I see from a match with three everybot passive climbers that no-one with this design is attempting a climb. Do they work?
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Both yes and no! I have not seen it work without some alteration. However we used a cut down version at Pine Tree, that worked well for the most part.
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It works but it is also very reliant on COG of your robot as well as having a good driver to drive it properly/with practice as well as the referee being able to tell its off the ground
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I’ve seen several instances where the robot finished a match resting with its rear bumper on the carpet, front end in the air, wheels off carpet, and climber arms resting on the mid rung. A high speed dash under the low rung generally leads to the above result.
In an even worse scenario, the raised front end of the Everybot sometimes spoils an alliance partner’s previous climb to the high or traversal rung.
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The everybot climb is… finicky. Get it right, you’re good every time. Get it wrong, crapshoot. Height, CG, and approach all need to work.
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At events I have been to so far, referees have used the standard “if it swings, it is hanging.” You’re right it is very hard to tell for sure.
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My experience this past weekend with alliance partners that used the 2022 everybot climber design was not a positive one. We at least in one case had a partner that slammed their robot into the low bar to then wedge their robot at a 45 degree angle upwards into the bottom of our robot almost invalidating our climb had it not been for somehow our robot twisting half-off the bar to one side.
Seems like there is some fundamental misunderstanding about how it should work from the teams that use it and where the COG of the robot needs to be for it to work properly.
If you wanted a simple climber this year that was more reliable I would recommend using the 2020 Everybot climber. We actually had an alliance playoff partner that did use that concept and it was a much better/reliable choice.
6 Likes
In our 14 matches it worked 13 times. The one time it didn’t work was driver error. As others mentioned, for it to work you need to be driving at just the right speed. We have a switch on our driver’s controller that changes the full stick travel speed from full speed to the speed needed for successful climbing. If you get in a bit of a hurry and forget to flip the switch… bad things happen.
To do it right, you need to practice. Without practice it’s likely to fail.
When done right, it’s hard to conceive of a faster climb for as minimal an investment in design time and fabrication resources. We think of it as either 4 or 6 free points at the end of a match.
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I’d go as far as to say teams with an everybot should probably work on converting their climber to a 2020 everybot climber. We have 2 2020 everybot climbers on our bot and while we weren’t the most consistent climber at our first event due to other things, it was much more manageable.
Feels like more teams should be trying to use the low rung side when partners are hanging, which I haven’t seen even attempted much. Otherwise there’s a high risk for running into a robot going for a high or more climb.
2 Likes
Our was reasonably successful in competition. I think it may have missed once or twice when climb was attempted? But it did require some fine adjustment once we were on the competition field. Basically, we wrapped a bunch of tape around the indent in the climb hook so that it would definitely be swinging. We only tried mid rung. We’ve never attempted low rung hang.
We have two weeks until our next event, and may still convert to a powered climb, but it isn’t our top priority at the moment. Getting the weighting right was important. We’d hung the robot a few times from our rung in our shop, but our drivers were actually driving it for the first time during practice matches on Thursday afternoon for Week 2. Given that, we were pretty happy with it.
Edited to add in a couple videos from Electric City. Not the greatest angle, but can see how the climb was lined up. Note we did not wait until the last moment to climb. In one we climb before other partners, in one we climb after an alliance partner is on traversal.
Qual 35: https://youtu.be/rSaHb9nm-tY?t=123
Qual 62: https://youtu.be/hGkst1SM2Nw?t=115
We chose the everybot for our robot in the spirit of simplicity, but I think we were able to get aboard about half of our matches in OKC this weekend. Of 43 teams, I think we were fifth-worst climb after Friday. But still ranked in teens due to shooting.
First, I’ll volunteer that our parts were sawed from UHMW with the full sized -CAD glued to it-- our precision can’t be that good. But we tested in our shop for a month. Climbed easily every time at home. We did intentionally make changes to the design.
The first problem we had is our people reduced the size of the bump to make it go on at a slower speed. Fine at home, but two times we were knocked off the bar after successful climbing, sliding back due to our own alliance mates. Robots are swinging and it’s pretty messy under there. At OKC we added a rubber-band latch to remedy this.
Also note, originally we built from plywood… broken in first week of home testing. I don’t recommend plywood for this.
Another time, bar of field was notably lower on right or left…one side wheels hanging, the other not. I saw that 6424 devised an adjustable height arm. You need to check your height before practice matches start.
Another time, arm sprung up during teleop…hard to get in hanger with up-arm. Made spring tighter.
Other times, other robots in the way…we waited too long to get in. Another time, other robots on floor touching us made climb not count.
Also getting six points in climb might get you picked for an alliance, but the winning alliance will have real climbers. I’d rather design for a win.
The cg of your bot will either work for the high side or for the low side. Don’t think many bots will work with both sides.
I wouldn’t pick this again. Working on new design tonight for next week. Not sure if can get ready.
1 Like
Friday was a disappointing 2 out of 6 attempts.
- We didn’t have the correct upright height and it was hitting
- The spring wasn’t tight enough and the hook rebounded once.
- One high climber alliance member taking middle of bar and only going mid.
- One an alliance member was touching us on ground and didn’t count.
Saturday was much better 5 out of 6 attempts.
- The miss was purely misaligned alliance member (low + mid) that were blocking access.
Altogether we contributed only 42 points of the 358 scored in our matches for climbs, or ~12%. Per match that is 3.5 pts / 30pts scored.
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Yes, it works when built onto a complete Everybot and tested before your first match. We’re not lying to you; it really does work on our Everybot on our hangars, and we’ve seen plenty of implementations that seem to work on the real fields. We cannot guarantee it will work when not built according to the plans. If you only have the resources to build the cargo manipulator or the climber, build the cargo manipulator. It has much more strategic value for this game.
You may want to verify that the hangar on the real competition field is set up at the same height as the one you’ve tested on, whether that be at home or on the practice field at the tournament. Be sure to account for the thickness of the floor protector that ends under the low rung. Our experience at FIT Channelview was that the height of the rungs aligned pretty much perfectly with those listed in the game manual.
That being said, I am disappointed in the inconsistency of teams’ implementations of the design. Clearly it takes a little more precision than we should be expecting teams to be able to pull off. This will be a significant data point used when designing the 2023 Everybot and beyond. The 2020 Everybot climber design is a great option for this year too if you have more that $1000 to build your robot. We could not fit another motor, controller, and gearbox into the limited budget.
15 Likes
There were several Everybots and a few simple bots with the Everybot climber at the Channelview event. Quite a few of them were adding ballast to adjust their CG. All of those got lectured by the LRI to improve the mounting arrangements so that they weren’t just using tape and/or zipties. I didn’t watch all the matches but in the ones I did watch, they generally worked. When they didn’t work, it was usually due to insufficient time or incorrect alignment. There was even a match where a bot hung on the wrong side of the field…
There was also a bot with a climber that was apparently inspired by the Everybot climber from a previous year (2020?). It had a piece of PVC pipe that would telescope out of a piece of 2x1 aluminum tube. A small constant force spring from the KOP was used to extend it.
2 Likes
From what I saw in week one, most teams, were not successful with Everybot climbers. As stated by others the weight balance of the robot is a critical factor that many teams did not consider. I also think the material used had an effect as well. Plywood versions did not seem to work well (possible friction issue) but perhaps polycarbonate or UHMW would solve this.
I am reminded that “copying without understanding often leads to disappointment”. The teams copying the Everybot design should really be studying the documentation for it to gain a thorough understanding of what the design decisions were and why the decisions were made the way they were. This is especially true when copying only a part of the Everybot design.
For perspective, in my day job, I never copy a piece of circuitry without a thorough review and evaluation to ensure it will work correctly in my new application. Sometimes, I can use the design as is. Sometimes, I have to make adjustments. Sometimes, I have to correct design mistakes or weaknesses. Sometimes, I can’t copy it and design something from scratch.
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If you’re still able to edit, I’d encourage taking a look at this sentence as one to potentially reword.
The following sentence suggests you’re aware it’s not a trivial implementation and that makes me believe the quoted sentence is more disappointment that the design is problematic specifically for the teams it was designed to help. As written, it reads like you’re disappointed in the teams themselves for their collective inconsistent implementation.
5 Likes
This applies to more than just Everybot climbers
We had it work for about 7 matches, I think we adjusted our speeds after that and we could no longer get on the bar, we also added weight, but tried to keep it balanced.