FRC Chassis Designs - How Can PTC Help?

[sm]

I am sure there are many FRC teams building a custom chassis this year and many teams modifying the kit chassis to support omni and mecanum drives. I'm curious if there is anything PTC can do to support your design efforts when it comes to the FRC KOP. For a long time, PTC has only provided the actual KOP items. If you take a look around any event, you'll notice teams using all kinds of designs and all kinds of suppliers for components.

I'm curious if it would help to provide some of the VEXpro chassis, or possibly some other custom designs that are being reused year after year? What about wheels, motors, chains, belts, etc that are available from the regular suppliers.

Give us some feedback and I'l start compiling a list of how we can enhance the FRC KOP.

-Scott

[JoshH]

This one comes up in the "More Like This" link in the community http://communities.ptc.com/message/174379#174379

BaneBot stuff is used all the time.

Vexpro is definitely a good one to have.

Standard sizes of SAE and Metric hardware

Sprockets (Martin Sprocket, McMaster Carr, http://www.sdp-si.com/)

#1 however, is a PTC managed Windchill Library

Also, assuming a PTC-managed library, association to spec. sheets would be good too.

[sm]

Excellent feedback. I thought I was going good getting all of Greg's RevRobotics stuff in this year. Just wish it was in stock at AndyMark now.

[nrensing]

Not exactly a chassis component, but the biggest pain in working with imported STEP files has been the pneumatic cylinders - reassembling them into a functional mechanism is very time consuming, and if the students can't complete it in one meeting it might not ever get finished. How about a library of functional Creo assemblies for an assortment of BIMBA cylinders? I know the possibilities are endless, but if they're editable, we could get close with modifications.

Also, we've been trying to work with Windchill; we get more fluent every day. However, I haven't figured out how to upload the KOP into Windchill without opening every individual file, so we're only uploading them as we use them. Is there a way for PTC to streamline the process? Would it be possible to create an assembly that references them all?

Noa

[JoshH]

Hi Noa,

To import Creo files from your directory, open up a Creo session connected to Windchill. I suggest creating a new workspace. You will get errors for anything that's already checked into the commonspace (Windchill Cabinets).

In your embedded workspace, select "Tools", "Import to Workspace".

Select the green + sign.

Browse to the KOP imported folder (all files need to be unzipped).

Shift-select all files, select "Open", then select "Finish".

[nrensing]

Thanks! I did not know about this tool - that really helps.

I presume any part that's a duplicate of last year will generate errors, even if I want to put it into a separate Windchill folder. What is the "best practices" way of dealing with this?

Thanks,

Noa

[JoshH]

For parts that are already in there, you will most likely want to just leave the old one in there and continue using it. I would review both parts and identify any features in the new part that should be added to the old one.

Attempting to replace the old one by the new one will likely send you down a rabbit hole of fixing referenced components or possibly features.

Worst-case scenario is that you would rename one of the components so that you can have old and new (something like "prt0001_2014.prt".

[sm]

You can always review this document: http://communities.ptc.com/docs/DOC-4660

[rjohnson-4]

Just to confirm, the document you reference has:

https://firstrobotics.ptc.com/Windchill

as the Wdinchill server, while we've been using:

https://academic.ptc.com/Windchill

Is there a difference?

Rande J.

FRC 4931/FTC 8620

PS - I'm not trying to shout - the editor will let me turn bold on, but not back off.

[sm]

Yes, that is the name of the old server. I updated the document so it now says academic.ptc.com/Windchill. You can still use the old URL, it will simply redirect to the new URL. .