I have seen the video and heard the tails about the walk from the pits to the playing field in Atlanta and the cart we used for regionals just won’t do.
We are thinking about a new cart just for nationals, one with toolbox and space for extra batteries and spare parts.
From your past experience is it a problem in having a wide cart? We would love to be able to carry our robot width-wise and with the bumpers that’s almost four feet.
Would this work with the traffic flow at the championship or should we strive for something thinner? Could we do at least 36” wide?
Technically, according to section 3.3.6 of the rules all carts should fit through a 30" door. Ours is just over 28" wide. Whether or not anyone is going to hold you to the 30" door limit or even if there are any 30" doors in Atlanta that you must go through I don’t know.
If i remember correctly you have to go through a couple of door frames. I forget how wide they are. I remember are biggest problem was are cart was to tall so with the robot on top it wouldn’t make it under the door frame and we always had to angle it down and it was a pain. I also remember that the way we walked you are walking up and down inclines, so make something that is able to be pushed easily
The trip between the pits and the fields is very spacious. You would have no problem carting your robot widthwise. That’s what we did the entire time.
We have a tiny cart with four universal castors. It’s nothing fancy but it does it’s job very well. It makes it easy to get through tight doorways if we need to. The only problem that would show up from carting the robot widthwise is getting past robots in one section of the hike between the field and pits. Teams would randomly stop and get in the way.
Okay, I have a questions about the carts in general… I am very aware that the carts are supposed to fit through 30" doors, but… What about the robots? The width of most robots is probably 28", and then half of them have bumpers that extends the total width of the robot outside that 30" door frame. So people have, if I remember right, a robot that can be 36" wide that should fit through a 30" door.
Yep, you are correct Ryan. Thanks for pointing that out. I guess now that this little mistake on FIRST’s part has been brought to light we can expect Update #19 on Friday to change the maximum robot size to 22" in the middle of the competition season. :rolleyes: (I hope you can detect the sarcastic tone here.)
Wouldnt we all love that, I believe from the past 5 years i have been in first,most arenas that have double hinge doors or larger, they end up taking out the middle frame in the main traffic areas, so ideally from the pit to the field, shouldnt be a problem, i would just make sure you are deffinitely under the 36"
At around second 13 there are a bunch of yellow stripes on the floor, like I would expect to see on the edge of stairs. Will teams have to transport their robot over stairs? I don’t really want to have to design a cart modeled on Dean’s wheelchair.
The yellow stripes mark roll up loading dock doors along the wall, if I remember correctly. As Billfred noted, the route does not contain any steps, but there are a couple of ramps.
Might I suggest you a cart like 648’s? I don’t have any pictures but it has a scissors lift that raises and lowers the robot to better working conditions. The scissors lift is drill operated and there is sufficiant space under the platform for all of our batteries, an emergency tube inflator, and a toolbox, on the front where the handle is is a platform for the controller. It’s nice, some people at MWR are oogling over it. We’ve had it since the 2003 season. And I think it is 28" or so wide. It fits through most doors.
ah yes…the cart at Atlanta…fond memories of fruitlessly spending half an hour searching walmart (after spending a longer time finding it) and then finding Home Depot just before it closed and buying their last furniture dolly…
The furniture dolly actually works pretty well, and you can test autonomous with it safely.
If you don’t want to ship your cart down there you could always pick one up from Home Depot in Atlanta. 1547 didn’t ship anything down to Atlanta last year and we just went to HD and picked one up. Worked perfectly!! (even during the running trips to the field so we wouldn’t miss our match ;))
Before the 30" rule, we built our cart to go through a 36" door. That means, bacuase of the door stops, your cart shouldn’t be any wider than 34". Most building codes require at least a 36 inch door for safety reasons. Doors in Atlanta sometimes have a divider jamb between double doors, so getting through easily if you make it larger than 34 inches will be a problem. Make your cart accommodate the robot lengthwise for transporting, and can also hold the robot sideways in the pit, if that works better for you. Be certain you design in supports that will keep the robot off a platform, so you can test the systems while in the pit. We find that we have more room if we keep the robot lengthwise in the pit. Our cart has a scissors lift to change working height, drawers for tools, storage for extra batteries, and a work light that works off the 12VDC on-board battery supply. If you have been to Granite State, New Jersey, UTC or Chesapeake Regionals, you’ve probably seen it - it’s bright yellow with a large smiley face.
We built a really nice cart out of wood IN the parking garage outside of our hotel overnight on wednesday…it worked out nicely. We even painted it, and all we needed was a reciprocating saw and a drill…THANK YOU DEWALT!
Before the 30" rule, we built our cart to go through a 36" door. That means, bacuase of the door stops, your cart shouldn’t be any wider than 34". Most building codes require at least a 36 inch door for safety reasons. Doors in Atlanta sometimes have a divider jamb between double doors, so getting through easily if you make it larger than 34 inches will be a problem. Make your cart accommodate the robot lengthwise for transporting, and can also hold the robot sideways in the pit, if that works better for you. Be certain you design in supports that will keep the robot off a platform, so you can test the systems while in the pit. We find that we have more room if we keep the robot lengthwise in the pit. Our cart has a scissors lift to change working height, drawers for tools, storage for extra batteries, and a work light that works off the 12VDC on-board battery supply. If you have been to Granite State, New Jersey, UTC or Chesapeake Regionals, you’ve probably seen it - it’s bright yellow with a large smiley face.