Physics of T-boning

[rnewendyke]

Originally Posted by ttldomination

I've actually seen this happen a lot on robots with good, traction setups. However, an all-omni setup goes to the other extremely and lets the robot slide out easier.

- Sunny G.

254's 2014 bot was pretty good at avoiding t-bones like that as well as t-bones in general. They used an alternative bumper material (I believe it is sail cloth, but I'm not certain) and is at least 20 pounds under the 120 pound limit. In most t-bone situations it either bounces off of the other robot, slips off of the other robot, or does a combination of the two. It's not quite as un-t-boneabe as a 33 or other butterfly/butterfly-esk drive trains out there, but it does appear to have an advantage over other traction setups I have seen.