Extendable Arm/Hanger Subsystem? What works best?

[Kevin Leonard]

A few things to the OP first/;
A climber is not necessary to be good this year. There will be dozens of regionals won without a single climber on the winning alliance.
2) Both an offensive strategy up front shooting boulders and a strategy that revolves around being a good breacher that scores low goals and feeds balls can be successful at a regional level.

Now if you still want to climb, there are some references to look at in 2010 and 2013. Additionally, if you skip the low bar, the challenge of climbing becomes much, much easier.

The challenge of climbing is two things:
1) reaching the bar, and
2) pulling your robot up

Reaching the bar can be done in a bunch of ways, including arms and elevators, some of which can be spring-loaded upwards for simplicity's sake.

Pulling your robot up can be done in a few ways, but I think the simplest is to have a strap with a hook attached that you winch down to your robot.

Something to look up:
3467 2013 climbed the pyramid by having their arm automatically spring up with torsion springs, then winching it back down with a strap.