Designing a climbing mechanism for 2013... a humbling experience

[Leav]

Hi everyone,

Just needed a place to vent a bit really... I've always thought of myself as a creative and resourceful mechanical engineer, but i've got to admit: this year's climbing challenge has got me stumped so far.

I usually have at least an idea for how the challenge can be accomplished, but the 30 point climb has eluded me thus far.

I'd love to hear from other technical people from the first community: has anyone managed to come up with a climbing concept that you would consider simple and/or robust?

I have no interest in knowing what the idea is (I'd like to solve the puzzle on my own, with the team), just to know either way if people feel like they have found a simple solution or not.

I am constantly thinking of the 2010 climbing challenge where I completely missed the "simple" grab&twist solution, and can't shake the feeling that I'm missing a similar one here.

Good luck and may the force be with you.

-Leav

[pfreivald]

Yup!

We've got a climbing idea that should be stable all the way up. The devil is in the details, of course, and we're still very much hashing those out, but we're cautiously optimistic that we've anticipated and planned around all of the hazards/challenges (including requisite force, consistent balance, current demands, sudden power loss, etc, etc.)

I'm quite impressed by the game this year, especially the climbing. A level one climb should be achievable by every team (if they plan for it -- a level one climb is much harder if your robot is too tall!) A level two climb is significantly harder than a level one climb, but well within the achievable range for most FRC teams. A level three climb is more difficult still.

But yeah, it's hard.

[Jared Russell]

For challenges like this, you think of 300 overcomplicated solutions before you find the "simplicity on the other side of complexity" (to quote Oliver Wendell Holmes).

We have not discovered a "so simple every rookie should do it" answer to the 30 point hang, but we have found methods that we believe are simple and robust within our team's capabilities.

[danopia]

Originally Posted by Leav

I am constantly thinking of the 2010 climbing challenge where I completely missed the "simple" grab&twist solution

You're starting to give me another idea, and I'm pretty sure that I already had a workable one to begin with

[Alan Anderson]

I hit on a simple climber design a couple of days ago. Making a robot that climbs for 30 points looks easy.

Combining that climber design with other mechanisms for handling discs looks somewhat less easy.

[FrankJ]

A fall from zone 3 will pretty much end your robots day. I don't really see the risk/reward as worth it. It will be interesting to see somebodies creative solution to this.

For Sure, I feel your pain. Every feasible idea has had a road block at this point. We have some reasonable ideas involving gripping but are unsure if damaging paint would be a foul. Most of the ideas we have had might be relatively simple for some veteran teams, but multiple moving arms possibly involving encoders and limit switches might not be where we are at this year. Also in a post competitve life, throwing the frisbee will be cool for demo's and such, the climber will never be seen again.

[holygrail]

We came up with an inside climb that looks doable and stable, but ultimately decided that it would take up so much space that we wouldn't be able to shoot effectively and climb. I'd be interested in hearing if anyone has a small footprint climber that can get 20 points or more safely.

[rinim324]

Our team has thought of several overcomplicated designs and now we have found the simplest design possible we could think of for climbing to the top. We took insiration from some lifter designs from the 2004 and 2010 games. It will be easy for us to make a climbing robot but we will most likely not be adding any shooter or pickup mechanism for frisbies.

[ttldomination]

I don't think you're alone in your frustration.

I know some teams have the option to simply go for the 10 point hang. If you are confident in your abilities to run and gun, then the 10 point hang can be done in a matter of seconds. Why overcomplicate the process?

My team has 2-3 designs, none of which make me sleep easier at night. So, when we're facing this, the only thing to do is to go down these paths and see what the designs yield.

We're hoping that we'll yield nice, quick solutions, but for now, all we can do is hope.

- Sunny G.

[swwrobotics]

Originally Posted by Leav

I am constantly thinking of the 2010 climbing challenge where I completely missed the "simple" grab&twist solution, and can't shake the feeling that I'm missing a similar one here.

Good luck and may the force be with you.

-Leav

Sorry, but what was the simple grab and twist solution in 2010? My first year was part of the 2011 season so I was just a little curious.

Also, my team has come up with an idea, but early prototyping has shown that balance is pretty important when climbing, otherwise the robot cannot reach to the next level. We'd also like a simpler design than we have now just because we see a lot of things that can already go wrong with our current design.

[danopia]

For those of you that have ideas for a 30-point climb, would your robot be able to scale to a pyramid of, say, 10 levels without nontrivial changes? Ignore your robot hanging 30 feet in the air.

It seems like some postings I've seen would because it's repetitive, and others have like a full dance routine going on that lands perfectly on top and wouldn't work for any other pyramid.

[Chris is me]

We think we're onto something, but in order to make an easy to use, simple climber there are a lot of compromises that might have to be made in other parts of the robot. Depends how our prototypes go.

[Siri]

Originally Posted by swwrobotics

Sorry, but what was the simple grab and twist solution in 2010? My first year was part of the 2011 season so I was just a little curious.

Also, my team has come up with an idea, but early prototyping has shown that balance is pretty important when climbing, otherwise the robot cannot reach to the next level. We'd also like a simpler design than we have now just because we see a lot of things that can already go wrong with our current design.

Basically this

We think we have one or two 30 pointers we could handle, but we're still in beta prototyping. And as to danopia's question, yes, it could, notwithstanding the height and a few other logistics (I didn't do any power/battery calculations for 10 levels).

[James1902]

Originally Posted by swwrobotics

Sorry, but what was the simple grab and twist solution in 2010? My first year was part of the 2011 season so I was just a little curious.

Also, my team has come up with an idea, but early prototyping has shown that balance is pretty important when climbing, otherwise the robot cannot reach to the next level. We'd also like a simpler design than we have now just because we see a lot of things that can already go wrong with our current design.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/35099

Instead of reaching for the high horizantal bar, many teams opted to grab onto the vertical pole of the tower.

We've considered using this meathod this year but including an arm on both ends so the robot could 'somersault' up the pyramid.