No comment on the legality of it ... but technically it'd be a challenge to convince me that it's worth the effort. We tossed that idea around for a little while during our brainstorming sessions, but it died off somewhat quickly.
For ball handling, with it's somewhat porous cover, the volume of air that you'd have to move would be huuuuge ... and the area of the suction cup would have to be pretty large. I don't think that a tank behind a solenoid would do the trick. I'd wager that you'd have to be constantly sucking large volumes of air to maintain a partial vacuum at the cup
If it's not for ball handling, then it's hard to comment on it's feasability. I suppose that there could be some use for a (partial) vacuum, but aside from ball handling, nothing comes to mind at the moment. ... other than an idea for next year's competition ... can anybody say Roomba-bots? Next year's trackballs could be dime-sized, and we'd have to gather as many as possible.
The regional winners get to travel to Mr. Kamen's house to help with his spring cleaning!
