[miketwalker]

I haven't got a doubt in my mind that you could make a self balancing robot. I know of several home-brew Segways people have made using the kit of parts.

As for actual robots though, I believe teams probably haven't bothered because it is kind've useless (in most ways that is). Yes... it is highly maneuverable... but a omni or crab drive system is much more maneuverable. As for pushing ability, I'm doubting you'll see much from that because it takes alot to keep it balanced so alot of the drive power is going into this balancing mechanism. Plus you would need height clearance to give it some room to move back and forth a bit without scraping the ground. Also you must keep in mind... what will the robot do when it is shut off before the match? If you want to have it fit inside of the maximum dimensions... you would have to use a pneumatic kickstand or something to keep it straight up, or else it will be leaning back till it powers up (and then will need even more time to balance itself... wasting autonomous time). I mean, you COULD make a self-balancing robot like a Segway... however it's probably going to be just a pretty robot driving around, because the resources needed to keep the system up at the beginning... the programming time... the self-balance turn-on time... pushing ability against another bot... it needs ground clearance under the body of the robot with the wheels so you lose some height to work with in the envelope... and it isnt as maneuverable as crab or omni because it acts like a tank robot by having to turn to go in that direction and not be able to stay facing a certain direction (making it harder to use accessories on the robot to perform tasks). To me it seems like a waste, but then again... you never know when a game might need this, I just don't see that scenario having much of a chance of happening.