Hi all. I am wondering if it would be a good idea to implement a system where a ramp would come off your robot, and your partner could drive on top of you, so you get 12 points from the center park? Is there a problem with this?
Although it might work, for the park to count robots need to be contacting the platform and you couldn’t just drop something down so the robot is contacting the platform as there is the 18” height limit.
Well, there’s some ambiguity with that lol (I was talking with some people about it). The rule doesn’t specify whether being in contact with another robot that meets the criteria for center parked would make the other robot center parked
The definition of Parked includes the following:
Center Parked – A Robot status. A Robot is Center Parked when it is:
• Contacting the Center Platform.
• Not contacting any Alliance Platform.
• Not contacting the foam field tiles or white tape
This indicates the the robot(s) need to be touching the platform, not just a robot touching the platform.
Also, depending on what you mean by “a ramp would come off your robot” you would be in violation of G4 if you detached a ramp from your robot for your alliance partner to use to get access to the Center Platform:
<G4> Keep your Robots together. Robots may not intentionally detach parts during the Match or
leave mechanisms on the field.
In my opinion it would be worth getting verification before making an assumption be considered true. There has been many circumstances in previous games where an object being supported by a robot is considered to be touching the location the robot is touching(StarStruck, for example). This may be applied this year as a robot being supported by another robot, instead of an object being supported by another robot.
While this is true, those rules were written into the game manual. Since it doesn’t say that in the game manual, I think the best assumption to make is that this would not count as parking.
Also, the parking zone isn’t in the expansion zone, so you’d have to watch for height limits, and probably also horizontal limits, when building this.
A very short and light, but rigid, robot designed to easily reach the alliance platform and then fold out a short ramp on either side to help their partner up to the center platform, and designed such that their partner would remain parked on the second ramp with enough weight to lift the robot off of the alliance platform. Would not be very valuable late game, but early on guaranteeing you and your partner could get 12 points would be pretty nice.
Definition of contacting is:
the act or state of touching; a touching or meeting, as of two things or people.
Hi. So just a clarification. We would dedicate 1 motor, so that we could drop it down, then when the alliance is on top, we would pull up. Attached is a digram of the idea. The only thing to think about, is that the partner would not be contacting the center platform. They would be on top of you. Would this still count?
according to the definition of “center parked” they need to still touch the center platform. So it would only count if they were also touching the center platform.
Maybe you could put an open section at the front that their wheels would sort of naturally fall into - if their wheel was touching the center platform, and the rest was suspended above anything else, I would think that should count as parked. Neat idea! Worth an official Q&A to determine if they need to be touching the actual platform or if they count because they are only touching you and you are only touching the platform.
You could also have a small hook that attaches to your team mates robot, so that even if their robot is hanging in the air some it would still be sitting on the platform.
You might be able to dedicate one motor to a winch of sort and grab hold of their robot and pull it up. just a idea.