Hooping It Up

Today was a super awesome day! We created a working prototype of a grabber for the game.

Grabbing is obviously incredibly important in this year's game. Each robot must be able to pick up the ball and pass it to another robot to gain bonus points.

Ever since 2012 when we did not make our intake space very large, we have focused heavily on leaving a large margin for error. Our grippers this year will be the same.

The idea came from a YouTube video we saw from 2008 (TONS of great ideas from 2008, btw). Here's the link.

Our original idea was two moving hoops that would be actuated with independent pistons. However, throughout the prototyping process, we decided to make one piston stationary. We also mocked up a pneumatic board to test the piston.

The simulate the hoops, we used last year's frisbees. We also simulated the full design thought by putting the gripper mechanism on a spinning tube. We also put a stool down to simulate the cradle that the ball will rest in.

Awesome prototyping day. Tomorrow we will move on to refining the process, CADing up the design, and making a launcher.