Suction Cups

[Sachiel7]

Hey All!
There are a few things I'd like to know about teams that used suction cups (or anything else) for king of the hill:
1) Where did you get them from?
2) How effective were they?
3) What Method did you use to deploy them? (Pneumatic/Motor/etc.)

We're probably going to be adding on a set of these for the MD State Fair, and I'd like to get some feedback.
Thanx!

[edomus]

we have a moster suction cup that is deployed by a motor

[Solace]

but does it work against a lateral force?

[edomus]

it is pretty effective. If we were to be spun, that is all that would happen, we would still hold our ground. Only drawback is the time it takes to deploy.

[Sachiel7]

Where did you get your suction cup(s)?
A local store?
Ordered online?
or Just plain ordered?
I just found about 3-4 sites online who make suction cups, but there is no pricing/ordering info. Do you know if any local hardware stores carry them?

[Eric Bareiss]

We got ours here.

Anver Suction Cups

The prices are there.

[Gadget470]

I believe this thread was intended at finding out from teams who have already competed and used a suction-cup mechanism. Just saying that you have a good suction cup, or saying where you got it doesn't mean it was effective in competition.

[Andy Baker]

We have suction cups and we used them somewhat in St. Louis. They are from Piab.

There was only one match (our last Q match) that we made a valiant attempt to "lock down", and we eventually got twisted by two robots. Curing the qualification matches, our focus was not really dominate the ramp (and we were in no position to dominate in St. Louis anyway), but to knock totes over, stay up there, and let other teams on if we were ahead.

As for "do they work"... the jury is still out with us. Once we get our drivetrain working well, then we will have more chances to get our locking mechanism to work. We are going to Pittsburgh this weekend, so we should have plenty of matches to try this system out some more.

Andy B.

[Kojib]

Hi, Garrett from 16, the Baxter Bomb Squad,

We have one suction cup, about 8 inches in diameter on the end of a pneumatic "foot" Although we do use suction to "lock down", we usually have enough from just deploying it (the foot shooting down). We've only been to one regional, so I don't want to over-guestimate, but we've not been pushed yet.

[Rev. Lovejoy]

We used 4 total suction cups, two on either side, in pairs.

They deployed by a pneumatic cyclinder (on on either side), the cups were 3 (or 4) inches in diameter, and held us on the ramp every time we were on, the reason for this was our second drive (tourque boost) dropped down and worked to hold us from moving once we were in the position we wanted to be, if someone tried ot push, we gave a little push in the opposite direction, making it impossible for them to move us off.

The suctions made it so we could last ditch effort deploy in the final seconds, we'd get speed going up the ramp and hit the suction as soon as our front wheels were on the HDPE, we'd slide into a perfect place, just as the clock ran out, we hit to too late once, and the tip of our suction cup was off the edge, just barely being out of 25 points, it was quite close.