Ball Shifter vs other gearbox

[Mark Sheridan]

Originally Posted by akoscielski3

Here's your biggest problem. You are designing your chassis months too early for next season. You need to find out what your ideal speed/speeds will be. Your strategy may not require even going around defense next year, like this year if you were a FCS you didn't have to be really fast, but a cycling robot needed to be really quick.

Originally Posted by pauline589

I have to agree with Aaron, how do you know what your ideal robot is if you don't know what you need?
FIRST gives you six weeks to build a FULLY functioning robot.
Not just everything but the chassis.

As well I do not think it is a bad thing to become familiar with different drive systems, it will give you more options next year and you will expand your knowledge. But designing something for next year and not knowing what you need might set you up for failure.

Originally Posted by akoscielski3

Exactly.
Also I never mentioned, though Pauline did, that offseason is a good place to practice things, like new transmissions. If you've never used two speed gear boxes then I suggest getting a pair of Ball Shifters and testing them out. Program them the way your driver would want, learn to find the best gear ratios, etc. Hopefully this will help you design you drive trains in future years.

I think his methodology is correct. Determining which speeds would be ideal for this year should yield a system to determine speeds for other years. Consequently, 766 and 3309 design drive systems to accept a range of gear ratios using data from previous games. We also have a range of ideal gear ratios that work for most years. Hence why 1114's kit-bot on steroids is so good.

You both touch on practicing drive trains, I would add testing. 766 ran their drive train last year through an off season event and more. So this year 766 and us had great confidence in the drive's durability. When running a new gearbox, things you have to ask, does the rest of my drive promote durability? What will break first, the wheel? and what sort of preventative maintenance you need?

I don't think you can design your drive train too early. Having the extra time invested to promote durability is well worth the effort. As long as you factor in reCADing during the build season, making adjustment to reflect the new game and time it takes to build a drive, I don't see a strong enough argument against starting a design now. I started next years drive during week 6 of the competition season.