Tank Treads in VRC Elevation

Hello

I was interested in knowing if tank treads would be a wise choice of movement during the competition.

I’ve seen an Elevation robot that was a 1/2 track. Omni on the front, tracks on the rear. It was geared so it would go pretty fast and had the tread upgrades for some extra ummpf.

I’d suggest you try it out and see if it works for you.

If you want to
[LIST]
*]Precisely turn a lot, they slip sideways fairly well.
*]Use the default sprocket, without gearing up the drive motors, they are pretty slow.
*]Get into a pushing contest, they aren’t so good because they slip pretty easily.
*]Wrap them around the other wheels, you can get some interesting effects.
*]Use them for chains between drive motors and wheels, they work pretty well, after you trim the wings off of each link.
*]Climb over the foam blocks they might work better than the wheels.
[/LIST]
If…

Trade-offs…

Blake

How about if i add the Upgrade kit for the treads.

The only way you can know for sure is if you try them. If you plan on being more of a defensive robot the tank tread with the upgrade kit would probably be a good idea. However if you plan on being more offensive then they would probably hinder your movement too much.

Just my $0.02

If you are talking about the paddles - Little or no help with traction on the fields’ foam tiles (the floors); but useful for other jobs or perhaps on other surfaces

If you are talking about the links with the rubbery “bumps” inserted in them; they get a bit more traction on the tiles, but still not a lot.

In general, a (heavy) bot with regular wheels that sink into the foam a bit will win sumo contests with a (heavy) treaded bot that sinks into the foam less deeply (because the treads spread the weight over a larger area).

Blake

Also note that if you gear them for speed, tensioned treads will be harder for the motors to move than wheels and won’t give you an axle to wheel ratio speed boost for the extra effort.