DEWBOT II

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Our second robot was DEWBOT II in 2006 and it played the game Aim High (game animation).

DEWBOT II was a shooter primarily designed to score via the central high goal. Alternatively, it was able to drop its shooter elevation and score by shooting into the low goals as well. DEWBOT II reloaded by picking balls off the floor and lifting these into a gravity-fed hopper. The hopper then fed by gravity to the Shooter, located low and forwards. Shooter elevation could be changed for range or target. The shooter did not traverse. Side-to-side aiming was accomplished by aiming the robot. The overall lift, hopper, shooter system was generally reliable.

The robot possessed a 2wd drive-train which was simple, reliable, easy to steer and provided good agility.

DEWBOT II just prior to shipping

Main strengths were:

  • Very drivable
  • Extremely reliable
  • Flexible (could score on both high and low goals)
  • Effective & efficient Ball pick-up

Primary weak points were:

  • Low rate of fire
  • Difficult aiming
  • The low shooter was easy for opponants to block
  • The robot was easily pushed out of shooting alignment
  • DEWBOT II could not easily score bonus points

DEWBOT II Build

season is detailed here.

Design Details

The links below will take you to details about the robot components.

Drive Train

A 2wd / rear wheel drive drive-train with unpowered omni wheels up front. Steering / driving was quite good, but the robot was easy to push around, especially from the front-side.
It was almost impossible to climb the ramp at the match end to score bonus points. Center-of-mass was too high and far aft to allow DEWBOT II to climb the ramp forward (it would end up on its back). Drive wheels, however, would unweight and lose traction trying to run up backwards. It was possible to get up backwards with a good running start, but this was in large part a controlled crash.

Ball Handling, Shooter

This is how we score. Dewbot II picks up Balls from the floor and loads them into a Hopper. From there, the Balls gravity feed to a Shooter to score in either the Center-High or Side-Low goals.

Programming

Electrical

Pneumatics

DEWBOT II is unique among 1640 robots (to-date) in having no pneumatic system.

Autonomous Mode

The team's original concept was to use the Vision System to aim the robot and set elevation to shoot on the high goal during autonomous mode. Vision System aimiong would also be used during the teleoperated period.
The Vision System aiming was not effective in practice.
What was effective was to set up DEWBOT II aiming at the high goal. At the start of Autonomous period, the robot would advance a fixed distance and fire the Balls in its Hopper into the high goal. This actually worked quite well, as long as we were neither blocked nor deflected by an opposing robot. This tactic was used effectively at Ramp Riot (and eventually countered effectively during the playoffs by opposition deflection).

Weight

The team spent 18-Feb cutting away as much metal on the Ball Lift as possible. We were legal (of course), but at the max. Weight management was still a concept for the future.

Bumpers

Standard Bumpers were built for DEWBOT II all around, with the exception of the opening for Ball pack-up. Simple bolt-ons to the KitBot frame.
In practice, the front and rear Bumpers were very quickly removed because they directly interfered with the Ramp. These were never used in any competition. Side Bumpers were retained.

Events

DEWBOT II attended a number of events in 2006. The links below will take you to the details of each event.

Philadelphia Regional
was the only official event we went to.
PARC IX
was our first off season event.
Ramp Riot
final competition

Outreach

Uwchlan Day

People


DEWBOT II Students

DEWBOT II Mentors

Sponsors 2006

See our other robots in the Robot Archives.