The actobotics chassis is waiting on the next shipment to be completed.
The shooter on the robot right follows the first design where a motor turns a spring or a stick, and this stick will get stuck on a beam which creates tension. The motor will keep turning and eventually the stick will move past the beam very quickly creating enough force to launch the ball.
This design of shooting was chosen over the choo-choo mechanism because it takes up less space and is able to shoot from the right side of the robot since it isn’t that long. Shooting from the right side of the robot is essential since the autonomous beacon attachment is currently on the left side, so shooting from the right means the robot does not have to make any adjustments during autonomous to aim the shooter at the vortex. However, shooting straight from the front will make the blue side autonomous difficult since the robot starts with the back facing the vortex on blue side autonomous, while on red side the front faces the vortex.
The next challenge in minimizing the adjustments the robot has to make to shoot the particles into the vortex in autonomous is the long distance the particle’s have to travel. In order to take advantage of the right side shooting, the shooting has to happen while the robot is aligned against the border and in between the beacon pressings. Hence, the shooter has to be able to shoot particles into the vortex while touching a border, which means particles have to travel a little over 2 tiles in lateral distance, far more than most teams. Luckily, with adjustments of the angle of the shooter, the shooter is able to easily overcome this long distance. If the shooter couldn’t launch particles past 2 tiles in lateral distance, then robot would have to shoot the particles in autonomous either at the very beginning or at the very end. Positioning the robot so that its right side is facing the vortex and near the vortex at the beginning would make aligning against the border for the beacons extremely difficult. And doing the same at the end has a chance of being inconsistent. And doing this in between the beacons would be insanely difficult to align. The most consistent position of the robot’s autonomous is either the very start or while the robot is aligned with the wall.
The shooter itself is somewhat consistent. It is able to shoot particles from the same spot into the same vortex 10 out of 12 times. Its long range has benefits and drawbacks:
Benefits
- More room the robot can shoot from
- Can’t be blocked as easily
- Can shoot particles quickly that are found near the edge of the field
- Can adjust from shooting to beacon pressing easily
Drawbacks
- Less accurate, training required
- Shoots particles that fall near the vortex more slowly since it has to move out
The rate that this shooter will be able to launch particles will be mostly dependent on the sweeper and the loading mechanisms, which are difficult. The shooter itself can shoot particles every 1 to 1.5 seconds.
The sweeper follows the same design of most teams, where multiple sweepers that are vertically aligned move particles up against a wall. The benefits of this design is that it takes little space front to back on the robot. Currently, this sweeper struggles in moving balls quickly from entry to exit on the top.