Robot orientation: Long or wide?

[Starke]

Originally Posted by Kim Masi

Last year, there were only a couple of robots that I could think of that went with the wide configuration. I think with this years game though, we will be seeing a lot more variety in the configuration.

This is a good poll, I was wondering the same thing.

Last year, 340 went with a wide robot, and we needed wheelie bars to get up the ramp seen here.

[dtengineering]

Umm... do omni directional drive trains count as wide or as long? I think you might be seeing a few of them this year, too.

Jason

[MrForbes]

It depends which way the wheels are oriented.

A "swerve drive" system has a variable orientation, but I believe all the other drive system designs have a wheel orientation that is fixed.

A "long" robot has the wheels parallel to the long frame axis. A "wide" robot has the wheels parallel to the short frame axis. See attatched sketch.

[Pavan Dave]

Did anybody think about a square chassis? I think that if you build your robot right that a square chassis would be ideal for maneuverability.

But if I had to choose I would make it long.


Pavan.

[Travis Hoffman]

Originally Posted by Tom Bottiglieri

This can be remedied easily (see: wheelie bar). What may be harder to fix is adding an extra joint to an arm in order to pick up from the floor or human loader because your robot isn't wide enough to hold a tube in it.

Wheelie bar = wedge?

[Paul Copioli]

All,

For what it's worth, if your robot is in the wide configuration then you will not fit on our robot lifter. Our lifter is compatible with a 28" wide robot plus the standard bumper depth for each side (so 28+ 2*bumper depth).

-Paul