It looks like both potential drive sprockets can move around. If so, how will the drive motors be attached? Studying track drive design is an interesting endever, but is there a practical reason to be adding shocks to robots of the size generally discussed here? Military archives would probably supply more track designs than one has time to study (and they actually proved they work to some degree).
Sam,
tension in the track is kept by the fore and aft tensioners, when at rest they are 60% compressed. at full compression at both bogie arms, the tensioners full compensate. Further more when the bogie swing arms are fully extended the tensioners are full compress
EddieB,
yes i am using 3" wide versionof Jim’s tracks, im kind of a beta tester for the larger design
Zoomkat,
yes both sprockets move around but the motor will be attached to one of the moving brackets, while the other sprocket is simply there to keep the track aligned. again the suspension is needed to stabilize the camera, and you can not fully take advantage of a tracked system if it does not conform to the floor
nick
whats wrong with normal tank suspention,kinda looks like urs may dive over obstacals better,?
Uh, read the posts above, buddy.
Especially this sentence:
Well, just to add a little fuel to the fire, aren’t shocks made to limit suspension rebound/bounce rather than to conform to the driving surface? And they are probably found on vehicles that travel somewhat faster than the usual tracked vehicles.
well, most of the time thats wat happens, but in special cases such as off roading, there is a special kind of shock, so that no matter wat the car does (closer/further from the ground), the shocks compensate and the wheel stay on the ground (to an extent)
I’m not building a tracked robot (yet) but I have a suggestion for a chassis. Take a couple of appropriate length “U” channels and connect them with a 3" or so tube and hub set. It just depends how wide a chassis you need. I am using “U” channels for the chassis of my robots and it’s easy to get different lengths and widths. 
8-Dale
All of my robotics projects are put aside. And might be for a while. School isn’t bad yet, but I got a new mountain bike and that’s fun 
All I can say is WOW and way cool! This design is very nice!
8-Dale
Very slick Nick…
If you are going to have the drive motors move with the track then this whole assembly is supported by the frame work and the motors will move about as the 'bot moves over uneven terrain. It looks very feasable how much torque will the motors have to produce if you only have one on each assembly?