Drive Base Help

[GeeTwo]

Originally Posted by messer5740

We used an angle grinder to cut off about an inch off of the bottom of the front of our chassis and made an angle so that when we would hit an obstacle it would pop our bot up..

Originally Posted by Billfred

The Team Cockamamie Robot in 3 Days build also ran an open front and saw the same frame bending you describe..

AndyMark also sells optional upgrades for the for the AM14U2/3: a wedge plate to solve this issue, and a cross plate to help with an open front/rear. One wedge plate adds close to 3" of length to the chassis length without increasing the wheelbase, but it does help get over the category B and D defenses. I can't vouch for the cross plate.

[OccamzRazor]

Originally Posted by GeeTwo

AndyMark also sells optional upgrades for the for the AM14U2/3: a wedge plate to solve this issue, and a cross plate to help with an open front/rear. One wedge plate adds close to 3" of length to the chassis length without increasing the wheelbase, but it does help get over the category B and D defenses. I can't vouch for the cross plate.

Plus they also make it easy to run the AM churro (http://www.andymark.com/product-p/am-churro.htm) in between the gear boxes to stop the sagging from happening as much. Tap the ends of each rod and shove some 1/4-20 bolts in from the gearbox side. Most of the teams that had these gearbox sagging issues I noticed had nothing in between their gearboxes. Even the weight of 3 CIM motors can cause that sagging and that alone can shred a gearbox from alignment issues.

See the attached photo. Every team should be supporting their gearboxes in some way because it will also stiffen your frame up.

[messer5740]

Originally Posted by GeeTwo

AndyMark also sells optional upgrades for the for the AM14U2/3: a wedge plate to solve this issue, and a cross plate to help with an open front/rear. One wedge plate adds close to 3" of length to the chassis length without increasing the wheelbase, but it does help get over the category B and D defenses. I can't vouch for the cross plate.

They sold wedge plates?!?!?!

[Knufire]

Originally Posted by messer5740

They sold wedge plates?!?!?!

They came out later during build season.

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by messer5740

They sold wedge plates?!?!?!

Posted on AndyMark's YouTube January 15th, after Kickoff (but in Week 1 of build season).

(scribbles notes on this for next year)

[messer5740]

Originally Posted by Billfred

Posted on AndyMark's YouTube January 15th, after Kickoff (but in Week 1 of build season).

(scribbles notes on this for next year)

Ah I always looked in the drive base category to look for upgrades. I didn't see the upgrades until AFTER our competitions were over.