pic: 195 Chassis

[Tom Bottiglieri]

loading photo ...

[Joe Matt]

Is that powder coated? What is the frame made of?

[Jeff Rodriguez]

PLYWOOD!

[tiffany34990]

interesting ..

how heavy is it??? and how deep is it inside??

[Tom Bottiglieri]

This chassis is made of 9 ply baltic birch plywood.

It was primed twice, painted, *sparkalized* (sorry im not sure on the term), and given a clear coat by a local auto body shop sponsor.

It weighs ~19 pounds, and is ~6 inches deep.

[JakeGallagher]

Oooh...purdy. How strong is that plywood? Sorry, I'm not too up on plywood strength, I don't use it too much.

[Alex Cormier]

thats one sweet bot! what are you doing tank tracks?

[Max Lobovsky]

I don't know about birch, specifically, but good woods are generally stiffer and stronger per weight than aluminum. The problem is that its hard to get efficient shapes out of wood, so it loses its strength advantage. If it was possible to make thin wall tubing out of wood, there would be a whole lot more high performance stuff made out of it.

[Tom Bottiglieri]

Originally Posted by Pit Bull 1126

thats one sweet bot! what are you doing tank tracks?

Yup.

Should look something like this http://www.team195.com/gallery/displ...?album=3&pos=9

Thats our programming practice bot ('03), by the way.

[Alex Cormier]

sweet, same design for the last few years?

[Tom Bottiglieri]

Originally Posted by Pit Bull 1126

sweet, same design for the last few years?

We have been using this tank tread/wood chassis for a few years now, and it has never let us down. We opt to keep it for a few reasons.

1) Plywood is much cheaper and easier to work with than aluminum. We can assemble the entire chassis in one day on readily available machines. We also like the plywood because we have tested it to be not only lighter, but stronger than its aluminum counter part.

2) Why reinvent the wheel? This design is proven, and we know we can depend on it to work again. Plus, every year we can tweak the design to bring it closer to perfection.

3) By knowing a general chassis and drive wheel design from the start, we have more time to focus on whatever armeture we want to put on.

[Jon K.]

Originally Posted by Tom Bottiglieri

We have been using this tank tread/wood chassis for a few years now, and it has never let us down. We opt to keep it for a few reasons.

1) Plywood is much cheaper and easier to work with than aluminum. We can assemble the entire chassis in one day on readily available machines. We also like the plywood because we have tested it to be not only lighter, but stronger than its aluminum counter part.

2) Why reinvent the wheel? This design is proven, and we know we can depend on it to work again. Plus, every year we can tweak the design to bring it closer to perfection.

3) By knowing a general chassis and drive wheel design from the start, we have more time to focus on whatever armeture we want to put on.

LONG LIVE THE PLYWOOD BOTS. RAGE also has been using plywood for about the past 7 or so years. We also use Baltic birch, and we have only ever had it break once, in 2003, but luckily a little wood glue fixes that, instead of tearing apart the whole bot.

This is basically our philosophy as well, we usually keep the same red plywood base design from year to year, allowing us time to work on our arm and programming.

[Sscamatt]

Our wood bot also cracked in 2003, all the pushing and shoving on the top of the ramp did it, Easily fixed though.

[Andy A.]

95 has used .5 Baltic plywood for several successful bots.

Not only does it have some great engineering properties, it looks down right classy!

-Andy A.

[Rocketboy]

WOW! I had no idea that plywood was so feasible when used correctly. I generally assumed that wood would splinter into shards when slamming into a robot with an 80/20 extrusion frame. I guess if it's worked before it should work again.

Plus it looks darn spiffy. GJ guys!