This robot is the culmination of a lot of progress for our team. We are really excited for this bot to hit the field.
All feedback is appreciated.
I’m a really big fan of this sleeker, more compact design. There are just a few nice details, like the full-length climber and the stealth wheels helping the gear intake that I think will definitely make Ad Astra more efficient and help it stand out from the crowd.
I’m most intrigued by the pair of omni wheels at the leading edge of the robot; it looks like a lot of thought went into your drivetrain design this year. Best of luck with the rest of your build, and I’m really excited to see your robot in action (both in video and in person)!
Thanks! It means a lot.
Overall a lot more thought went in to this design than anything we have done before. Many of the mechanisms have been completely iterated at least 3 times and we really took a lot of extra time designing to make sure the bot was not only good at gameplay but also easy to maintain.
We really look forward to competing with you guys.
How much smaller than the maximum size are you? I can see that the gear chute sticks outside so there’s some room there, but it definitely doesn’t seem 36" wide to me.
Have you tested gear cycling on a full or half field yet? If so, what was your cycle time? Will you have vision to assist with gear placement?
Looks great 2869!
Thanks!
Our width is about 35" with our length being 35" as well and our height sitting just a tiny bit below the 24" mark (something like 23.85").
I specifically wanted to keep plenty of room in terms of length if we wanted to further iterate on our intake or gear mechanism.
As for gear cycling I don’t really have an answer at the moment. The gear mechanism in the picture is our 3rd revision and hasn’t actually been cut yet. It will probably be thrown on the router tomorrow which should give us a better idea but we won’t truly know cycle times until we bring our robot to a full field.
Oh and yes we will have vision for gear placement.
I’m hoping those number are WITH bumpers…
Yes they are. Its actually assuming the bumpers are 3.5" each so we are definitely within the limits.
Looking good! Was worried there for a second about the dimensions. Love the sleek compact design.
What’s the drivetrain? From the omnis, I’m guessing something articulated like butterfly or nonadrive.
It’s just a normal west coast drive. The omnis are there for easier turning as well as finer motion towards the front of the bot.
That’s a climber up high on the near side behind the gear holder, right? Any concerns about rope pile up on one side due to not hitting center of gravity?
We are using 1" velcro stitched to webbing so pileup isn’t much of an issue.
I think the question was really about the rope running to one end of the axle. This was the biggest problem with our first prototype.
(the climber is built and mounted) and through a few tests we haven’t noticed any issue with that. Mostly because the entire roller is covered in velcro plus we have an entirely velcro covered rope.
did you test lifting the robot if the rope got caught on the very edge of the climber?
Hmmm this looks familiar :p, looking nice good luck this year! 
