Both the shooter mechanism and the catapult Mechanism have been seen in past competitions like Strong Hold. In this years competition, the cargo is the sphere that needs to be manipulated and scored at different heights. There is the Cargo Ship with Bays and a Rocket ship with Bays at different altitudes. The Hatchet panel needs to be placed in some of the Bays in order to be able to deliver a cargo. What do you guys think about both mechanism, which one would benefit the manipulation of the cargo the most and have positive impact in saving time and efficiency? What do you guys think?[quote="Jonnathan333, post:1, topic:339550, full:true"]
Both the shooter mechanism and the catapult Mechanism have been seen in past
competitions like Strong Hold. In this year’s competition, the cargo is the sphere that needs to be manipulated and scored at different heights. There is the Cargo Ship with Bays and a Rocket ship with Bays at different altitudes. The Hatchet panel needs to be placed in some of the Bays in order to be able to deliver a cargo. What do you guys think about both mechanism, which one would benefit the manipulation of the cargo the most and have positive impact in saving time and efficiency? Any thoughts on the subject?
I personally think the Catapult is better because you can get intricate on getting the cargo into the rocket with close to guarentee-able points, and can make it adjust accordingly to get higher; it’s also easier on the driver, as they can just memorize the shaft’s length to get to the desired height (with Java/C++ of course). Only problem I see is when it is shooting for low altitudes and how there’s a bounce to the ball resulting it in falling back into the catapult unintentionally. With this design, its only effective on the rockets.
Then like also the shooter it can be accurate but the clearance for the ball and the hole is a lot smaller than Stronghold, making the shots much more difficult and precise. The shooter would work great for lower altitude levels of the rocket and cargo ship.
My opinion is swayed towards the catapult but to be honest, they’re both kind of a stalemate.
Remember that the shooter will have to be incredibly accurate. The slots for the cargo to go into are 15" wide and the cargo is 13" in diameter. Tossing into the cargo ship would be much more viable in my opinion. This is no reason to eliminate the idea, you’ll just have to keep in mind that you will have to be very accurate in your shooting.
You are NOT going to want to shoot Cargo. There are inconsistencies where if you roll or bounce them on the ground they vier off one way or another. They are weighted off center.
This is one of the worst game-piece-to-score-hole-size ratios we’ve ever had. Our Ri3D team was missing balls sometimes even being right under the goal. I walked into the game thinking shooting might be an option, and walked out of Ri3D heavily dissuaded from it.
Toss that ball in the air. Now toss it in the air spinning. Notice how badly it wobbles when it’s spinning?
The word “shooter” implies that it’s using pitching wheel(s) (I think?) and the ball is going to exit the robot spinning. I think spinning that ball will lead to an unpredictable shot.
My team, 1108 has built catapults for most of the years we had balls. But this year, the target is too small compared to the ball.
I recommend something that can get right up there and put the ball in the hole.
I agree. But I think the faster the velocity of the catapult is (hopefully don’t slam it against the rocket ship), the more likely accurate the trajectory of the ball is, since the ball is forcefully caught within the net or whatever thing is holding it within the intake.
We had a little history lesson at one of our meetings this week…1726 has made effective use of catapults when the “goal” was huge, relative to the size of the ball. But we’ve had little success with shooters, when the size of the goal is not much larger than the ball. This year is the tightest fit yet. We are planning to place the CARGO in the rocket, and spit it into the CARGO SHIP.
Your team should throw the ball at a target at least 5~10 times and measure how consistent the trajectory is. Then you can determine if shooting/throwing the ball is still a good idea.