As you can see, Bison Robotics made a robot that can clamp on the cone, but couldn’t control its pitch (although gravity would sometimes align it vertically, but not reliably).
Additionally, I think it’s the case that the best pitch for the cone when scoring is not perfectly vertical, rather slightly tilted such that the driver can slam into the pole with the cone.
Therefore, I think teams who plan to use a similar approach to scoring cones, should consider adding the ability of manually controlling the pitch rotation of the cone after picking it up, as it would increase the margin for error for the driver, and make scoring faster and easier.
Keep in mind that adding an additional degree of freedom (rotating gamepieces) is an additional layer of complexity. which introduces additional failure points. It may make things easier for the driver, but it’s certainly not a free decision.
Definately, but I’m thinking about what it would take to win. If you want to be a difference maker in a match, every advantage in your robot compared to others is critical. Imagine if you did this, you could just quickly slam into the pole, while teams who didn’t do it would have to position themselves carefully above the pole, because otherwise, they would let go and the cone would hit the edge and fall off.
If a particular cone pitch is advantageous, you should be able design that into your intake via a 3D printed guide or something so the cone naturally falls into the desired position once intaked.
I’ve seen someone post 5 times in a row recently. Seems like forum etiquette is being lost to time as the medium loses relevance to greater internet culture.
This is a true statement on its own, but the way to achieve that advantage is not always by adding another mechanism. As others have said, passive devices may be a better solution. Or, likely, more driver practice rather than additional time spent prototyping, building, and iterating.
A well practiced driver with a mediocre robot will beat the exceptional robot with no driver practice almost every time.
I completely agree with the premise of this thread. Here’s one of 6045’s prototypes from kickoff… essentially we used a passive bar to force the cones to a 45 degree angle. We liked the results so much that we’re taking it a step further in CAD and will be testing a higher fidelity prototype soon. (Surgical tubing not shown in the model)
I think a good general rule of FRC is, “the extent to which game elements have degrees of freedom that are not in your control is the extent to which you’ll find it harder to win,” and the corollary is, “if a game piece is in your robot and you can’t control every aspect of its position and orientation, that’s not ideal; if a game piece is in your robot and is not in contact with an active mechanism, that’s very bad.”
Passive orientation of a game piece is great, but you can’t expect it to be perfect. Adding active adjustment will make it “better.”
Another good general rule of FRC is, “Robotics build season is a zero sum game; anything you spend resources making better takes away from other things you could be making better, so prioritize, prioritize, prioritize.”
To whit, it shouldn’t be that hard to add a mechanism that makes a more ideal cone orientation from your initial passive orienter. That may or may not be as good use of your team resources.
Strongly disagree, Robotics build season build is a game of compounding interest good choices early lead to better choices later. This effect is magnified over course of a students career in the program but absolutely visible during the season.
That’s not at all what I meant… I meant that in any given build season you only have so many resources (people, time, expertise, money, connections, etc, etc), and any of those resources you direct to one thing is not available for other things.
You can of course use resources (time, contacts) to gain resources (money, expertise).
Fair enough, I am probably just reacting to the connotations of “zero sum game.” That phrase implies outcomes are fixed and total system improvement is not possible.
The single biggest forum etiquette one could follow is not derailing the thread to complain about preferred syntax. OP brought up an excellent point about orienting the game piece in an attempt to foster discussion. Comments like the all caps comment without adding to the post topic is the bane of every forum ever.
Back to the topic at hand though, I do believe the fastest cyclers this season will be those that angle their cone as displayed by OP. However, it will not be the single best thing to increase cycle times. As with motorsport, driver mod is gonna be the most valuable change. if it was between re-angling the cone and letting the driver practice more, the driver practice would probably be a better time investment.
I likely wasn’t as clear as I could have been, sorry. Internet pithiness and all that. I was specifically talking about “each particular build season for a particular team,” not the program as a whole, not one team’s trajectory, etc.
If you think about it as a zero-sum game, but where you can influence the resource cap going into that zero-sum game via off-season actions, then you can improve both your short- and long-term prospects, both on the field and the impact on your students.
