So in preparation for the World Championship I would like to get a discussion with many opinions in it. So here is that all important question, " Is a single horizontal roller or dual vertical rollers more effective and why"
Please post your own opinion and why, as unsubstantiated opinions are simply speculation. Video would also be welcome in comparing the two sides.
A horizontal roller needs a wall to intake large balls. It also has no significant advantage over vertical rollers in terms of bucky balls. It leaves you with one extra motor to use on something like a forklift or a claw, but a forklift or a claw is A) more complicated to use than vertical large ball rollers, B) more complexity and weight that you don’t really need
Therefore, I think vertical rollers are better.
EDIT: you probably knew which one I thought was better, seeing my avatar photo 
I might be wrong but I feel like vertical rollers generally have more reach than horizontal as in the balls can be farther away with vertical rollers and still get picked up.
I prefer vertical but that’s because that’s all I’ve used. Maybe I’ll experiment with horizontal next year if applicable.
aaaaaaa this thread is kind of confusing to read because I reverse them. I call the side rollers horizontal, and the single top/bottom roller a vertical, since that is the direction they rotate in.
I would say the side rollers is better in a lot of aspects for this year’s game, and the top down rollers will have a bit of a tough time against those who are using the side rollers.
It is much easier to have a magic intake with side rollers.
I think that you have to have a good reason to go with a top roller. if you are trying to essentially make a ‘normal’ robot then I would say go with side rollers. but if you go with something like one motor intake and one motor lift and put an 8 motor drive on it or something then it might pay off.
Speaking of possibility of advantages it might be worth it to note that the robot
that won U.S. open had a forklift and horizontal roller. But my theory is that it’s all a trade off, for example the horizontal roller can pick things up off the bump, making autonomous mode of greater potential, it can also center things up for scoring if the robot needs greater accuracy, but the vertical rollers has a wider range from side to side making it more of a funnel and it has increased large ball potential.
As for me I've been using the side rollers all season and they worked great no complaint, but I wonder whether there is potential not as many people have explored due to the popularity being on the side of the side rollers.
The other two robots on that alliance had side rollers. Just saying.
We used a vertical intake on our scissor lift(sorry no picture), to moderate success. We did this solely because of spacing reasons. Also, the intake could only handle buckyballs, with some difficulty. The trouble came when the balls were against the wall, or in the corners. This is one of the contributing factors to our season’s limited success, this design giving way to the superiority of the intake seen on four-bar style robots.
My team has both (we bevel gear them into a single system). It’s worked very well for us, but I think if I had to choose one I would take the side rollers. In intaking large balls, top rollers must reverse direction and push against a wall or raise above their set height. Side rollers can intake large balls with very little modification or added motion. I gotta go with side rollers on this one.
Even though my team’s used side rollers all season, I kinda regret using them.
Sure they grab bucky balls and large balls much easier than top rollers, but top rollers would have complemented a de-scoring system(without pneumatics) or a hanging system much more easily(without a 4 motor lift). To be honest, I also realized that conveyor belts could have been an even more viable option assuming I figured out how to compact the mechanisms.
I think it just depends on overall robot design look at 1069e. The state finalist alliance captain in Oklahoma had a top roller. and we don’t need examples of side rollers. I think it depends on how long people take to perfect their intake. I spent at least two weeks on my intake on my robot and I know that 2398b the robot I was talking about spent all season perfecting their intake and in the end they were able to beat lots of side rollers for both types of balls. Some food for thought top and side roller 4004a has this and they have destroyed just about every one in the state.
Having had robots that utilized both intake types, I would have to choose side rollers over a top roller. Our top roller was second to none when it came to controlling buckies. It never dropped them and it was very fast in controlling them. The big drawback was bog ball control. we could cap with them, and get them over the barrier fast enough, but we needed a wall to pick up with, and it consumed a lot of time.
Our side rollers (magic intake of course:)) picked up the buckies very smoothly and quickly, and had some minor issues with dropping if the rollers got pushed up or spread out too far horizontally. However, it controlled big balls much better, allowing us to be much more efficient with our time and scoring.
Winner IMO: Side rollers
What has been discussed is during a 2v2 match. What about during driving skills of 1 minute. Does this change how you would do things?
How do you build a magic intake. One team at my club tried it with their 4-bar, but could not figure it out.
What we have found is the height of the intake must be at the top 1/3 of the bucky ball. That way when driving around the bucky can be on the outside of the intake and the ball will still be sucked in by the intake although not directly in front… like it’s magic
