pic: Top Gun Team 1294 Teaser

[Rick TYler]

Originally Posted by Elgin Clock

How many balls can fit in there at one time?

And.. what is driving the balls? Is that foam noodle material I see? (the yellow)

Robotaddict is my son. He designed it and I helped him build it.

The loader holds seven balls internally. He wants to use a sensor (TBD) to pulse the single feeder motor just enough to load one ball to the shooter each time the firing button (TBD) is pressed. Behind the loader will be a narrow (one ball thick) hopper which will hold another 8-10 balls fed by a one-ball-thick scooper across the back of the bot. We are big on one-ball-thick designs since we know that any other configuration would lead easily to ball jams of squishy poof balls.

Making rollers out of thin-walled 3/4-inch aluminum inserted into pool noodles was my contribution to the design. They are ultralight, cheap, and strong enough. The 1/4-inch steel axle pins in the ends are heavier than the whole rest of the roller. We might wrap the noodles with a rubber surface (something like a bicycle innertube slit open and wrapped around it) to improve grip.

Cheap and effective -- two words that should be the FIRST slogan.