Here’s a better side view picture of the intake:
The bottom of the roller just barely touches the ground when the intake rests on the bumpers. We plan to tune PID when we get everything wired up so we don’t know the optimal height above the ground. We also measured our extension limit and it is around 11.5’’ from the frame perimeter with the stationary brackets mounted 2.5’’ back from the frame perimeter.
We did some testing today of the over the bumper intake after mounting it to the robot.
Date: 1/31/2024
We installed a curved backplate to the intake to hold the game piece for the handoff.
Also, Krakens arrived so we began making further progress on the shooter and climber.
Today, we did more testing on our intake using the carpet, as well as tested it scoring into the Amp. We found that it works just as well on the carpet as it did on the table:
During our Amp testing, we found that we could eject the note into the Amp with good consistency - made around 80-90% of shots once we found the correct angle to hold the intake at.
Although we had some delays with the shooter, we are expecting to get that on soon and begin testing the full system.
Although our Krakens arrived, we are still waiting on the SDS adapter kits to come in so we cannot work on our drivetrain yet - hoping those come in soon but preparing to work around them for now.
What compression did you wind up with on the shooter?
We are using 1’’ of compression with Colson wheels and Krakens. We have not tested this yet but are hoping to get it done next week.
Date: 2/5/2024
We installed the shooter on the robot. We still have a few more supports to attach, but it should be ready to test once we get the electrical board done. Here are some photos of the shooter:
We are currently waiting on SDS conversion kits for the Krakens so we can attach them to the drive train. For the climber, one of the parts we need is backordered so we are currently 3-D printing the missing part until the one we ordered arrives. Hopefully we can start testing as soon as possible!
When did you order your Krakens? I’m trying to see if it’s possible to get them for this season if I haven’t ordered already. Great CAD work to adapt that Ri3D to swerve modules.
We ordered our Krakens the day it was released. According to WCP, if you order Krakens right now, they will not start shipping until late February. Thanks!
Thanks for the quick response. I was hoping for a miracle when I saw the product status on their page. Sorry we won’t see your bot at any district prelims. We’re Dalton then Carrollton.
Krakens + 1:1 gear ratio + 3 inch Colson wheels + 1 inch compression + 35% power = 100% Amp shooting…
…big post coming soon…
who even needs arms
2/7 Update
Mechanical:
Drivetrain: All Drivetrain motors have been taken off. We have received the Krakens we ordered, however we are waiting for the Kit, Adapter, 16T Drive Pinion Gear (MK4i) for Krakens to arrive in order to assemble the Drivetrain.
Intake: The first intake is completely done and has been mounted onto the robot. The limit switch came today so we created a custom bracket to mount it onto the intake. We tested it, and it works fine. We have X-carved the shooter plates to make a second intake however we are waiting on shafts to assemble it.
Climber: We are missing a part and it is scheduled to arrive Wednesday. Once that arrives we will immediately begin assembling the Climber.
Shooter: We finished the shooter and have mounted it on the robot. Based on the tests we did, we do not think we need to make any adjustments mechanically.
Programming:
Programming is going nicely. The shooter, climber, and swerve code have all been created. The code for the intake is slightly more complex due to our plans to automate a lot of the movement. However, we expect to finish it this week.
We also had to reformat the RoboRio and reprogram the Radio.
Electrical:
Electrical has connected the wires for the Krakens.
We are currently working on wiring the intake and shooter of the robot. A group of electrical members are also currently learning soldering from our mentor to better solder the connections on our robot.
Scouting:
We realized that this year scouting will be extremely important. You have to be able to know what autonomous plays your opponents have.
We are planning to use QRscout and are currently creating our custom forms. We plan on using two: one for stand scouting and one for pit scouting. We will be testing this with everyone this week.
Shipments:
We ordered two SuperCarts powered by Fabworks and are expecting them next week. This will give some of the newer members something to do.
We are also expecting our note shipment to arrive next week which will hopefully allow us to do more testing.
Testing:
After mounting the shooter, we were able to get a lot of testing done. Parts of all the tests we did have all been posted on our youtube channel and I will link it below as well. Here are the results and analysis from the tests:
The first series of tests we did was shooting into the speaker from different positions and using different speeds. We are currently using a top and bottom shooter powered by two independent Krakens. Also due to having only one note on-hand, if a test showed something in the very beginning or was not accurate enough for our standards, we quickly moved to the next test. That is why some tests we may have done 30 shots while other tests we did as little as 4.
From our initial tests, we discovered that shooting at a high speed increases accuracy but does significant damage to the note and draws a lot of power. After testing we determined that 65% speed was able to shoot consistently without drawing a huge amount of power and causing too much damage to the notes.
We discovered that our robot is able to shoot consistently up to 14 inches away from the Speaker.
We learned that shooting from the sides were a lot less consistent unless you find that one sweet spot. However, backing up from the speaker seems to increase accuracy when shooting on the side.
We tested lofting the notes in at a slower speed for longer distant shots however discovered the accuracy to be low enough to not fit our standards.
|Test 1|Test 2|Test 3|Test 4|Test 5|Test 6|Test 7|Test 8|Test 9|Test 10|Test 11|Test 12|Test 13|Test 14|Test 15|Test 16|Test 17|
After shooting into the speaker, we decided to test if our shooter would be able to score in the amp. Our original plan was to shoot into the amp using the intake, which we successfully tested; however, having two ways to score will be beneficial in case one subsystem breaks. We positioned the robot right up against the amp and tested four different speeds: 20, 25, 30, 25.
The results are shown below:
Right away we noticed that as we increased the speed, the accuracy increased.
At 35% speed, we were able to shoot with an accuracy of 100%, which is very promising.
Here is also the full video of all 29 shots at 35% speed: Video
We started off the tests with a relatively brand new note. After shooting the note 235 times today here are the results:
As pointed out by other teams, the wear seems to be significant…we will definitely keep a few new ones in storage.
These tests have been very useful in giving us an idea on how our robot would score and play the game. We are hoping to finish building and wiring the robot by the end of next next week, which should give us plenty of time to tune and host driver practice.
This caught my eye… Are you guys planning to put a gearbox here? If that’s actually a ~1 ft arm geared 1:1 to a ~6,300 rpm Falcon motor, then this is geared for a tip speed of 450 mph, but with the extremely low mechanical advantage, gravity will have you beat before it’s able to move 
Other than that, nice robot architecture and design approach!
Thanks for catching this! We are planning to just throw a gearbox on today but didn’t realize it in the design process. Should be pretty quick to fix, but better to do it now when we are wiring then getting all the way to testing and having it fail.
Hello! We’re really impressed with your amp shooting tests as its the first cranberry style bot we’ve seen that scores in the amp consistently. Would you be open to sharing the height and angle your shooter wheels are at?
Its in the CAD document we published. Feel free to copy and make changes!
Ah thank you so much, I did not see the updated CAD the first time I looked. Much appreciated!
Hello, had a question regarding the green compliant wheel roller before the shooter. I noticed in the CAD it has a Falcon on it 1:1, but I don’t see that in your photos/videos. Is the roller passive and what led you to add it to begin with?
The roller is passive irl - it has a Falcon in the CAD because we weren’t sure originally whether we needed an active roller. We haven’t tested the full system yet, but we think we will only need the passive roller. We added it to fill the space between the intake and the shooter and protect against any handoff accidents.
