Picking Up Upside-down Totes?

[Scott Kozutsky]

It should be reasonably easy to flip totes. While this (http://youtu.be/qfu9l_OF_gw?t=2m4s) is definitely not an FRC link, I feel like it effectively shows a possible (albeit massively overpowered) system for flipping totes. If you compacted it you could probably just bolt it to the back of your bot. It's not like it requires anywhere as much force to flip a tote.

I don't think it's reasonable to stack totes on top of an upside down tote that's being held with friction. Then again, your robot design and experiences may vary from ours.

[aasrobotics]

Wait, couldn't you make basically a flapjack flipper? Yknow, to flip over the disoriented totes? Just a thought, not really sure HOW to accomplish this, but just wondering.

[Batterink]

My fear for building a device that flips totes is flipping them onto, or over, the step.

[rich2202]

Originally Posted by nxtmonkeys

You could just have a little arm with a spatula-like thingie on the end of it.

Here; I made a picture:
PICTURE
(yes, I am a bit bored. How did you know?)

Your pic is for flipping over an upside down tote. My question was for a tote laying on its side.

Also, your design assumes enough friction to keep the tote from sliding, and that there is room behind the tote.

[bEdhEd]

Originally Posted by SamCyanide

What I would do is have two pads (possibly rubber or something else that can grip plastic well) that are built off of arms with motors on them. This way, you can grab the tote and flip it right side up by using the motors. You could even do this in testing and have it automatically rotate the motors (and as a result the container) only a certain number of degrees.

We prototyped this, but we decided passive pads on bearings would be simpler. (Our new designs being considered at the moment don't involve this system yet, since we are still speculating if flipping is necessary.)

If you pick up a tote off the ground with the pads within the area that is the bottom half of the tote, whether it is right side up or upside down, it inverts since the point of contact is off center and near bottom, and the object wants to find a point of rest with minimal potential energy. That point of rest is met when the point of contact is now above the middle of the tote. i.e. When the tote flips when held at the bottom, it rotates down so then it is being held at the top half. So this works for flipping totes that are upside down, right side up, and it can also be possible to use it for the containers. The only thing that needs to be powered is the pinching and lifting so the tote or container can get off the ground to swing to its natural position due to gravity and the off center contact points. I recommend playing with that idea.

[221Sarahborg]

The only strategy I found with trying to deal with the upside down totes was to get to the extra containers on the step if your reach was short range, when the human players have plenty more totes in the Alliance Station available to the robots.

[Kayla_Wallet]

My team decided to go with a pincer style grabbing mechanism, and we decided to use a material similar to the grippy stuff on tennid rackets with a bearing on the "hand" part so no matter which way grabbed, it will turn right side up because of how the weight is distributed.

[diddoarch710]

Originally Posted by Michael Hill

Do you really need to? There's enough that are right side up. Perhaps it would be easier to just move the upside down ones out of the way.

Yeah, that's what my team was saying. One of the people on my team did the math and he said the max points you could make not including time is 408, and those upside totes only count for like 20 or something like that, so it probably won't be significant when you have more than enough right side up totes. They may become more relevant in Nationals, and by then you'd have more time to make changes so that you could deal with the upside down bins. I'd say they aren't very relevant unless you're with a team that can quickly and efficiently stack all totes and bins so that you'd actually need the upside down ones. 10 out of the 64 totes are upside down, I don't think they'll really need to come into play till nationals, or if you really need points on your average (since you don't win individual matches till eliminations) or wanna go try hard mode.

[Deucalion]

Ah! The gravity flip certainly is a fine idea, I must say. The only trick here is implementing it on the fly.