Quote:
Originally posted by SuperDanman
Well it all depends on the robot's drive train and how they are aligned according to you.
The problem was that we were trying to move TRIBE by essentially going broadside into them. TRIBE was latched onto two goals, one on the front, one on the back. We were trying to move them by pushing them right in the center at 90 degrees to their movement path.
If you try and do this, it all depends on how much surface area they have touching the carpet. If they just have 4 wheel-chair wheels touching the carpet, then yes, this is possible. If they have treads running the lengthwise of their robot, doing something like this becomes a lot harder - no matter HOW much power you have. When trying to push a bot this way, what it basically comes down to is their drive system and how much surface area they have in contact with the ground. Our problem is that we tried to push TRIBE like this more than once. Had our drivers pushed them at an angle, pushed the goal (not their center of balance), or better yet, gotten parallel to them and pushed the goal, theres a strong chance that we would have moved them. Either way - thats why we have videos of the event - to see what we did wrong and improve on it next time. 
BTW, that picture didn't work. You sure you have the link right? I'd like to see this bot of yours 
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Surface area has very little to do with pushing power (it has NOTHING to do with friction), the only real way to get a holding advantage is to add more force on your wheels, lift the goals or somehting else. I was talking to a team at the canadian regional and I asked them what they would do to increase their pushing power, their answer was "we would use more motors"
There are ways to max traction but if you really want an advantage you have to get more then 130 pounds pushing down.