Swerve Drive

[CJmango]

Originally Posted by Team1710

I thought there needs to be just enough traction to allow the turning of the wheels. High traction wheels would just rip to shreds with that kind of turning.

In crab you don't turn the wheels much more harsly than you do with car steering, and you definitely don't drag them sideways. With tank steer the wheels actually have to skid horizontally in order for the bot to turn. With crab, you rotate the wheels in place, so where the friction gets you is torsion on the tread in contact with the ground. This is no different than front wheel steering and it's not a ton if you have regular wheels. If you go to high-traction wheels you just have to make sure you're moving at least a tiny bit when you turn large angles or you could run the rist of tearing tread just like you can tear your car tires if you turn the steering wheel too much when the car isn't moving.

There really is no reason to shy away from high traction tires. The robot I mentioned in my prior post had 4 wheel crab and could out pull any robot at the championship that year, I'm betting even the Beaty walker.