Wheelbases

[akoscielski3]

You just made me want to start designing ANOTHER chassis. (chassis #11) Hmmmm.... What should i design this time? Any suggestions?

I have a few questions.

What kind of chassis are you designing? Sheetmetal? WCD? etc

Is it going to be wide or long chassis?

what gear boxes (and geared for what speed) and wheels are you using?

Originally Posted by akoscielski3

You just made me want to start designing ANOTHER chassis. (chassis #11) Hmmmm.... What should i design this time? Any suggestions?

I have a few questions.

What kind of chassis are you designing? Sheetmetal? WCD? etc

Is it going to be wide or long chassis?

what gear boxes (and geared for what speed) and wheels are you using?

It will be a WCD, with the wheels as far out as possible.

It'll be long

It will be custom transmissions, and though the speeds haven't been set yet, we're thinking about using no more than 16fps, and no less than 6fps.


If you do make chassis #11, do show us! If I like anything, it's a well-built chassis.

[Aur0r4]

This was our first year with a wide 4-wheel robot and we had issues with motor load during turning (2 super shifters driving four kit wheels). We had to switch to omni wheels in the front to make turning easier. We have also had stability issues on the bridge and during very fast direction changes.

To be honest, one of the best tank wheelbases we've had was a long 2-wheel drive with ball casters in the front. Obviously, this is not good for climbing obstacles, but it allows high friction wheels to be used with no scrubbing during turning and gives great maneuverability when the driver gets used to the turning point. Our 2003 robot climbed the mesh ramp and pushed robots off the top with standard casters and big, soft rubber wheels in the back.

I wouldn't really advocate our current design in the future. There's better climbing setups, and its only a mediocre floor-only design. The issue with compromise is that can often produce results with no advantage either way.

[Aren Siekmeier]

We're 10 wheel wide this year, with about 27" wide base and the center 6 dropped, making it 9" long. Seems to do just fine.

The whole 10 wheel thing was to get over the bump while keeping everything low, but that hasn't worked out yet for other reasons....