Hello forum.
I want to make a catapult with 2 motors that can shoot full court shots.
**I don’t care what the firing rate is.
**I haven’t been having much luck with lexan drop off cams.
I’ve been told that catapults are inherently more accurate then other types of launchers.
Besides cams the most common release mechanisms for catapults are directly connecting the motors to the catapult and using gears that have teeth intentionally removed.
Directly connecting the motors probably won’t work with only two motors. You’ll have to gear down the motors enough on the backward stroke that they will drag on the catapult on the forward stroke.
Take a look at this thread:
https://vexforum.com/t/9541-launching-mechanism-reveal/30887/1
How well would this work as a 2 motor catapult?
https://vexforum.com/t/choo-choo-catapult/32060/1
i believe that it would be very accurate if done correctly but not have a high fire rate, but also it seems to be quite complicated.
My team is currently working on a catapult that shoots full courts, however we are using 3-4 motors doing so as well as slip gears and rubber bands. You could probably do it with two motors; however, a couple things you need to consider are:
Angle
Force of Launch
Amount of Rubber Bands
Hopefully, this helps. And make sure nothing breaks. We bent a standoff because the catapult kept hitting it lol.
With 2 motors I would go with a slip gear launcher. One team in my club (8931C) had successfully made one with a fire rate of 1 ball per 2 seconds. I believe that they just geared a motor driving a 12 tooth high strength gear to a 36 tooth high strength gear witch then drove the slip gear.
Hope I helped & good luck!
You can make a slip gear launcher with a 36 tooth slip gear to a 60 tooth gear on the arm and it will get full field(depending on the amount of rubber bands and the angle). We made a slip gear catapult like this, we used a hammer type catapult and we have a firing rate of approximately 2 balls per second. We used 3 torque motors, but 2 will be enough(if you are willing to sacrifice firing speed).
Our catapult uses 3 high speed motors (I think) driving 3 individual 12 tooth gears. Those gears are driving a 60 tooth gear, and on the same axle is the slip gear. Our slip gear is another 60 tooth gear with a pattern of 16 teeth on, 14 teeth shaved off, 16 teeth on, 14 teeth shaved off. The slip gear drives an 80 tooth gear on the arm of the catapult. We have 5 rubber bands attached to the arm and the base of the catapult. We are definitely taking away speed, however, it is just a prototype, and we could fix the speed of it later. And for it only being in the prototype stage, it is fairly accurate.