Does anyone have ideas for teams who are just starting vex?
Where has Milo shared that?
I would suggest searching YouTube for “VEX IQ Pitching In” and seeing what comes up. Then check it out and see what other teams are doing. If you find a design that you think you could build, go for it! If you don’t see anything you want to try, you could try the hero bot, Fling (it does come with build instructions). If you are looking for a very simple robot that scores a decent amount of points, I would suggest this one because it’s pretty easy to build.
One more thing that is very useful to do if you haven’t done so already is to read the game manual as it will answer many, if not all, of you questions regarding the legality of various robot designs and how to play the game.
Good luck, and we’re happy to answer any questions that you have.
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Discord, I know it for a fact.
Hey, @FRC973 my team is going with a massive hopper to get as many balls as possible, then go for a high hang and launch them all in with a flywheel. Could you show a video of how long it takes to launch like 20 balls from your flywheel? My team is deciding between a catapult and flywheel and speed is the determining factor.
Honestly, I think a short range launcher instead of a dumper is better. When we tried that, we couldn’t find a way to Keep it inside the dimension limit. Unless there is some horizontal expansion rule that I am not aware of.
I don’t have my flywheel robot together anymore, so I can’t send you a video, but I have done tests like that. It can shoot about 1 ball per second because I have to wait to it to get back up to speed. If you were shooting from a high hang into the high goal, you’d be able to shoot much faster because they don’t have to spin as fast so they’d spin up again after each shot very quickly. From the ground, I have found the flywheel to be much less accurate, but I think that from a high hang where you are shooting just like 6 inches, a flywheel might be better. From the ground though, I’ve found a catapult to be better because it doesn’t care about the variance in the balls, the amount of stuffing inside, or the seams on the balls ripping a little. Since the flywheel is so inaccurate from the ground because it’s such a long shot, if you shortened the shot by putting your robot super close to the goal, I think it’d be able to shoot much faster. But you could also do a Bank Shot style of catapult because the shot is so short and shoot really fast, possibly faster than a flywheel. So I guess I don’t really know which one is faster, and if you do it right, I don’t think it’ll matter that much because they are about the same. If you can though, I would suggest just dumping the balls in because that’ll be faster than any flywheel or catapult.
I’m looking forward to hearing what you decide. Good luck.
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Thanks so much for the thoughts and info,
We are going with a dual flywheel setup, as we have found a catapult to far over shoot the distance we want. The flywheel offers (imo) a more easily adjustable range in addition to taking up much less space than the catapult.
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Thank you! I will do this today
What do you think about Ben lippers video where he scored 100 points? We are a new team, other than me, so do you think we should go for his other one with 60 points? I do know that the fling is meant to barely work, and u have to improve it. Which one do u recdomend, if any
I think that while it is a great robot, there are better robots and designs out there. I have found a flywheel to only have 80% accuracy, while other robots I’ve found to have 98% accuracy.
A lot of this post is logical observations, and should be treated as such; no offense to anyone should be inferred.
I would highly suggest going for the 60 point robot because it is much easier to build and can still score a lot of points. One thing I’ve noticed (no offense to anyone here, just an observation) is that quite a few of the elaborate designs that people have built (including Fling) cannot get 60 points as easily as that robot can. I understand that this is largely because the designs are not fully developed yet, but it is something worth taking into account. One more note about Fling. In this tournament with the overwhelming majority being Fling robots (props to sankeydd for hosting it), most of the matches are under 20 points, a score that could easily be beaten by just clearing both corrals and having both robot low hang without scoring a single ball. Or you could score the 10 balls from the corrals and two of the balls right next to the goal and skip the low hangs.
So all in all, I would recommend the 60 point robot over Fling because it can not only get more points, but it is more consistent as there are shots to miss or anything. It is also far easier to build and doesn’t need many, if any, improvements before it can score 60 points. Good luck, and I’m looking forward to hearing how it goes.
P.S. I am Ben Lipper’s brother.
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I had a question about one of the rules, and for the sake of not creating a new topic, I am posting about it here. I have heard a few people’s opinions on this, but I was looking for a more official answer (because I wanted to make sure it was legal before putting in all the time and effort of making a robot with it).
The game manual defines High Hanging as:
High Hanging – A Robot is High Hanging if it is contacting one of the Hanging Bars, is not supported by any Balls, and is completely above a horizontal plane that is in line with the bottom edge of the lower Hanging Bar. Referees can check to see if a Robot is High Hanging by sliding a VEX IQ part which is 15 holes long (e.g. a 1x15 beam) underneath it.
As per the bolded part, the robot has to be touching one of the bars. But can the robot touch both bars? It doesn’t say “at least one”, but it doesn’t say “one and only one” either. Thanks!
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The wording used for scoring criteria are very specific checklists, and if the items are met, then you are good. If a robot were hanging from both hanging bars, does it meet the criteria of “touching one of the hanging bars” ? Yep!
You will probably encounter, especially at a local event which is not using certified referees, a referee who will argue or try to apply their own or additional rules to the game manual (most often, some referees try to add additional rules based on what they think the game should be, not what is in the game manual)
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I think it just means that it is touching one(so therefore hanging) and above the low edge. So technically you can High Hang where there is no High Hanging bar(I think).
(Edited to correctly follow the rules in the game manual, thanks SCFarrell for catching it)
The rule says you must be “contacting one of the hanging bars” so theoretically your bot could be perched on top of a low hanging bar (making contact with the bar), and be counted as “high hanging” provided no part of your bot is below the bottom edge of the lower hanging bar.
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You have added the word “high” to that definition. Re-check the game manual definition of ‘high hanging’. Bottom of page 5.
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1:15 is what they are using, motor spins once, the flywheel spins 15 times
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Okay, thanks for the info. We spent far too much time fiddling around with our catapult design and not enough with our flywheel
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