So it seems that ramps are going to be pretty popular this year due to it’s simplicity and effectiveness.
My impression is that most robots would probably have a lowered drivetrain to prevent balls from getting stuck under their robot. This however would mean that it would be near impossible to get onto the ramp since the drivetrain will start to scrape the ramp.
I know tossup robots can easily go over the bump, but when i tried it out with the balls, they would keep getting stuck under the wheels and drivetrain.
I am feeling that for a ramp to be effective it will need to be a gentle angle and not an extremely large angle cause a lot of robots won’t be able to climb up a steep angle, for example mine won’t be able to go up a steep ramp.
I agree with the lower angle. An extendable ramp would be an idea to get over this. You just will have to have a ramp that does not go outside the zone.
My team was thinking that an angle between 30-35 degrees would not be too ridiculous for a robot to climb in order to high elevate. So long as the baseof the other robot has an angle cut out to allow the wheel to roll onto the ramp. The design of most bases will probably not be a problem, so long as they don’t have any ridiculous triangle base. A square base should be compatible with any ramp.
i think another important thing to consider is whether they have a drivetrain configured in tank formation or x drive holonomic. X drive would force teams to build a ramp that could account for the loss in torque
30-35 degrees seems a bit steep to me. If you’ve ever walked up a ramp built for people, those usually have a slope of at most 1/12, or about 5 degrees. A robot might be able to go up a ramp a bit steeper than that, but I honestly think ramps turn out to be steeper than we may picture them to be.
Two other things to consider are how the tilt of the robot will affect its balance and the space in the climbing zone for an unfolding ramp.
That being said, I haven’t prototyped a ramp yet, so I may be underestimating a robot’s climbing ability.
I can expect some teams to change their robots last-minute to make sure they elevate their alliance with no problems.
But, cooperation between 2 alliances from over the world for elevation (especially in Worlds) would be hard.
It will be good if the community had a standard base to fit ramps and a maximum angle ramps can have. This will help get the community better organised and thus perform better in competitions.
Without a certain standard, schools would tend to pick their sister teams in alliance selection (as we have seen in 8059’s example, they build robots to complement each other, especially in the finals), which would be a disadvantage to teams without sister teams
there was a thread that discussed that. it was about building regulation bases so that anyone could lift one another, but too many people shut down the idea
Even if your school doesn’t have a sister team, there must be at least 1 person on another team who you are friendly with who you can design a ramp with. The problem with the standard ramp is that it advantages your potential opponents as well as you.
About the actual ramp, I agree that it shouldn’t exceed 30-35 degrees. At that point, the problem becomes how to support the ramp, as a few C-channels of that length cannot support 15-20 pounds without bending. Maybe some sort of upside-down archway (picture an inverted aqueduct) below the ramp would be more space-efficient and easier to build than a spoke that touches the ground once the ramp is deployed. Or maybe there would be some sort of clutch or passive mechanism that would allow the spoke to fold up before the ramp is activated. Has anyone thought about/ prototyped any of those or anything else that does the same thing? Or are the C-channels actually able to support a 15-20 pound robot? Thanks.
I have to totally disagree with you in using 8059A as an example over here.
8059 had 4 other teams that were allianced with other teams.
In fact, the winning alliance include 8068 as well. There was never a pure 8059 alliance.
During alliance selection, the main criteria is always how well the other teams can complement yours (be it in national or World).
And for your info, one of the reasons 8068F went with 8059K was because 8059K can be lifted up by 8068F. And they were hoping that the lifting will be enough to offset the better shooting ability of 8059A.
Another example will be the 2nd pick of 8059A - it was 8068D. There were quite a few teams that were better ranked than 8068D. But the reason why 8059A picked them was their outfield scoring ability.
It is all about choosing teams that can complement your robot and strategy.
So I don’t see how teams without sister teams will be in any disadvantage. As long as the team has a robot that can perform well and can complement others, there is no reason why it can’t do well in competition.
PS - during our planning stage, we had already worked out that the most likely approach to this game will be having a strong base shooter and a outfielder. And hence we designed our robots these way.
And true enough, most teams (at least in an early season event) were only either good at shooting from the base or in the middle of the field. And this made us easy to complement with other teams.
I feel like if you build a proper extending mechanism, steel c-channels will be able to support a robot, though I am trying to incorporate any sort of support for the ramp in my designs. It’ll be interesting to see. A simple unfolding and locking truss might be a good option.
It happened in Singapore VEX. From a spectator’s point of view, the 3rd seed alliance had a ramp but neither of their alliances could make it up their ramp because of low bases.
8068A’s robot was designed to elevate robots and to climb on other’s ramps if needed. They have a fairly high base, but whenever they leave the starting tile to move around the balls do not get stuck under their robot.