I am from team 842 and we have been having problems with our wheels. We used the ones that came in the kit. We need to reduce the traction, is there anything we could add to the wheels to reduce the traction between the wheels and carpet? Please respond.
Go to your LHS and get some “sump pump hose” It is about $10 for 24 feet. (around here anyway) It looks like corrugated drain hose but is much softer and more flexible. Cut a slit down the side of that and zip-tie it over two of your wheels. Your robot will turn so nice you won’t believe your eyes.
If you have durability problems with that you can use a sturdier “pool vacuum hose” which is a harder material but stil just as flexible. It is a bit more expensive at $1.10-2.60 per foot. This will give increased durability and forward traction over the sump pump hose but sideways traction with this material is not as good but still much better than just tires.
We put zip ties on our wheels.
We cut the rubber off some 8" (I think) Skyway wheels and milled horizontal slots into the sides. They have great traction going forward, but turning from side to side is smooth as silk. I saw a lot of zip tied wheels in the regional webcasts I watched.
We struggled with this problem as well.
At UTC zipties were allowed to be wrapped around the wheels, but if the robot stalls and the refs see damage to the carpet they will make you take off the zipties.
UTC Refs will also allow you to wrap tape around the wheels as a traction device but NOT as a fastener. This interpretation seems a little weird to me so I don’t know if it will be allowed at every site.
Velcro is NOT allowed.
The best idea is vacuum cleaner hose, which I believe was called sump-pump hose earlier in the thread. Team 500 was generous enough to supply us with a lot of this stuff.
Remember, this will probably change your traction significantly so your driver will need a lot of practice to readjust and your autonomous mode will need to be recalibrated.
We tried zip ties, but we lost too much traction and could not push other bots(2 chips + 2 drills). Then we tried another idea that some others were using in Chesapeke. Cut 4 in. lengths of the green air tubing and feed the zip ties through them, and then zip them to the tires. Works pretty good and helps get you up the step easier.
It also helps reduce traction and bounce to keep your tires slightly over inflated.
Good Luck!
at annapolis some teams were required to remove their zip ties
Take skyway wheels, 6" I believe, drill holes in black plastic, use vaccuum hose, and zip ties, and bingo. I know that a few teams had these at the pre-season meets, and after that, EVERYONE had em.
Yeah, I reccommend the sump-pump hose. Simple, cheap, light weight, and it works. The zipties work too, but again, you could be told to remove them. That wouldn’t be good.
you know what you do, you get a bottle of armor all and spray the wheels completely before each match. Thats what we did to our front wheels last year to reduce the traction.
we had this problem early on with our 6" (5" maybe?) pneumatic tires…our robot was walking as it turned so we used two pneumatic tires and two skyway wheels…
oddly enough we burn through pneumatic tires quicker this year then we did last year…and we havent damaged a skyway wheel yet…last year we were going through them every other match…
The problem with the armor all is that it could be considered a contaminent to the field 
not that this could really help you right now, but in the future USE 6 WHEEL DRIVE.
my team has been having the same problem with turning. the solution that we came up with at the philadelpia regional was to use tie wraps covered by pneumatic tubing. we drilled holes in the sides of two of our beadlock wheels, fed the tie wraps through a few inches of tubing, and secured them by looping them around the tires and through the holes. we figured the judges wouldnt mind them as much since the tubing is smooth and wont damage the field. they allowed it, but they also told us that putting anything over the wheels will not be allowed at championships (nats; im trying to get out of the habit of saying that). it worked alright but it is just a temporary fix and we will probably consider replacing our wheels or something.
Wrap the wheels in duct tape. It’s cheaper than pool hose… 
On the FIRST Q and A they stated that duct tape could not be used on the tires.
We had the same traction problem and at St Louis we put tie wraps covering the wheel. One of the other posts stated that they were not going to allow tie wraps at Nationals. What rule does it violate and why would they change at the Nationals. It does not make much difference to us since we are not going to Nationals unless we win at Palmetto.
We did the vacuum hose and tie wraps thing. It allowed us to turn easier but we still bounced through the turns. Then we dropped the drill motors into low gear and it’s smoooooooooth sailing for the Uncomfortable Hunk of Metal now.
In LA we did not allow tape as a traction altering device. Tape may be used as electrical insulator or as a non-functional decoration. Using it to alter traction makes it functional.
Zipties were allowed as long as there was no damage to the carpet. Since most were being used to decrease traction, this was generally not a problem. It is the knobs you use to lock the zipties that damage carpet. So by keeping the knobs away from the carpet, there were no issues.
en contraire my friend, 10 wheel drive 