pic: 'I' drivetrain concept

[BotDesigner]

Originally Posted by RyanCahoon

Have you considered the loss of traction you're going to get by only driving one of the wheels in the primary drive orientation? At best, the robot's weight will be distributed between the single primary wheel (whether omni or plaction) and two of the side omni wheels. This will reduce the amount of force you can apply before the wheels start slipping, meaning you won't accelerate (or push, if that was a consideration) as well as a drive system where all wheels are driven

I am not sure if what I am thinking is a very good approach but it would seem that by using a high-speed/low-torque gear ratio we would be able to somewhat get around this issue. The high speed would allow us to move quickly even though a percentage of our speed would be lost to slippage while at the same time our reduced traction would allow us to use less torque without a stall. How does the gear ratio of approximately 4:1 for the plaction wheel and 2.81:1 for the omni wheel sound using for using with 3 CIMs? If these are ridiculously low (I am pretty sure they are) we could do something more on the level of 5.95:1 for the plaction and 4:1 for the Omni.