So this is a very debatable subject that our team and many others are debating with, our team currently has a flywheel but we are contemplating new ideas. what is your view on this subject and what design should we use for a puncher.
please feel free to link videos and pictures about how to build a puncher
Flywheels: easier to build, accuracy is somewhat compromised.
They also don’t require you to cut gears, which is nice if your team doesn’t regularly get more.
Punchers: more variables to control and harder to perfect, but I’ve heard they have better accuracy.
It should be said that there are more than just these two methods to throw things, they are just the most popular.
So I’ve never understood where the idea that punchers are harder to build came from. Flywheels always seemed far harder considering any issue in the build is amplified due to the really high gear ratio. Punchers are pretty simple, and you can look up 574C’s puncher tutorial if you need help building one.
Now my opinion is a puncher with an angle adjuster will work far better than a flywheel, due to their consistency and decent fire rate. We use a Striker, but the strategy is the same as a puncher and we can compete with double catapults pretty well. The typical puncher fire rate is around 3/4 of a second and if you have a reliable double shot it will typically take between one and two seconds. You can compete with double catapults pretty well with this speed. You can look at my reveal or 574C’s to see the strategy I am talking about.
574C
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11495A/B
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Yeah take a look at 574C’s tutorial. That’s where we got our puncher design from and it works amazingly. With a little bit of tuning, we got it to be extremely accurate. Plus, it’s pretty easy to build
Building a puncher is incredibly easy and making an angler also isn’t that hard if you have an example of how to do it.
I think the only debate here in raw design is between a 2BC and a flywheel. Punchers, while they can have a really fast double shot, are typically slower than both a 2BC and a flywheel.
However, punchers, as @ZackJo says, are very easy to build. Flywheels are really hard to get working correctly. Even 2BCs can have some tuning difficulty.
Honestly if you don’t have the capabilities to shoot both flags from the same spot your at a pretty large disadvantage. I honestly think the debate is between punchers and double catapults, flywheels are starting to die out due to the insane amount of tuning they require to work, and how inconsistent they can be. Now the main argument against punchers is that they have a slow rate of fire, but the difference between the two comes down to maybe a second, and considering how often you’ll use a double shot the overall amount of time you save is very small. We have gone against some pretty good double catapults before and have done really well against them.
Yes, we have discussed this in length. Last I saw, flywheels were still pretty common in the Midwest, where I am. Flywheels were dominant early season because a lot of teams had experience from NBN, and they are starting to decline, but I don’t think many (halfway decent) flywheel teams are changing to punchers. If they’re going to change, I would think that a 2BC would be more of a popular choice.
With a puncher, you have to come up with an indexer so ensure you can hold two balls, as well as a sometimes complicated feeding system.
And flywheels lend themselves to vision sensors, as finicky as they may be. The variable speed allows for multiple shooting positions, as well. I’ve seen full-court double shots from flywheels (Though I can’t quite remember where). Whilst being a lot more complex, flywheels, in theory, are the midpoint between the single-shots of traditional punchers and the shot efficiency of a 2BC.
We can throw around successful punchers for a long time. They certainly have their merits, such as simplicity. Every design does.
double flywheels are pretty easy to make, but it makes more sense to do a 2 BC or a puncher that changes it’s angle.
So I honestly think in the long run punchers are better, the double shots save very little time, and the punchers make up for it with accuracy and consistency. I do admit that loading can be tricky, but the indexer can be pretty simple. All ours is, is a standoff that holds the second ball back when aimed down and lets the second one in when aimed up. Their also is 574C’s approach where they just held the second ball in the intake. I personally don’t like this technique, but you can’t say it didn’t work, they have been the fastest scoring robot in the world, ranking number one in skills for the past few months. I do agree that most teams that change from a flywheel will most likely go to a 2BC, just because there are so many examples to look at.
I like cap bots
Or, you can completely negate the slow firing rate of a puncher by making it a 2 ball puncher and having the same capabilities as a 2BC and have a stronger, simpler, and more accurate system of shooting balls. This is what my team has done and the 2 ball puncher works great.
https://vexforum.com/t/answered-match-loads/19001/1
Here is the forum post about it. The videos or images there are not up to date because we are doing a redesign, but they are from our old 2 ball puncher that worked very well.
How consistent is that?
At the time, we were still working on it, so it wasnt very consistent, but we tuned it a bit more and it worked like a dream, especially during autonomous.
Nice. Love to see the unique design. I still prefer my angle adjuster though, but I’ve always been willing to sacrifice a little bit of speed for more consistency.
if you have a working flywheel, don’t build a puncher tbh. unless you can make it a super good 2 ball puncher.
I think it’s a bit late in the season for anyone to really change and have a good, nonstressful time with it. I try to make any major design decisions by the end of November, and then try to stick with it, if possible. Most of the time, it’s better to just tune what you have rather than changing everything and starting from scratch.
agreed
That being said, I don’t view this conversation as a tactical discussion more so than a hypothetical (and/or inspirational to late- starters/redesigneds) design comparison. So, as a precaution, there’s no use in getting worked up over it. 
A lot of good points are being raised on all fronts, and that’s great.
When comparing 2BCs and 2BPs, I think the 2BC will win out because it is easier to design and work with. Less power is transferred continuously with a 2BC as opposed to the 2BPs required power.
Like ZackJo’s Striker (which is epic, btw), single punchers can have their merits. But he put a lot of work into getting that cycling double shot down to the speed he did.
Definitely don’t start to redesign at this point. Just get your driver really good at what you have, and worry about the hypothetical designs later.
If you have a reliable flywheel, and are considering redesigning to a puncher, don’t your not likely to build a puncher better than a good flywheel on your first iteration, and you probably don’t have time for it.