Direct Drive Four Motor System

[Veselin Kolev]

Originally Posted by sanddrag

Now, as for the credibility of Holtzman's post, I remind you that it comes from someone that chose to buy a gearbox instead of building one. Not that their's anything wrong with that; it is a quite strategic decision. However, it does make for an interesting conversation point in the sense that I don't think buying a gearbox as opposed to building one provides anything to brag about. This is where our two teams differ. We have a drivetrain that is worthy of bragging about whereas I believe they do not.

Sanddrag,
Although your team did pull of an interesting drive train, there are plenty of other teams that have as well. Many even more impressive than yours. I can always post about how wunderbar my drive trains are, and how awesome the teams are I have built them for are. For example, last year's drive train on 1072's robot was seen to push two opposing robots at the same time, in low gear. We had amazing traction and huge torque off 4 CIMS and six skyway wheels rethreaded with wedgetop, and each transmission was 8 pounds flat. Not too many people can pull that off. However, there was a time for discussing this drive train, and I took full advantage by posting pictures and talking about actual performance, not just saying "how good our drive train was" or "it never broke"

When bragging about a drive train, use numerical facts. 8 pounds. High/low speed, minimum pressure it took for shifting, torque it took to slip the wheels, etc. Make your post relevant to the discussion. Also, do not assume that just because you have 6 motors, you can outpush anyone. I have seen teams using 2 drills (a while ago) effectively bully a robot with 4 motors. Or six.

Although I personally find many areas where your drive train could see improvement, I am not here to diss your drive train. It worked fine. I am here, however, to "diss" how you constantly use your one Hexamax drive train example to justify how six motors two speeds is the way to go, and how people that use any other system (like #35 chain) are doing something wrong. This shows to me that you may be a little narrow-minded, not willing to try other things, things you may think are unorthodox. While I have never used #35 chain for drive train, I have used direct gearing to the wheels, and plenty of other things you may think hideous.

As for influencing other teams, you may be giving teams a false impression of your drive train by always bragging about it. True, you have the right to. But should you? Not everyone else brags about their drive trains, I don't. Because I know that my drive trains are only good for a very select few teams, and they will make their own decisions about what to make. You don't need to always tell people how good your drive train is. For the people that saw it in action, let THEM chose if it worked well or not. And let THEM decide if they want to base their designs on yours. Pounding it into our heads isn't going to help is, it may mislead us.

We aren't trying to compete for who's drive train is copied by rookie teams the most. It is a bad idea to think your drive train is so good it can apply to anyone. As you see, the kit drive train is very generalized, and was made by engineers to serve the purpose of a drive train anyone can use. I do not think "sanddrag's hexamax" can be compared to the kit, nor can it be advertised like the kit. Your drive train worked well for you. It would not work well for anyone who tried it. The kit was designed to work well for anyone. I can always say my swerve drive from my sophomore year in high school was good. But I think it sucked, it was a terrible design and I made a million improvements during the past few years. It would be a disaster for some teams to try it.

My point is, we can do other people on Chiefdelphi forums some courtesy and DISCUSS our drive trains, not brag about them. We can not post things we have posted in dozens of other threads. We can at least admit to ourselves that our own designs arent perfect, simply because we can always improve on them. We can humble ourselves and not think we have made the ultimate, full proof drive train. Because remember, we may be wrong about some of the things we say here on Chiefdelphi. #25 chain has been known to break, 2 speed transmissions are not always so great, and 6 motor 2 speed gearboxes are not so impressive when they weigh 12 pounds, because they have been known to weigh 8. Just look at my drive train for team 100. You don't see me bragging about how amazing my six motor drive is, do you? Anyway... we should all just be humble, courteous, and act like gentlemen (or ladies) on these forums, and not fill it with yakking about who's drive train is better. My two cents.