pic: AIR Strike 78 2012

[Rick]

Originally Posted by Nathan Streeter

...used a similar looking material on their kop wheels to acquire the trackballs in 2008...

It looks like your entire upper assembly (loader and shooter) is on a turret... do you mind if I ask what the reasoning behind that decision was?

...I'm quite curious about your shooter and drive motors, your drive wheels, how you handle the wiring for the upper assembly, and your seemingly sheet metal outer frame (new for you guys, if I recall correctly).

To answer some questions:

Like all teams with wheeled shooters, the shooting distance will be dependent on the balls at the event.
The front bumpers are 8 inches long and are not beveled. The angle of the shot and tightness of the fabric may make the bumper appear as though it is beveled. The plywood and pool noodle are both cut to 8”.

The shooter wheels are standard rubber 8” AM wheels. The coloring you see on them is due to some rather extensive testing and our workspace (Navy warehouse – not the cleanest spot). Didn’t have time to clean before the glamour shot…
We decided to rotate the feed and the turret together to ensure the ball was consistently hitting the shooter wheels the same way on every shot. Also, if for some reason the turntable bearings broke (including our spares), or we needed to remove the turret feature due to weight, the turret could be mounted directly to the chassis.

The turret wiring is attached to the turret with powerpole connectors. This allow for a quick disconnect if needed. All wiring to the camera, LEDs, shooter motors runs through conduit on the sides of the turret.

The non kit chassis is a new endeavor for us. We received a CNC machine this fall and incorporated it into our workshop. If you look closely, you can see the weight reduction in the chassis, bridge device, and turret. The chassis plates are ¼” aluminum held together with extrude aluminum. It was nice being able to have a consistent hole pattern on all our machined parts.

The drive wheels are four 8” pneumatic wheels and two AM 8” plastic wheels. The plastic wheels are there to aid with turning. For the last 3 years, we have had this type of wheel in the back of the drive train with great success.

Nathan, stop by the pit and say hi. Our student pit crew can give you a tour of the machine. I will be by the 1519 pit to check out your machine as well.

[Lil' Lavery]

Awesome work. Can't wait to to see what it can do on the field. Wish I could convince NAVSSES to let us use a warehouse.


How well does loading from the floor work when your turret/tower isn't at a right angle compared to your loader?

[mott]

About how many driving hours have you been able to put on that machine?

That design (with the turret at the bottom of the tower) was exactly what we were going to do originally until we realized that we needed to support the top of our tower to prevent it from snapping off at the frame/turret during rough driving/collisions/bump crossings/etc. The weight of that shooting head (especially with 2 CIMs up there) will induce incredible forces on the base of your tower during rough play.

Great looking machine though for sure!

Congrats.

[TD78]

Our NAVSEA sponsor graciously pays the rent on our warehouse workspace. We have enough space for our workshop, 1 FRC team, 3 VEX teams, and 2 FTC teams. They were also instrumental in getting us a (new) CNC machine...a 1995 Wells-Index. Taken some time to learn how to use...it's been a fun learning experience.

I believe the turret is coded to revert back to center in order to pick up.

We have some driving time on the lazy susan bearing, but it was never beaten up like it could at a competition. It's a rather beefy bearing...got it through McMaster. We'll see!

[BrendanB]

Very elegant robot 78! Can't wait to see this in a few days!