Team 179 Robot Improvements

[MARS_James]

So we are now on the road to Bayou but before we left we made some improvements to our practice robot to allow us to stack quicker, unfortunately we didn't get as much practice as we wanted with it due to shipping delays but here are the results:

Link

Feel free to leave questions or comments

[Gregor]

Are you dependant on that first tote falling flat? That is almost never the case.

[Mike Marandola]

Originally Posted by Gregor

Are you dependant on that first tote falling flat? That is almost never the case.

A trick that I got from 1640 is to let the tote go when it's half way in the chute and quickly open the door. With some practice it results in the totes lying flat about 90% of the time. It worked pretty well for us at PVDE when we did it. Check out 1640's HP at the bottom right for an example of what I mean.

[Jetweb]

Originally Posted by Mike Marandola

A trick that I got from 1640 is to let the tote go when it's half way in the chute and quickly open the door. With some practice, it results in the totes lying flat about 90% of the time. It worked pretty well for us at PVDE when we did it. Check out 1640's HP at the bottom right for an example of what I mean.

Our human player is well practiced in both this method (which we prefer) and one we learned from 2016 in south Florida in which you hit the rear of the tote with the door right before it slides out.

We do have about 1 in 15 come out on end/sideways which we can usually right quickly with the lifter arms.

[Procolsaurus]

Originally Posted by Jetweb

we learned from 2016 in south Florida in which you hit the rear of the tote with the door right before it slides out.

You should ask the Head Ref's is view on this. At the Greater Pittsburgh Regional, utilizing the chute door to manipulate a tote was viewed as a form of propping open a chute door with an object, and called as G6-1.

Relevant Q&As

Q260
Q.This question touches on Q164 and the recent update to rule G6. Can a HUMAN PLAYER use the CHUTE DOOR to contact and intentionally slow down or manipulate the movement of a TOTE that is in the TOTE CHUTE if the HUMAN PLAYER is only directly contacting the CHUTE DOOR? The update to G6 seems to imply that it is no longer legal to contact the TOTE with the CHUTE DOOR at all.
A.Good catch, apologies for our incomplete edit to G6. G6 will be updated to accommodate the normal operation of the CHUTE and CHUTE DOOR in Team Update 2015-01-30, which makes it consistent with the answer provided in [Q164].
Q164
Is the chute door allowed to contact the tote as the tote is entering the playing field? If so, can the human player control/touch the chute door while the tote is entering the field?
A.There is no restriction on when / where the CHUTE DOOR can contact a TOTE. However, please keep in mind G6: "A single ALLIANCE member may not be in contact with both a TOTE and the CHUTE DOOR simultaneously." Also consider G6-1: "G6-1 DRIVE TEAMS may not use any object to prop the CHUTE DOOR open." which would prohibit actions such as using a TOTE to prop the CHUTE DOOR open in order to feed multiple TOTES through the TOTE CHUTE without operating the CHUTE DOOR. Depending on the actions of the HUMAN PLAYER or DRIVER, G16 (FIELD damage) may be enforced if the CHUTE DOOR or TOTES are being damaged by the method.

[Chief Hedgehog]

A form of this chute door manipulation was allowed at Lake Superior.

I would be interested to find out that this was called against the rules as the competition season progresses.

[JohnFogarty]

Had to switch to a chain lift too I see.