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Unread 11-01-2008, 22:57
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Re: How to get the ball over the overpass!?

Quote:
Originally Posted by ar2 View Post
I think it will benifit us all if you drew out your design.
But i am likeing your thoughts in the design process!
Ok... this probably creates more questions than it answers... but I think it's enough to help you figure out what I'm talking about if you think through it.

Missing some obviously necessary mechanisms like latch to keep off floor when not in use, resetting device, etc.

If this whets your appetite for more I can try to spend more than 5 minutes drawing. If only I had a white board at home, and different colored markers

Quote:
Originally Posted by jleibs View Post
Step 1), Clear out a lot of space in the center of your robot. This definitely involved a very custom chassis.

Step 2) Imagine a pole going through a ring, so that the ring can slide along the pole. Now, mount this ring so that it can rotate in such a way for the pole to do its business. Do so somewhere near the center of your bot.

Step 3) Attach a large, high-friction foot to the end of this pole.

Step 4) Include some kind of actuated latch to keep the pole locked in a position such that the foot is off the ground.

Step 5) Drive forward quickly, then release the latch.

Step 6) Hope that the pole slides down and plants its "foot" on the floor. As the robot continues to drive forward, the pole rotates about the planted foot, being driven by the forward push of the robot at the location of the rotating ring. The rotation and sliding of the ring allow this to happen "nicely."

Step 7) This should be able to generate 30-40 degrees of rotation, at a reasonably high speed with sufficient torque to drive any mechanism you care to implement. The 100 joule figure I've seen for energy that needs to be imparted to the ball really is not that large compared to the kinetic energy of a decent sized robot moving at high speed.

Step 8) Either the other end of this pole flings the ball. Or, what I think would be extra fun: since the ring needs to be able to rotate to accommodate the rotation of the pole, this ring is presumably attached to a shaft. Any number of gears or other mechanisms could be attached to this shaft and used to drive some other mechanism than depends on a large amount of force being delivered over a short period of time.

Last edited by jleibs : 11-01-2008 at 23:00. Reason: Adding a recap of my earlier comments
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