With this years game there are two main ideas of how to get the robot up either four inches or twelve inches. They are by ramp or by lifting. For those that are lifting and for those that plan to either climb or be lifted, I believe that the lift is much more dangerous. Although with the ramp you have to to keep it in your base and with 2" of clearance due to bumpers you will need to have a small angle thus a longer ramp, it is much more safer. Your robot is always on solid ground. With the lift you are in the air. Are you sure 30 points is worth the risk of your robot falling twelve inches off of the ground? Although I hope this never happens, I think before teams start thinking of being lifted that they should all consider the possibilities both positive and negative. The main one is a robot falling, and today when my team was discussing this I thought of the fact that if you are being lifted up, you are no longer in control of your robot, and that if anything happens your robot will fall. What if it does? Will your team build a more robust robot that can take a twelve inch fall? Will your team prepare for a worst case scenario?
Before you answer keep in mind that six hard weeks of planning, designing, and building went are going to go into your creation.
Yuu forgot another idea of lifting…
Both a Ramp and a lift, meaning either a robot will be gping up a ramp and then lifted, or one bot goes up a ramp, and another is lifted using an arm…
There are many fine ideas…be sure you think of as many as you can before you decide what you build nd what strategy you are gonna use.
U could also build your bot witha safe lifting system. Its FIRST, everything is possible here. You may even build a chopper
I am just asking the robots that are going to be lifted, if they know the risks and I am more so asking them if they are prepared for the consequinces of their choices.
I see what u r asking…
But u make is sound is if each and every liftins system in the game is going to be hazardous, and it will be so in osme cases, but some of them are gonng abe very safe, with not a big risk at all, bout the same risk as there was last year climbing a ramp, maybe even smaller…
I personnaly thing that 30 points are a lot and that it can cahnge the match from side to side…expecially if it’s gonna be 60 points =]
In order that robots who want to be lifted at the end of a match, someone should come up with a specification for a standard lifting attachment. This way, teams may design a lifting mechanism that other teams can design for.
ramp = safe
lift = dangerous
bottom line
also in order to accomodate two robots on a platform it would have to be between 36 and 38 inches wide and 80-86 inches long. This would accomodate for robots with wheels along the short or long sides.
i think we got it. I designed it in inventor and have made a cardboard mach up and today I’m building a half scale model to show at the meeting tonight.
wouldn’t 60 points pretty much change the match outcome in most situations?
I can see lift from below being dangerous because your centre of gravity is above the lifting point and toppling is an issue, but lifting from above should be safe as long as your attach point is solid and they aren’t lifting you with silly string.
Ramps are only slightly less dangerous from a toppling perspective. Maneuvering onto a 3ft wide ramp at low speeds will be very difficult for many robots because a motor might stall and all of a sudden they spin and fall off. You can’t go at high speeds because you’ll damage the lifting robot and also probably fall off. If either your drivers or the rampbots drivers bump their controls, you can easily topple off.
If you’re 12 inches off the ground on a ramp, you’re just as far up as on a lift. That’s just as much robot-destroying potential energy. In either case an accidental movement of either robot might topple you. If you’re lifting from above, with a chain, even the lifting robot jiggling might be safe since you you just sway. The lifted robot could do whatever they want.
There were plenty of robots in 2004 that chin-upped without incident despite other robots competing for limited chinup space. Many of them got substantially higher than just 12 inches.
Hmm, You must have been watching a different competition than I was last year. The number of teams that couldn’t climb the ramp surprised me. The number of teams that tried to climb the ramp and fell over astounded me.
It is almost going to be impossible to use a lift to elevate your alliance’s robots. It is going to be impossible because pneumanic cylinders are not going to give enough force to exert a lifting device.
Now i dont know if this idea is good for use… But what if you had a bar extend from the “lifter” robot on both sides, and other robots had their own lifting mechanism that would pull themselves up? it would be like 2004, execpt you must make it at least 12" of the carpet.
This is very true… that is why team 118 had 2 arms on our robot chainzilla during the 2005 competiton. We had noticed after getting a certain height off the ground that more weight on one side made the robot tip over more so we added a second arm to balance the weight and always made sure that both arms had a tetra on them.
I don’t think we can determine which method is more dangerous since you can’t know exactly how those two options are being accomplished. But if someone messes up their bot driving up a ramp it’s their fault, which could be a different story with a lifter, so I’d opt for the ramp.
We’ve been thinking about a ramp that has a sort of jack underneath it to level out the ramp and raise your ally’s bot. I see this as a combination of the two methods.
I think the practice fields will be full of teams praticing lifting to lower the risk. It would be nice if at the regionals there could be the practice field and then also an extra spot of carpet that the teams could practice lifting on.
I wasn’t refering to the ramp of last years competition. If you had a more shallow grade on your ramp it is easier to get onto. Also a ramp wouldn’t require the counter balancing that would come with lifting a robot.
Of course, however a lot of teams couldn’t climb the ramp last year because on low ground clearance. I am just trying to point out that these robots are/should be built to take a beating, fall over, etc. A ramp is not always “safe” and even a 12" fall shouldn’t be the death of a robot.
I think you should broaden your thinking about not cantileaverd lifts.
