Quote:
Originally Posted by Cory
If you can optimize the weight of your drive base, you should. This does not mean you should have a 50 lb base and the remaining 70 lbs 4' off the floor...that's just not smart engineering. What it does mean is that when your scoring mechanism weighs 60 lbs you aren't thinking "Oh ****, how many 1" holes through 0.125" aluminum does it take to remove 20 lbs of weight?", because your robot is 10 lbs underweight. Or it allows you to add more functionality.
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Last year, we had weight issues, as we were a couple of pounds overweight and eventually passed inspection at 119.8 pounds.
We kept that in mind this year, and designed everything, from the chassis to the scoring mechanism, as lightly but as robust as possible. We ended up at about 105 pounds at ship.
This allowed us to add more functionality, adding fans, encoders for traction control, and even another gearbox to slow down our shooter slightly. Eventually, we were still under 120 lbs, and we ended up strapping rebar to the bottom of our chassis.