Are treds going to be a good idea this year?

[Joe Menassa]

Are treds too slow for this kind of game or is the extra traction neccessary?

[Clark Gilbert]

Slow???

[Gadget470]

Treds can be good, or bad. Depends on your approach and strategy. You can make treads move very fast, but keep in mind, more surface area = less psi of power. Chances are with treds, you can be speedy, with lots of traction, and won't lose a pushing match, but you also won't win.

With treds you probably won't be able to actually PUSH as hard against another robot but you will be able to hold your ground against one trying to push you or take a goal away.

2 Examples of tread usage:
1) Wizards (don't know team number) I believe it was 6" wide or more treads, they could nearly climb a wall, but they were very slow going up and down the bridge.

2)'da Bears (247) We had a serpentine design last year that was decently speedy with 1" wide tread. We were able to push around obstructions, and the 2 goals onto the bridge. Downside was in 2 matches our treads popped off disabling us where we stood and we were tough to be pushed out of the way.


In this years game I don't think treads will be too great of an idea. Treads are more for ATV robots so they can keep traction over obstacles. A peice of timing belt wrapped around wheels I think can give more power and almost as good of traction as treads can.

3¢.

[mike o'leary]

the fact that a bot has treads certaintly doesnt make it slow. just think about tanks. they arent exactly fast, but they're definately not slow either

[khssoccer16]

The key to making treads it to not sacrifice speed, and increase traction and torque. Last year on the TechnoKats we mounted two motors together, and were kinda fast. If you want to see the plans, they are @ www.technokats.org .

[Mike Norton]

Tracks slow ? it is how you want to run your motors.

We as a team have had tracks for the past nine years.

We have mastered the tracks. If you go back to 1999 you would have seen us pulling the puck with other robots trying to pull it away.

two robots on puck while one pulling away and we still controled the puck.

tracks are the best way to go. when robots fell in front of the bridge last year we just push then out of the way. We were one of the few that could pull the streacher over the ramp.

So if you think track drive is bad look for are team this year.

I would love to see a robot pull off.

[Keithicus]

MOE from last years comp also had a good tread design. Took them to the winners circle at nationals.