I was wondering about the weight of my robot and took out a kitchen scale, I realized that it was around 20 pounds. However I was curious to as to whether or not it is considered heavy or light. What is the weight of your robot? Take the poll below:
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0-5 pounds
5-10 pounds
10-15 pounds
15-20 pounds
20-25 pounds
25-30 pounds
30-40 pounds
40-50 pounds
50-70 pounds
More than 70 pounds
0voters
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And furthermore what do you use to weigh your robot? :
The lighter the better, but don’t compromise structural integrity to be lighter. Also, don’t over engineer and try to over strengthen something. Finding the right balance is difficult but it should come naturally.
Yeah, lighter is better. Try to use aluminum to decrease the weight. But don’t skimp on strength and structural integrity as this could cause your robot to break mid-match.
That being said, the density of steel is around .291 pounds per cubic inch. An 18” cube (18^3) equates to 5,832 cubic inches of space within the bounds of the cube, and multiplying the amount within the cube by the density gives us (5832*.291) = 1,697.12 pounds of possible material for a robot. HOWEVER, the rules regarding a legal robot state that all materials must be VEX-certified, which dense raw steel is NOT. So, we will have to use 5x25 hole steel plates as a backup. These plates are weighted at 0.327 pounds per plate, and are 0.046” in thickness. This means that we can stack a maximum of 391 plates from the ground to the top of the 18” area allowed. The 5x25 plate are 2.5”x12.5” in total area (from the perimeter) which means that they take up a total of 31.25in^2 of space, and a total of (31.25x0.046)= 1.4375 in^3 of space. This means, in a perfect world, we can cram 4,057 Steel plates into the possible area. Now, this is fun and all, but it still doesn’t meet the requirements of a robot. in order for that (in a loose sense) we need a cortex , a battery, and a key. The cortex takes up 17.15 in^3 of space, or about 12 steel plates worth. The battery takes up 10 steel plates worth, and the key takes up only 1 steel plate’s worth of space. This means, including the 1.13lbs coming from the combination of the necessary items for a robot, we can fit an adjusted total of 4,034 steel plates onto our perfect robot. This means, our perfect robot will weigh (4.034x.327+1.13) pounds, or a total of 1,320.248 pounds.
TL:DR- my robot this year will be only 4,034 steel plates and a few basic necessities, and will weigh a total of 1,320.248 pounds.
For offensive designs lighter is better but for defensive designs it’s quite the opposite.
We’ve played some matches against 30-35 pound robots in turning point, it doesn’t matter if you have more torque than them they have momentum and weight which will absolutely shove you around.
I disagree with most of you. If you have a heavier robot, especially lower like the base, it minimizes tipping. This is why a steel base is a better choice in my opinion.
Not necessarily, I have a complex tray bot that can stack 11 cubes and once you get that many on one ramp you tip. You still need wheels that pop out to the back, but steel definitely helps.