[EricH]

Originally Posted by gimpnub

why don't you use a three-wheel setup instead of a four-wheel setup?

correct me if i'm wrong but i think it would give you more stability and reduce your weight at the same time

your only difficulty might be programming it with 0, 60, and 120 degrees instead of 0, 90, 180, and 270 degrees, but there are also less wheels to program

i don't know how speed would be affected by the 3-wheel setup

if i'm wrong in any areas please forgive me and ignore my comments

Reduce weight, yes, but 3-wheel setups have to be carefully thought out. I can only think of 4 off the top of my head: 330 (2002) had a triangular robot and no omnis; 67 (2005) had a peculiar triangular setup that I don't quite remember, but it involved flopping down; 16 (2006) had a 3-wheel swerve with pads to keep the frame from hitting the carpet and digging in, and 148 (2008) had a 3-wheel swerve patterned off of 118's V6 and a much smaller robot than the other three. The only one of those that involved omnis was 67's, IIRC. I remember hearing that 67's drive code took up an awful lot of room on their controller...

More stability is debatable. If you've got it fully in a square or circle, possibly. But with a frame like this, I don't think so. You've got a big risk that one corner will go down and dig into the carpet.

Speed might not be affected. I'd have to do the vectors to figure that out, and I'm not in a position to do that right now...