4" vs. 6" vs. 8" wheels. Advantages?

[thefro526]

Originally Posted by Kevin Sevcik

I'll pluralize that anecdote. 57 went with 4 slicks at our first Lunacy regional and driving performance was lackluster. I argued loudly that just doubling up the wheels was completely pointless, physics! etc. But we had a little weight and a lotta desperation, so we gave it a shot. I subsequently had to eat my words when 8 wheels DID perform better than 4. I still have no adequate explanation for it.

The only explanation I can come up with is that the Regolith was not "Rigid".

In an ideal world, the Regolith would not have depressed or deformed at all when weight was put upon it, but at every competition I went to and drove it did. We spent build season practicing on field where the FRP Regolith was placed directly over a tile floor and found minimal if any difference between the number of wheels and traction - and the floor felt much more slippery than any Regional Field or The Curie Championship Field. I'd venture to say that the Deformation of the Regolith Playing Surface due to the Carpet Underneath was probably the cause for the strange friction differences - though not knowing enough about the physics behind it I can't really give a conclusive answer.

There was also the "breaking in" effect that I still don't completely understand. It seemed that Fresh Fields were more slippery than a field that had about 40 or so matches played on it. I'm not sure if the coating of the FRP began to break down dude to the heat of wheels spinning over it or if there was some other thing at play here.

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On the topic of the original post, We prefer to use 6" wheels when the game allows. We've found that 6" wheels are a nice compromise between the Small-Low COG benefits of a 4" wheel and the Higher Speed and Obstacle climbing abilities of 8" wheels.