There are a variety of intakes to obtain game elements. There have been countless different iterations of designs used in past games to control objects. Competitive intakes want to follow the principle, “touch it - own it”. This increases cycle times and scoring points in generals. A few common designs are listed below.
Horizontal Wheeled Intake
This is a very common intake type that has been used throughout FRC in previous years. Some noticeable games in which these types of intakes were used were Infinite Recharge and Rapid React. These types of intakes are usually used to pick up balls, but can be used for other stable objects as well. They are typically powered with motors with chain or belts, and with some sort of drop-down mechanism to extend outside the frame perimeter. It consists of many compliant/high-traction wheels that smoothly intake the elements. In scenarios with balls, mecanum wheels are added along the sides to guide the ball into a specific region of the robot. All this does is intake the balls inside of the robot into another mechanism, typically an indexer or storage system. This mechanism itself does not usually outtake, however it can. Here are a few examples of successful intakes of this design in previous years:
254 2020, 4099 2022, 2910 2019
Roller Intake
Roller intakes are another iteration of horizontally wheeled intakes, however, they have some key differences that affect the reliability of it. A roller intake is typically a motorized tube with a grippy substance around the outside such as griptape or gum rubber. If this design is executed/manufactured correctly This type of intake is typically used with balls. The quickdraw of this intake helps improve cycle times drastically. The drop-down mechanism is smoother for this too, as it is much lighter and does not offer much stress. Here are some examples of high performing roller intakes:
3847 2022, 254 2022, 6800 2022
Stacked/Vertical Wheel Intake
This is another type of wheeled intake which is very similar to its vertical counterpart. This consists of compliant wheels stacked vertically on each side to “suck in'' the element. It is extremely adept at intaking stable elements, for example balls and blocks. Some good example games where this type of intake were 2018 and 2019. In those applications, this intake was mounted to a lift and used to score blocks and balls respectively. The key with this intake is that it usually also acts as a quick outtake. It can be modified in many ways in order to grip from multiple angles as well. For example, in the 2018 season PowerUp, Bronc Botz used surgical tubing to add compression to the grip of our intake. This allowed for the ability to pick up the blocks at all different angles.
A few examples of this are:
Polycord Intake
The polycord intake is an interesting iteration of an intake. This has the ability to sort of pull in the elements into the robot or in the robot or the intake. It is a tough material to work with as it needs to be heated and molded together in custom looks. One perk of this is its ability to use pulleys to change axes of motion. 1577 in 2022 did a fantastic job of utilizing those properties of it and made an intake that was able to intake from 3 sides of the robot. Another application could be gripping irregular shaped objects. For example in 2011, there were giant irregular shaped balloons. Having a polycord intake was beneficial, as it obtained the elements quickly and also maintained a good grip on them. Here are some examples of some intakes that used polycord very creatively.
