Ball eject

[brandon.cottrell]

While I do like Aerial Assist, this is something that kind of worries me about this game. Along with the autonomas shots missed, it's now easier to pinpoint exactly whose fault it was that a match was lost and why.

[atucker4072]

Originally Posted by Brandon1266

While I do like Aerial Assist, this is something that kind of worries me about this game. Along with the autonomas shots missed, it's now easier to pinpoint exactly whose fault it was that a match was lost and why.

Thia will be a great test of gracious Professionalism! Although if teams meet before a match like they should lots of problems can be avoided. If I had to as a driver I wouldn't like a team to load a ball into their robot if they haven't tested it or been successful with it.

[Mr. Lim]

Originally Posted by atucker4072

Thia will be a great test of gracious Professionalism! Although if teams meet before a match like they should lots of problems can be avoided. If I had to as a driver I wouldn't like a team to load a ball into their robot if they haven't tested it or been successful with it.

A very BIG test of gracious professionalism

I'm not sure where to go with this aspect of the game.

I'm asking myself very seriously, if a robot can't automatically eject a ball when disabled, should it be allowed to intake it?

Autonomous is also very tricky - if your robot requires the ball to be inside your robot at the start of the match, and can't be easily freed by another robot, your alliance partners might ask you not to run it.

How would you feel if your alliance partners ask you never to pick up a ball? Or to not run your autonomous?

Would you ask your alliance partners not to do those things?

Because right now, this seems like the prudent thing to do.

[FrankJ]

The issue is the state "Estop" is really the same as disabled. So you load the ball in the disabled state (Robot is disabled until the match starts) Nothing will happen until the robot is enabled. The coders that can make the robot magically eject the ball on system failure aren't going to be the ones with these kinds of issues.

Scouting is going to be important this year (as if it was never unimportant) because a non functioning robot in the seeding matches can really skew the scores.

This might be the year that a good defense is a good offense.

[JohnSchneider]

Originally Posted by Mr. Lim

A very BIG test of gracious professionalism

I'm not sure where to go with this aspect of the game.

I'm asking myself very seriously, if a robot can't automatically eject a ball when disabled, should it be allowed to intake it?

Autonomous is also very tricky - if your robot requires the ball to be inside your robot at the start of the match, and can't be easily freed by another robot, your alliance partners might ask you not to run it.

How would you feel if your alliance partners ask you never to pick up a ball? Or to not run your autonomous?

Would you ask your alliance partners not to do those things?

Because right now, this seems like the prudent thing to do.

It's a terrible enough feeling at a regional telling a team "Hey we need you to put this giant net on and sit there and not do what your robot was designed to do because of the nature of the game." I cannot imagine telling someone they cannot play the game in its proper form because "We don't trust your robot's design".

Heck, there are times when a team will just refuse and try it anyways and when the ball gets stuck then what do you do? The rules pertaining to this are not fair for any member of an alliance.

An E-Stopped robot with a ball most definitely should not have its ball counted. That way there's at least a way to keep playing the game for the other 2.

[RSaunders]

Why wouldn't the referees consider a ball in an EStopped robot "out of play"? It's a good idea to raise this question in the Q&A, but software solutions aren't what you want when a simple human decision can solve your problem. That's what referees are for.

/Randy

[DonRotolo]

Originally Posted by Mr. Lim

I'm asking myself very seriously, if a robot can't automatically eject a ball when disabled, should it be allowed to intake it?

I would think a robot capable of taking action while disabled would be a safety hazard, violating R8.

[Whippet]

Originally Posted by DonRotolo

I would think a robot capable of taking action while disabled would be a safety hazard, violating R8.

What about the robots in 2012 with the after-the-buzzer pneumatic bridge balancers?

[vhcook]

Originally Posted by Whippet

What about the robots in 2012 with the after-the-buzzer pneumatic bridge balancers?

You had to trigger the solenoid before the buzzer. Any after-buzzer activity was just the air pressure equalizing on a decision that had already been made.

[Racer26]

Originally Posted by vhcook

You had to trigger the solenoid before the buzzer. Any after-buzzer activity was just the air pressure equalizing on a decision that had already been made.

Not strictly true. You can have a single acting solenoid valve which spends the entire match energized, keeping your ball ejector retracted. As soon as the robot transitions to the disabled state (either commanded by the field at the end of a match, or because the robot lost communication) that solenoid will cease to be energized, and extend your ball ejector.

The trick is in figuring out a way to either A) make it so that during the pre-match disabled phase you can keep your ejector retracted (perhaps you use a dump valve connected to a servo to trap air strategically in the system that can later be released) OR B) pick the ball up at the start of auto instead of pre-loading it into your robot.

[Dalrik]

Originally Posted by Racer26

B) pick the ball up at the start of auto instead of pre-loading it into your robot.

This is probably what most teams are going to have to do. The corner case of a robot that crashes as soon as auton starts and thus never has time to arm an eject mechanism is one that I don't see a clear solution for. Then again, you have to waste part of your 5 second window for the hot goal picking up the ball...

[tStano]

Single action solenoids are great but if you don't have pneumatics on your robot (and many teams don't), it shouldn't be necessary to add an entire pneumatic system for that.

[atucker4072]

Originally Posted by tStano

Single action solenoids are great but if you don't have pneumatics on your robot (and many teams don't), it shouldn't be necessary to add an entire pneumatic system for that.

You have a good point but having a pneumatics system is better than loosing matches.

[Siri]

Originally Posted by tStano

Single action solenoids are great but if you don't have pneumatics on your robot (and many teams don't), it shouldn't be necessary to add an entire pneumatic system for that.

I have no background with them, but R29 also allows for some sorts of electrical solenoids. These can be spring return, so maybe a clever system could use the electrical rather than the pneumatic variety. Anyone have more experience with these?

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by RSaunders

Why wouldn't the referees consider a ball in an EStopped robot "out of play"? It's a good idea to raise this question in the Q&A, but software solutions aren't what you want when a simple human decision can solve your problem. That's what referees are for.

/Randy

A referee's job is to enforce the rules, not make up new ones. As much as we'd sometimes like to help out teams, we can't do so if the rules don't allow it. If the rules are amended to define a ball in an E-Stopped robot as field debris, we will so decide. If the rules remain as is, we can't do it.