Quote:
Originally Posted by Akash Rastogi
I know its probably highly unlikely, but did anyone get to measure pushing/pulling forces on new FRP materials like on Einstein and compare the numbers to heavily worn FRP? It would be interesting to see how much the results differed from FRP dust and lots of other factors. Significant addition in traction? No effect at all?
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Akash,
After several months of practice and several events, I have come to the conclusion that the point of contact with the floor of any wheel is so small that other factors seem to have little effect. I have seen small spots on the floor worn through the surface or have the high spots removed by repeated slipping in one spot. However, the chance of that small spot and your wheel meeting for increased friction is very small and only lasts a fraction of a second. In practice (at our shop) our wheels were picking up all kinds of debris from the floor including what appeared to be wax, to the point they were completely coated. At events, the field people were cleaning the floor at regular intervals to keep the grit to a minimum and clear the floor of the normal hardware, wire ties and insulation from wire. I examined several of these pads after a cleaning and found that same waxy type of coating and extreme amounts of dirt and dust. Anyone who was near the field knows that they were breathing this fine dust and it covered my laptop at the regionals where I inspected everyday. The good news is that every robot that practiced or played one match came off the field with significantly cleaner wheels than when they started. As inspectors we feared we would be making teams sand or clean wheels on a regular basis. That fear was unfounded during the first week regionals. I have a bag of sand paper and sanding blocks at home that went unused.
When we tested pulling force on our field there was no perceptible change from the first day to ship. And the same was true at several places on the floor. I would suspected that humidity might have made a difference but it turns out that the surface is sealed with an overcoat of resin.