Driving on Regolith

[Miksoko]

We drove tank drive, with 4 CIM powered wheels, two on each side. It worked pretty well for us. It would often skid, but we incorporated this into our strategy and learned how to skew into corners. Our lunacy bot was my favorite to drive, and, watching some footage of our matches recently, I was pretty darn good at it, too. That bot went wherever I wanted it to.

[Billfred]

2815 used two 550-sized motors (Mabuchi? F-P? Been so long...) through AM Planetary gearboxes, through the standard 2009 kitbot (AM Toughbox, AM C-Base, the 2009 wheels) with a wide base. We saw little reason to do more.

(And it let us use four CIMs on the ball collector/power-dumper. When else can you get away with that?)

[RogerR]

Originally Posted by Billfred

2815 used two 550-sized motors (Mabuchi? F-P? Been so long...) through AM Planetary gearboxes, through the standard 2009 kitbot (AM Toughbox, AM C-Base, the 2009 wheels) with a wide base. We saw little reason to do more.

(And it let us use four CIMs on the ball collector/power-dumper. When else can you get away with that?)

You used FP motors; the lower overall power and (relatively) high speed gearing helped reduce slipping (I was intimately familiar with your bot that year).

That was a fun year to design end-effects; no lack of available power (which sometimes presented its own problems).

[Taylor]

I wish I could find pictures, but I believe 71 not only had swerve drive, they had fans that they could pivot to help them steer. As I recall, the fans were small, maybe 6" across, but they were powerful.
2009 was a fun year. Lots of intricate gameplay strategies that were often lost on the general public.