Creating the perfect robot

[Jay O'Donnell]

Hey CD,
So a project that I've been working on for the past few weeks is coming up with the "Perfect Robot" now that we are in the offseason. My idea of the perfect robot is: A 7-disc Autonomous, a 50-Point Climb, and having the ability to FCS. So now that we have finished the 2013 season, what combination of certain robot's parts/robots with certain additions could create this "Perfect robot"?

[Matthew Lang]

Being under 30" tall and being able to use their pick-up during the match as well as autonomous are two great attributes. An extendable blocker would also be cool but this is already getting pretty crazy .

[Kevin Leonard]

469 with their fabled 30-point climber. Done.

EDIT: Or, if you want to improve even further (not by much), you could have a wildly modified 1538.

[pmangels17]

What about just 67 with a floor pickup? They have a 30 pt climb, FCS ability, and extra 20 pt pyramid goal dump ability. Add a floor pickup with 7 disc auton, and they would probably win everything.

[SoftwareBug2.0]

I'm surprised that I've never seen anybody mention this, but how about a robot that does full court shots from a high starting point, but can also lower to go under the pyramid?

[Caleb Sykes]

The perfect robot would also be able to adjust the height of their shooter, much like 1718 did. When the robot is shooting full couurt, the shooter would be as close as possible to 60", thus making defense difficult. When the shooter is down, the entire robot height, including the shooter, should be <30" for driving under the pyramid.

Adjustable height was a pretty rare feature this year, but the perfect robot would definitely have it.

EDIT: lost the race

[Kevin Leonard]

Originally Posted by SoftwareBug2.0

I'm surprised that I've never seen anybody mention this, but how about a robot that does full court shots from a high starting point, but can also lower to go under the pyramid?

Originally Posted by inkling16

The perfect robot would also be able to adjust the height of their shooter, much like 1718 did. When the robot is shooting full couurt, the shooter would be as close as possible to 60", thus making defense difficult. When the shooter is down, the entire robot height, including the shooter, should be <30" for driving under the pyramid.

Adjustable height was a pretty rare feature this year, but the perfect robot would definitely have it.

233.
But with a 50-pt climb somehow. I'm not exactly sure.
But if you took 233, removed their consistency issues, you'd have a 7-disc auto robot with a tall full-court shot. I'm not sure how to put a climb on it, though.

[MichaelBick]

If I was building the "perfect" robot I still would want it to be boiled down to simplicity for reliability. In my opinion a FCS is too easily blocked. Cyclers are harder to block and much more accurate(efficiency/reliability is king). Climb and dump is required because of the reliability of the 50 pts. Front vs back intake is a question of points vs versatility. The front intake allows you to dominate by yourself while the back intake gives you a faster back auton(more likely to pull it off) and a bit of a better position for picking up stray frisbees on the way back to the feeder station. Either way this boils down to 610's shooter, 1114's climber, and 1986's intake(forward or back facing with a respectively faced hopper).

In a more realistic case, my favorite robot this year was 1114's. With the large amount of multi-disk autos this year, 1114 proved to be an ultimate 1st pick. They were extremely reliable at scoring enormous amounts of points and are by far my favorite robot of the year.

[efoote868]

The robot I wanted to see this year would've been similar to team 1501 from 2007 (which was basically a platform on wheels).

The robot would be optimized for climbing the pyramid, but what would make this robot special is that it could carry two robots with it, and do it very quickly (under 10 seconds). That way, it could pair with a couple robots similar to Robot In 3 Days, and give the entire alliance a 90 point bonus instead of 50.

As an afterthought, the robot could also have an auton (say it dumps 3 discs into the 1pt goal) or be a dumper, and if it wasn't too difficult could be designed to make more than 1 trip.

This type of robot would fit into most alliances better than a "perfect" robot, since it improves their scoring capabilities rather than completes every aspect of the game all alone.

[Boe]

Originally Posted by efoote868

The robot would be optimized for climbing the pyramid, but what would make this robot special is that it could carry two robots with it, and do it very quickly (under 10 seconds). That way, it could pair with a couple robots similar to Robot In 3 Days, and give the entire alliance a 90 point bonus instead of 50.

That would be one of if not the most impressive feats FRC has ever seen or will see.

[cmrnpizzo14]

I like the idea of a more consistent 233. The elevator design that they had on their bot was really brilliant if they had been able to utilize its full capabilities. I'm wondering if you really need the 50 pt. climb though if you had the elevator system.

Theoretically with the elevator you should be able to get close enough to the pyramid goal that you could probably score pretty consistently in the top of the pyramid anyways. With a good FCS you could drain the feeder station quickly enough that you could still get 1 (maybe 2) trips of alliance discs in.

With the elevator, you could also make it robust enough to be some sort of pyramid climber. Especially if you could somehow pull off a design similar to 340's where the robot adjusts its CoG to swing to the next bar.

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-vikQ5-DoE if you do not know that design)

It's also possible to just perform a 50 pt climb if with the elevator you could extend your shooter upward directly adjacent to the pyramid goal and put 4 alliance discs in.

This design is probably fanciful for a 6 week build but it would be a killer offseason bot if a team had started son enough that they could finish it. I could see it being possible since most of the concepts are already designed and tested, it is just the integration and implementation that would take time.

[brennonbrimhall]

Originally Posted by Thunder910

Or, if you want to improve even further (not by much), you could have a wildly modified 1538.

If you had a 1538-style robot (chassis, arm, etc.) with 67's shooter on top, rather than 1538's shooter (which is on the bottom), you should be able to use a 118/2056 style design to move a hopper of discs from the pickup to the shooter pneumatically. You'd essentially have one of the best floor pickups and FCS capability in FRC, with minimal integration effort.

But, we haven't touched the drivetrain. There's no reason you couldn't put a 67/1114 climber on there. And with the 1538 arm that pivots, you'd be just as accurate as the 67 dump.

[LDiDomenico]

If 118 could make the robot in their reveal video lighter and possibly add a dumper it would be able to do everything pretty well.

[evanperryg]

• 118's ground collector because it is robust and doesn't extend out of the robot.
• 67's shooter.
• 1114's climber will take up whatever space there is between the top of the collector and the bottom of the shooter.
• If we want the raising shooter(which I really see no reason for, as we all know that cycling is generally better than full court) Then use 1477's design.

[Michael Hill]

I wonder if it would have been possible to make an accurate full court shooter that shot frisbees upside down so you could fire them at a higher, unblockable angle.

From videos I've seen upside down frisbees don't get the lift that right side up frisbees get.

Or even throw them "hammer" style at a higher angle.