Handling Balloons

Balloon Intake

The balloon intake is mounted on the front of the robot and is intended to pull balloons into the chute where the airflow from the fans can pick them up. The original design that was prototyped was a simple 'flapper' wheel that swatted the balloons toward the chute. the current design is to use an active mechanism (a motor/gearbox) to move the intake up/down from the stow position, down to the active intake position. Another motor would be responsible for running the flapper.

Balloon Chute