At our last competition, we found that there where a lot of robots that were not very “lift friendly.”
I wanted to start a thread that teams who want to be lifted can hopefully refer to. Just some basic build guidelines that could increase there chances of being lifted. Here is my list I have created after a few competitions being a lifting robot.
At least .6 to 1 inch clearance from the ground (including motors and sensors). Mostly have problems with intake platforms being too low.
Somewhat rugged chassis (just can’t bend easily) most robots are fine with this.
Light robot - under 17 pounds (for what I have seen).
Wheels normal width apart from each other. Weird “+” drives and odd things like that can be difficult.
Feel free to post your own list and comment on mine. Hopefully this will help teams on their builds.
Personally, I feel that the “liftee” robots should also be optimized as a good/ fast close up shooter rather than full court shots as they are probably going to have a faster ground speed than the lifting robot.
What do you mean by “+” drives?
I might add to your list by saying that robots could also build a flat frame on top of their robots, for self lift bots.
Right thanks.
As for lifting, it might be interesting for a team with a solid narrow intake and launch mechanism to build some locking linear sliders into their H drive, so that they could adjust the width of their drive prior to a match, allowing them to easily fit on most ramp lifters.
Design a lifting robot that can easily adapt to the variety of frame sizes would help. Think about adapting your robot for each match/alliance partner. I think you will get more mileage from that approach than getting teams to adapt to your needs.
We made a ramp and we had no time to design stoppers at the end of it, so we lined up at the control towers just in case the robot that was climbing up fell off. We successfully elevated that match by backing up a bit. I guess we just wanted an elevation. 0 SPs earned in that match
For a liftee, make sure the drive base doesn’t overheat and have good clearance if the lifter is a ramp. Shooting well will help out too.
I think that the people creating the lifting robots have to design and build lifting mechanisms where the chance of something like that happening is a low as it can be. Maybe consider a “Build Guidelines for Lifting Robots” :P. I don’t blame people after seeing some of the spectacular fails we have had this season :D.
Honestly, no matter how good your lift is, it’s bad engineering if your lift is only compatible with a few robots. Why do your robots have to be under 14" wide?
My lift is similar to the one below, and it has no problem lifting any drive size or configuration, unless they have no clearance.
With only 2 motors, it’s possible to make something like this.
sadly