Omni Directional movement for tank drive.

[Hawiian Cadder]

after observing the competition at saint Louis, and how tank drives were far superior in most respects this game, i remembered something Ive read about called melty brain.


the idea is to have a tank drive robot, that spins very quickly. by altering the amount of power to each side at different angles within a spin. omni-directional movement is achieved. a standard 2 speed tank drive should be able to spin fast enough to make this work ( to some degree) in a fast gear.

this type of movement has one big advantage that i can see, a very intimidating defensive robot. because of all of the added energy stored in the robot, even a robot with tank treads would have a difficult time passing a defender with this type of drive-train. especially if it could move in any direction.


http://www.spambutcher.com/meltyb.html


all of the open source software can be viewed above.

my question is, how do you think this would work in a match, would it be legal, and how tough would the spinning robot need to be. would it pose a danger to other robots on the field. ( the goal is to intimidate, not actually destroy) if the answer to the last question is yes, what is a reasonable speed to spin. ( our robot this year with 6 wheel tank, powered omni wheels on the ends, could spin approx 4 times per second.)

also what other potential does this type of control scheme have in FIRST. if it werent for the trailers i think it would have been THE best drivetrain for 2009. and it would have been an intimidating contender for a simple omni directional drive that rookie teams could pull off. ( direct driving 8 inch wheels from cimpleboxes) without buying ANY additional hardware.