Chairman's Update
Our entry for the Chairman's Award has been submitted for the Portland regional! Thanks to everyone who worked on it and who sent in pictures. Now all we have to do is put together a presentation...
Subteam Updates: 1/19/08
The robot is happily in its lovely crate =]. We cleaned up
the room and put tools and other items in the boxes they
should be in. The bins and room look much nicer now. It's
unfortunate that so few people showed up today to help out.
The "Thurs" bin is now the 2008 bin and has several items we
will need in Portland. We decided that we should buy some
new/extra skids since our former ones are somewhat damaged
and probably won't survive through all of the competitions.
We made a shopping list and task list for Portland. The
bumpers should be far easier to take on and off now. We will
attach 10x11 plates in Portland to protect the sides of the
electronics boards. These will be waterjetted and have our
name, etc. engraved in them. We most likely will have at
least a meeting before we go to Portland. Have a good break
everyone!
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GO TEAM!
Subteam Updates: 2/18/08
Electronics: Solder extensions to the wires on the IR board
and crimped the ends.
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Drivetrain: Attempted using bungee cords on the flag to
stabilize it, but instead it just kept the flag down when it
fell over so we decided that the best choice is to just have
an entirely stable flag support. We attached a piece of
polycarbonate to the support beams and attached the radio to
the bottom of it.
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Driving: We finally went to Aviation HS for driver practice
today! We had some problems with going straight at first but
that improved after the code was fixed. We also had issues
with translating. Sadly, we broke the gear box in one of the
turn motors and are waiting for our order of replacements.
Even with this disability, the robot was fairly drivable in
the end. All four skids were torn off after hitting random
corners and we are replacing them with box beams in
Portland. A few people had some time to try driving, which
was a neat experience. In the end we concluded that Elyse is
our driver. It was good to watch the other robots and see
how they functioned and start thinking of ways to prevent
them from scoring in competition. We never actually went
full speed and were still quite fast. Our spins are fairly
cool and very fast. Software took turns of getting to test
the robot and fix the code when problems arose and we
managed to fix or improve several bugs. We removed the old
flag and are going to have our flag the way we did last year
with the angle bracket. We still have to mount the flag in
Portland as well. When we returned to IHS we noticed the
antenna was broken on the radio on the robot so we attached
a new one and placed it to the side. We found that the belt
somewhat slips. When we quickly go from driving forward to
reverse and vice versa the robot makes unhappy sounds. I'm
not sure if we actually got to tensioning the chain.
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We still have not tested Hybrid mode and have a
non-functional OI. We hope to change both of those in
Portland.
Subteam Updates: 2/17/08
Drivetrain: Took off the turn motors and Branden replaced
the bolts in them and we then put them back on.
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Software: Adjusted the PID and possibly some other drive
code.
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Fabrication: Disassembled and reassembled the bumpers to
attach pen nuts. Put on one of the two bumper pieces which
took forever...as in an hour or so. It was hard to get the
bumpers flush. Also, we had to do some measurements, etc. We
will attach the other bumper tomorrow since one of the pen
nuts came loose. It shouldn't be nearly as bad later on.
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Electronics: Drilled a hole into the upper electronics
board and pulled the wires through it so they won't
interfere with the bumpers. Zip tied the radio to one of the
support beams. Elyse finished painting the OI board and it
looks very nice. We used plastic fusion to attach the
control board to the OI board, attached the RC with screws,
and attached the joystick with velcro. We need to cut some
new wires since some are too short, etc.
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Mechanism: Yes, really, a mechanism section! Kendrick
decided to attach "ears" to the front and back arch on the
top of the robot so when the ball hits the ears and the
bumper the ball goes forward so we can somewhat herd the
ball.
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Driving: Sadly, we still can't go entirely straight and are
a degree or more off. It is calculated however if we are one
degree off in both directions we will have gone 90 degrees
in approx. 24 feet which is about the width of the
field...if I said something inaccurate, please correct me.
When we try to drive straight the robot slightly veers to
the right, which is somewhat odd since the robot seems to be
heavier on the left side and slightly leans that way. We had
some problems with translate mode and can't entirely do that
right now. We still have not driven with the remote for
hybrid yet...I believe that software is almost done. We
discovered that if the flag is approx. the height it will be
in competition, the flag falls over and nearly touches the
ground when we turn...which is a problem. We never ended up
going to Aviation HS, but we will tomorrow.
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Yeah, yeah, my post is long.
Subteam Updates: 2/16/08
Drivetrain: Took off the polycarbonate on the bridges,
drilled holes in them, and attached the metal plates to hold
the brushes down. Made new skids that are kind of like skiis
and lowered them. They are now a tad bit shorter than 2".
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Software: Worked on drivecode-PID.
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Fabrication: Made the bumpers and painted 1318 on them.
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Driving: We practiced driving in the classroom and then
decided that there wasn't enough room so we drove in the
commons. We tested driving in a straight line, turning, and
using translate mode. Translate mode seemed to work to some
degree. The spring seems to absorb most of the impact of the
ball and the robot doesn't tip over when a ball is thrown at
it or when it's kicked.
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No springs! Heh heh heh heh =].
Subteam Updates: 2/15/08
Drivetrain: Attached one of the three pieces of metal to
protect the electronics during competition. We still have 2
more to attach. We cut the bolts that were too long and kept
hitting one of the brackets [or some part of the robot...]
[I think] . These are basically our shell and seem to be
fairly durable and effective.
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Fabrication: Cut new angle brackets to make the electronics
board more stable so we don't cause it to get loose again
like yesterday... These attached the box beam to the
chassis.
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Software: Worked on the proportionality of the encoder and
other code.
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Only a few more days left and we still haven't had driver
practice =[.
Reminder: The robot is now being picked up by FedEx
somewhere between 2pm-4pm Tuesday February 19th.
Subteam Updates: 2/14/08
The robot drives! Software got the code working well enough
to actually place the robot on the ground and drive it.
Unfortunately, the driving is still extremely difficult and
as a result, we crashed into a table and a few of the bolts
holding the box beams to the electronics boards came loose.
Looks like we still have a lot to accomplish in the next few
days before our ship date.
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Fabrication: Measured and cut pool noodles for the bumpers.
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Drivetrain: Replaced the graphite brushes with the new
copper ones which work better.
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Spirit: Hoodie design basically finalized.
Subteam Updates: 2/13/08
Fabrication: filed the new copper brushes.
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Software: Worked on making the crab modules rotate at the
same speed. Worked on other drivecode too.
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Electronics: Decided to cut a hole into the electronics
board and move the electronics into it so they don't
interfere with the bumpers.
Subteam Updates: 2/12/08
Software: did more testing and fiddling with code
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Drivetrain: determined bumper mounting system, added rail
to the top of the robot
Subteam Updates: 2/11/08
Robot delivered to software team! (which is VERY excited...)
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Drivetrain: finished reassembling the robot, began
constructing supports and discussing and designing shell and
bumpers. Delivered robot to programmers, who for six minutes
were oblivious to said delivery despite the many suppressed
laughs and intense staring by drivetrain.
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Fabrication: evaluated materials on hand for bumpers,
marked and made some pieces for structural supports
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Software: worked on getting PID control for turning wheels
tuned. Found a couple of mechanical problems--ribbed
drivetrain appropriately.
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Electronics: wired motors to the board. Drilled holes into
the polycarbonate for the OI.