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September 14th, 2015
We had a couple of meetings last week to get introduced and get our room set up. Today we discussed rules of the game until everybody understood them. We then began to brainstorm strategies and how we would approach the game. One of the big things we noted about autonomous was that one robot would have to wait for the other to go to the rescue beacon and that that team had to get there and out of the way in 15 seconds or less. Also, that the second team would be unlikely to be able to get on the ramp or climb in autonomous. Tomorrow we will be using last years robot to test timing of how fast we can expect a robot to run the autonomous routines. We are hoping to have a great season for the FIRST team.
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September 15th, 2015
Today we discussed a few strategies for our autonomous mode. We also discussed the different problems we have run into with two robots in our autonomous mode. They could possible run into eachother if we don’t time it right, or if we don’t make our programming accurate enough, also knowing what the other team will do with the possible use of defense. We also discussed options for Tele-op, whether we should focus on picking up debris, or hanging. We made notes on our board to add points together. We discussed if we should make a strong drive train or strong hanging arms.
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September 17th, 2015
Our new game floor mats arrived so today we replaced the mats for the field. The old mats were 9 years old back from when our mentor Mr. Marts started the team in the 2006 season. This is the team’s 10 year anniversary but because this is an 8th & 9th grade team, none of us have been around for more than two years. Over the years, the Junior Bomb Squad has been to World Championships several times. In 2009 they won the World Championship competition. Go to our archives for 2009 season. It was quite a year for the team. Mr. Marts told us that five of the six students on that went on the Bomb Squad FRC Team 16 and as high school seniors won the World Championship in FRC.
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September 21st, 2015
Our field elements for this year’s game came in. We are excited to get them built. We started working on them and it kind of turned into a boys v girls thing. Both teams had one mountain, whoever built the mountains first wins, but we had to save finishing the mountains for tomorrow as we ran out of time. The next day we started to finish the game court and our competition. Since there are three boys and four girls, Mr. Marts worked with the boys. We thought they had an unfair advantage but we kept up with them. The boys couldn’t work together very well. As it turned out we finished at the same time so there was no real winner. We put red and blue tape on the buckets and started/finished putting the ziplines up. We had to retie the ziplines multiple times. We then tied the ziplines to the wall.
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October 1st, 2015
We’ve been brainstorming robot designs for a few days now. Today we rated our designs. We had 3 that rated about the same around 37 and one that rated highest at 43. Somewhere during our brainstorming we decided that the most resource intensive part of the robot will be climbing and hanging and our design ratings reflected that. The design that rated 43 was focused on climbing and hanging and we figured we could add something later to handle debris once we were good at hanging.
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October 5th thru 8th, 2015
Today we began designing the robot in CAD. Since none of us knew how to use CAD software, Mr. Marts ran the computer and designed what we told him. We got the 3D model of the mountain from AndyMark website and placed our lineup of wheels on the rungs to determine how to space them. We were also thinking of how to put our wheels with math to calculate torque and speed necessary to climb up the ramp. Looking at our wheel options we chose the wheels we wanted to use and decided we needed only 5 wheels on each side. Based on the CAD models there will be one spot that the rungs will be close to falling between two sets of wheels but we think it will be ok. We were trying to figure out the prices, sizes, etc. of the parts connected up to the wheels, how many wheels, and basically figuring out how to manage the ramp, which we found a little bit complicated, but it’s a good challenge.
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October 13th, 2015
With our basic design well under way, we determined who was in what groups, and assigned who works on what. One group works with Cad, one for Android Studio/coding, and building /prototyping.
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October 20th, 2015
Last Saturday, Mr. Marts took those who could meet to the Bomb Squad building to use their CNC mill to machine some of our parts. That showed us how a part goes from a drawing to something you can hold in your hand. He ran the machines but taught us step by step how to transfer the files from CAD to CAM software that makes the G-Code to run the mill and how to load it to the mill and set up the part and tools to cut the parts. He bought us lunch while we were there. This was a very fun day. Today we decided to prototype and finish designing the hook for hanging. We had 6 pieces of metal to finish shaping. We had to use the belt sander to make the edges so they don’t cut anybody. Using the sander, we had to shape the curved piece into a curve. We then drilled holes with the drill press and put it together with screws.
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October 22nd, 2015
Today we learned to use, and started to use the 3D printer. Last year, FIRST and Cube gave away like 1500 Ekocycle 3D printers. The team applied for it and were lucky enough to get one but it was after the season so they didn’t get to use it but two of the members are from last year so they get to use it. We tested it to make a spacer for our wheels, and we learned how to import the files from cad, into the 3D printer.
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November 2nd, 2015
I’ve been working closely with Mr. Marts on CAD. Today he surprised me and told me I was driving. I was a little slow at first but he was patient and pretty soon all the things he had been showing me I was doing on my own. We worked on how to visualize the design before we start drawing, what plane to draw on, extrude or revolve and that kind of stuff. This is very exciting and I can’t wait to do more.
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November 10th, 2015
We are beginning to realize we are behind. The tournament is coming up in less than a month and we don’t have the drive train finished yet. We talked about being more efficient at meeting and decided to have all day meeting Monday and Tuesday of Thanksgiving when we are out of school. Mr. Marts said as long as the school janitors are in the building we can be there and work.
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November 16th, 2015
Last Thursday, we started to 3D print the hooks for the arms but when we loaded it to the printer realized it was going to be about a 19 hour print. Mr. Marts took the printer home with him so he could make sure the parts were done for today. The ends of the hooks have to pivot inside two side walls but the clearance was too tight so we had to sand some of the sides walls and hook parts down so the pivoted freely. We adjusted the 3D model so if we have to print more they will come out right next time.
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November 24th, 2015
This is the end of two long days. We are out of school for Thanksgiving but met for about 12 hours yesterday and 9 hours today. We had a lot of work to do and not much time for competition. Mr. Marts made us keep working hard but gave us lunch both days. We are all tired and cranky and worried that our robot isn’t going to be able to climb before the competition. These were two of the most fun days so far.
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December 1st, 2015
Major event today! We hung once! Yay…after flipping the robot over six of seven times. I guess we built a strong robot because we didn’t break anything. Now to pick a driver and operator, and oh yeah, we still have to add something to get the zipline people. Can we postpone the tournament a week or two??????
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FIRST Tech Challenge
