Defense: Pushing and Blocking

[d.courtney]

Originally Posted by Nuttyman54

well what is considered "average pushing power"? i think a lot of teams (including mine) overestimate the amount of actual power their drivetrain has, and that is responsible for the statistic

would winning a pushing match against the year's before, which happened to be unbeatable in puching matches overestimating... what I am getting at is test on how well it does against previous years (unless you are a rookie team) it will give you a general idea of greatness

[Nuttyman54]

Originally Posted by d.courtney

would winning a pushing match against the year's before, which happened to be unbeatable in puching matches overestimating... what I am getting at is test on how well it does against previous years (unless you are a rookie team) it will give you a general idea of greatness

Excellent standard. unless the challenger has a really weak drivetrain, you should be able to get a reasonable idea of how good it is.

[RogerR]

with the profusion of high traction wheels and two speed transmissions, i expect that there's a pretty good chance that the opponent's robot will have the same (if not better) pushing force as yours. i think whats going to make or break teams both offensively and defensively will be their machines' maneuverability.

[Cody Carey]

You know what they say... “The best defense is a good offense”

[Faith]

Originally Posted by Cody C

You know what they say... “The best defense is a good offense”

That is what I was going to say..

[Mike Norton]

How can a majority of the teams have a transmission with above-average pushing power?

I have to say being in this for over 12 years we know what it takes to have a strong robot. And yes we have a strong robot.

What teams fail to realize is if you are going to push other robots around you better have a strong base to be able to take the hits. And a robot that will not break on you. I have seen so many robots that show up and will make one match and then break so badly they are not able to do what they think they could do.

another thing is yes you might have a good pushing robot but if someone know how to stop your power what then. there are so many ways to stop a strong robot. But unless you have had a lot of time and know the past you will be a robot with a lot of power but will not be able to use it wisely


Mike

[phrontist]

Verdomme! Almost everyone is going to have the same amount of defensive ability, techincally speaking. I can assess the defensive capability of your robot with two questions:

1) What is the net power rating of all of your drive motors?
2) What is your lowest gear ratio?

That's all folks! After that it really comes down to driver skill, the range of which is fairly minimal in my experience. So most of the time, robots will be at a stalemate defensively, or it will be a complete shutout.

The game will be decided by your offensive capability.

[RogerR]

Originally Posted by phrontist

Verdomme! Almost everyone is going to have the same amount of defensive ability, techincally speaking. I can assess the defensive capability of your robot with two questions:

1) What is the net power rating of all of your drive motors?
2) What is your lowest gear ratio?

That's all folks! After that it really comes down to driver skill, the range of which is fairly minimal in my experience. So most of the time, robots will be at a stalemate defensively, or it will be a complete shutout.

The game will be decided by your offensive capability.

i think you're over simplifying it a bit. no matter how much power your motors are putting out, or how low you gear them, if you have an 80 lb robot running two wheel drive on slick skyway caster wheels, then odds are they won't be winning many pushing contests. a few additional important questions might be:

3) what is the coef. of friction of your drive wheels?
4) what percentage of your wheels are driven?
5) how much does your robot weigh?