Tonka Trucks to clean it up?
)
As for the pnumatic stuff - we used the largest cylinder to draw about 6 psi of vacuum over 144 in sq. (1 square foot!)