Is assisting the robot arm with a vacumn legal?

FIRST General Forum
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Is it legal to use a vacumn in the robot arm?

2

As long as your vacuum is powered by a legal FRC motor and the rest of your mechanism complies with the FRC 2011 Manual.

3

I remember a lot of vacuums back in the days of Overdrive 2008; they were cool, but pretty ineffective.

4

True, but think of team 25’s vacuum last year. It was a highly effective means of holding on to the soccer ball. All in all, however, I think that a vacuum takes a lot of tweaking when compared to a “grabber” that can to the same thing.

5

Indeed, and those soccer balls were a hell of a lot lighter than that darn track ball.

I’m fortunate enough to have one in my 19 year collection of game pieces.

6

I think the most common issue with engineering is that it makes people aim to produce more creative methods instead of using effective methods. Innovation is a fantastic tool for solving problems, but sometimes your problems have already been solved in a more efficient way.

What does this method add in functionality or approach? If it doesn’t alter the functionality and is only there to be cool, then it’s a waste of time and energy.

It is a cool concept, but don’t let cool factor diminish functionality.

7

Legal, yes, as long as it follows the specifications. However, keep some stuff in mind when dealing with suction of any sort:

  1. The surface of suction needs to be fairly flat, otherwise there’s no chance of getting a good seal.

  2. The amount of suction required could be quite a bit.

  3. The power requirement would be great. Remember, you have to carry the tube across the length of the field before you can score.

So, yes, it’d be cool to have a vacuum robot. But our team found that there were just too many issues to justify it.

8

When you let go of the tube, a vacuum is less likely to get caught in it.

9

Well if you can make the outcome just as efficient as a mechanical counterpart then the answer to my previous question is yes, it does increase functionality/efficiency.

I’m not trying to hinder any ideas from developing and flourishing further - I just wanted to give some advice. Our team has a bad habit of getting stuck on improving a particular idea - so much so that we do unnecessary things and waste time.

10

Right now our team is stuck between claw/rollers, vacuum/suction cup, and a pincher for the grabbing mechanism. Have any teams prototyped any of these yet?

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