BallBOPPer 2026 Rover Overview

This post goes over a few ways that the Rover differs from the earlier version. More detail will be provided in the documentation going forward.

The 2026 Rover has three 270 degree swerve drive hub wheels. A swerve drive is an omnidirectional drivetrain in which each wheel is both driven and steered independently. This allows the robot to move in any direction — forward, backward, sideways, or diagonally without needing to rotate the chassis.

The 2026 Rover is therefore a three-wheel drive system with powerful hub motors that are VESC controlled giving it the capability to transport the full 2026 BallBOPPer system, including the new Elevators and Catcher, around the court at competitive human speeds.

The three hub wheels can be clearly seen in the bottom view. The shiny cylinder next to each wheel is a rotary encoder that is used for measuring the distance traveled by each wheel.

The wranglers on the 2026 Rover are similar to the previous version but are structurally stronger with their own swivel wheels and they now also act as outriggers, providing the additional balance and stability required when the launch head is elevated high above the court.

The wranglers open out in a V shape and can wrangle all the balls in a 5-foot-wide swathe of court with each pass. The wranglers steer the balls into reloading wheels that push the balls into the chute running underneath the rear section of the Rover and directly under the ball Launcher and Ball Revolver.

A rocking lever then rapidly rocks back and forth pushing a ball from one side and then the other up into the upload wheels in the launcher. From there they are either reloaded directly into the launch head or back up into the center tube in the Ball Revolver where they then flow up and refill all the Ball Revolver tubes.

This design, in combination with the Ball Revolver (which is covered in more detail in its own article) is considerably faster at reloading the balls from the court.

In addition, the 2026 version has its own pair of batteries mounted in the rear bumper along with its own compute and control system. These additions remove the need for any electrical connection to the Launcher. All communication between the Rover and the other components of the BallBOPPer system is now wireless.

The final major change is that the Rover now has two cameras mounted at the end of each wrangler. These cameras are able to rotate to provide a 360-degree range of view on all sides of the Rover for navigation, positioning, ball finding and hazard detection.

The rotating white bumper underneath the cameras allows the wranglers to roll right up against the fences, and they are sensored such that the Rover will immediately stop if it runs into an obstacle.