Narrowing in on a final shooter

Today we made more progress on the shooter. We went up to the gym and ran tests at different distances, angles, and power. The results, awesome!

A new video is posted here.

Unfortunately, we spent much of today looking for some encoders that went missing. In the end, we were forced to accept that they had been thrown out in an "empty" box.

We also hung a model two-point goal so we could take some shots.

Testing shooters, building drivetrains, and coding with cameras

Today was another busy one. We continued to work on the drivetrain while another group of kids started putting the finishing touches on our shooter prototype (video below). Still no pictures of our intake/indexer, but we have high hopes that it will be something different, an hopefully effective.

The programming team also continued their work with the camera, trying to get it to recognize rectangles and target them.

Programmers working with the camera.

Our shooter prototype.

Machining!

Our shooter.

A productive night all around

Tonight we got a lot done. From the drivetrain, to the intake, to the CAD, we were productive all around.

Assembling the drivetrain.

Electronics' test kit-bot. Programming was working on camera code.

Will this camera stuff ever work?!

Our shooter. It uses three Banebots, a CIM, and two mini-CIMS.

We are about halfway through build season and boy o' golly, did it go fast! Here is our Week 3 summary Vlog, Thanks!

Closing in on Our FInal Shooters

At the end of week three, we admit we're a little bit behind. But we've also made a lot of progress. We finished our two-wheel, linear shooter today, and it was a huge success. It still needs to be tuned, but we expect great things from it. Video here!

We continued to work on the CAD of the robot and also worked some on the intake. Tomorrow, we are picking up some sheet metal from one of our machining sponsors  GP Precision Inc., while another group of kids will start assembling the drive gearboxes.

Come Monday, we should be in full build mode, and hopefully the final bot will be ready by the end of Week 5! Wish us luck!

A Day of Parties and Robots

Today we had a goodbye party for one of our head mentors, Conor Ryan. He is moving to Cleveland for work and we're sad to see him go. After the party, we got right back to it, working on our shooter. 

The programming team was hard at work today working on camera code, while the business team knocked out all the short essays for the Chairman's submission. The electrical team continued to work on the control board (shown below) and the CAD worked on designing our hopper/ indexer.

Not much new today...

We didn't do many new things today. We continued to build prototype shooters and intake; we're so close to finalizing our designs! Our Week 2 Vlog is up on our YouTube channel.

One of our more successful prototypes.

Another prototype, this one linear.

Our control board mounted on an old kitbot.

Shhh. It's a secret!

Bandsawing like a boss.

Goofing around at Robotics in its finest,

Midterms AND Robotics

Oh boy, it's that time of year again-- midterm exams! The students on 3929 are balancing the rigorous tasks of  both studying and building robots. This week, our goal is to finish our shooter and our intake/hopper. Once we finalize designs, more photos will come.

One of our shooter prototypes.

The programming team.

I wish Banebots posted their CADS.

Our hopper concept.

So Long Week 2

As Week 2 draws to a close, the Atomic Dragons feel ready to take on the next four weeks with enthusiasm and passion!

Week 2 brought many highs and lows. On the plus side, our drive train is all CADed and ready to be manufactured. Also, we have prototyped many different shooters and are almost ready to make a decision. Week 2 also welcomed our new YouTube channel. We will try to keep this updated with vlogs, prototype designs, and maybe even a robot showcase near the end!

On the other hand, we failed to meet some of our goals such as finishing our new website and prototyping indexing methods. Well, mistakes teach us lessons and make us better people. No photos tonight, but hopefully some new videos soon!

Throwback Thursday

Well, throwback Thursdays are coming back! Ok, so we never had them, but we do now!

Today, we'll be looking back at one of our favorite competitions from last year- the Mt. Olive District. At the end of the first day, we were in the bottom ten, but that didn't stop us from winning every single match the next day. Our drivers really stepped up and performed six double balances in a row! Their hard work paid off when Alliance Selection came around. We were selected by team 25 (World Champions) and team 222 to join their alliance.

Our winning streak continued into eliminations, winning six games in a row to capture our first blue banner!

YouTube playlist from Mt. Olive here.

We're getting close...

OK, so today was another day of shooter prototypes. We have been leaning more towards a curved shooter, but we haven't ruled out a linear one either. The video is below. In other, non-technical news, the business team worked a lot on our YouTube channel (Subscribe!) and our new website (frc3929.org).




 
 

Do you even flick?

So, today was a big day for our prototyping team. We finally have a working shooter prototype and boy were we excited. Maybe a little bit too excited. No photos or videos yet, but the team is voting tonight on how much of our designs we should release to the public.

In other news, our YouTube channel is up and running. Check it out here. If we do decide to upload videos of our prototypes, this is where they will be. We already have all of our videos from last year up and we'll continue to post more.

The CADders are still hard at work, today designing motor mounts for a possible intake design.

The programming/electrical team finally won their battle with a pesky gyroscope and got it to work.

Hello Week 2, Hello Drive-train!

We started off week 2 with a bang, the CAD team revealed the drive-train to the rest of us and I have to say it was beautiful! We also worked more on shooter prototypes and on intakes.

1st Week Over

Looking back at our first week of the build season, we're proud of what we've accomplished so far. The CAD for the drive is done, we have a shooter and intake prototype ready to move into the next stage of development, and we have a group of kids who are ready to take on anything that's thrown at them.

Next week are goals are as follows-

• Programming- begin integrating and testing sensors on kitbot
• Electrical- design general control board
• Mechanical- prototyping and field elements
• Business- work on content for new website (frc3929.org - it's still very much indev.)

Not that many photos tonight because so much pf what we did tonight is top secret. Instead, here are some shots from the business team meeting.

Our Robot is Done?

Today was yet another day of prototyping and CADding. The drivetrain CAD is near completion; just a few finishing touches before it is released to the rest of the team tomorrow for critiquing. On the prototyping side of things, we made a lot of headway on one of our intake prototypes and coninued work on some shooters.

 However, the most important thing that happened today was the completion of our robot. In reality, we found a manikin, stuffed a CIM in its arm,  a shirt over its head, a disc in its hand, and a cRio at its feet (it might be under the shirt). Then, we put the bumpers on and we had our robot.

Flying Frisbees Everwhere

Today was all about those discs. We tested three different shooter designs and with all the discs in the air it was hard not to get hit in the head. Our CAD team continued to work on the drivetrain, while all the programmers started working on coding the kitbot and integrating sensors into the code.