View Full Version : What does your team do during the first few days?
Al Skierkiewicz
30-12-2002, 08:23
Since kickoff is coming soon, I mean REAL SOON, it might be interesting to teams on what your team does in the first days following kickoff...
Wildstang does a whole team approach on brainstorming starting on Sunday. All team members, volunteers and parents and siblings are invited to come and analyze the problem, scoring and robot needs. All ideas are recorded and reviewed over the next several days and prototyping will begin as well. We are lucky to have a "field team" which will start making field pieces on Saturday so that we can have an idea of what the playing field will look like and the problems the robot will encounter during play.
Mike Martus
30-12-2002, 11:11
That is almost a carbon copy of what we do. The goal is to have a basic design and understand the game by Wednesday following the kick off. Making styrofoam models to play the game is very important.
Well, we watch the thingy on NASA and we all leave. We skip suunday, to give everyone time to decide firmly on what they believe is the best approach. Monday we break up into teams of 5 people(5-7 of them) and each small team decided what is the best approach between itself, and then the whole group comes together and each team presents it's idea, then we vote on the best, then we have several rebutals to the idea(sometimes someone see's a major fault in an idea that noone else does) if the rebutals are strong enough we re-vote on the design. The whole process took just over a week last year, and it's by far the funnest part of the whole building process i think.
sanddrag
30-12-2002, 12:56
We set it up pretty formally like this. I really hate how legislatively and formally everything is done on our team bu it is probably for the better. Keeps the slack off students in line I suppose.
Our build season starts at 6:30 am on Saturday January 4. We will meet here at Clark (unless there is a problem with getting the video feed) and watch the Kickoff until 9 am. After a short break, we will carry out some activities designed to help us understand the game and to begin to understand the characteristics we want our robot to have. This will go on until approximately 5:00 pm or a little later.
On Sunday we will meet from noon until about 5 pm. We will continue to refine our desired characteristics of the robot and we will break up into smaller groups to begin the process of creating proposals (designs) to be presented to the executive committee (Veteran Members) on Wednesday.
On Monday and Tuesday, space will be provided for you to continue to meet in your small groups, creating your designs, from 3 until 8 PM. You don't need to be here the whole time, but you may if you need to.
On Wednesday you may work here from 3 until 5;45. At 6:00 proposals will be presented to the executive committee. The committee will decide which plan or plans will be refined further.
On Saturday 1/11, the executive committee will make final decisions
leading to work groups.
From this time on until February 18 we will meet on Saturdays from 8:30 until approx 5:00 pm and Tuesday from 6:00 pm until 8:00 pm at a minimum. Subgroups are likely to meet at other times during that period as well.
We will not take design proposals from anyone who misses the first Saturday or Sunday. Only first year students will be allowed to make presentations on Wednesday night. This means that veteran students who have ideas will have to develop them with first year students who will then present. All decisions will be made by the executive committee of 5 students made up of veterans and subject to veto by the adults.
We're going to try something a little different this year.
Jan. 4, Day One: Pick up kits and have evening kick off party. Watch NASA video taped earlier in the day. Disseminate rules to most of the team. Go through the bins of parts and get a viceral idea of what we have to work with.
Depending on how many people show up to the kick off, we may start brainstorming right then.
Jan. 5, Day Two: Make major drive train decisions (ie shift or not, gear ratio, motors to use). Complete basic frame, controller box, battery mounting design.
Jan. 6, Day Three: Start building controller box and battery tray. Start gear box design. Assign major sub-system designs to sub-groups for brain-storming on how to do them.
By the end of the first week, we should have picked our sub-systems and have a good idea on what we will be doing there and have them assigned to the "engineer in charge" to carry on. We should be building our drive system, base platform, controller box, battery tray and starting to wire the controller box connectors, test the speed controllers, sensors, et al. We should also be starting our operator interface design and build.
On field pieces, we may begin building "critical artifacts." However, from past experience, we don't usually need actual field pieces till about week five or six. This year, we're going to focus on getting our drive system up and running by week two-three to the exclusion of all else. At the end of every competition season, we've complained, "if only we had our drive system running by week three, we would have discovered all these little problems and been able to correct them." This year, we're going to try to "make it so."
Although we will have "locked in" some critical design decisions real quick, the only restrictions on the sub-system designs will be mounting points and non-availability of some resources. These activities (continued strategy brain-storming, determination of which modules to go to final design with) should continue well into week three. Hopefully by week three-six we will only be spending time on design and fab of our modules and not on working on our drive system.
Andrew
Team 356
A team member is going to record the NASA TV broadcast to VHS while teachers and myself attend the remote kick-off in Brooklyn.
After we've picked up the kit and head back out onto the Island, the team will assemble in the school and watch the kick off video together. Then, we will go over the game rules, scoring, and its strategy. Saturday, we will discuss strategy alone - as I found last season that some students on the team didn't grasp the concept of the game until weeks after regionals began. This year, I want to make sure that everyone understands the nuances of scoring so as to be sure that mechanism designs are coming from knowledgeable groups with an understanding of how to play the game.
I'm a rogue; an outlaw. . . I operate above the law, so I'll probably start designing things as I drive back from kick off ;)
On Sunday, we will meet again to discuss mechanism design. Small groups will spend some time discussing possibilities and creating rough mock ups from card stock. Sunday evening, they will present their concepts to the larger group.
The veterans from last season and myself will likely discuss these concepts' feasibility, potential, and and aggravation factor. From there, I hope we'll reach a concensus regarding design strategy. If not, the veterans will make the final decision. Last year, I decided on the design. This year, they've earned the right to make that decision themselves.
By midweek, we'll iron out specific plans of attack. We'll determine the style or category of each mechanism that needs to be design (4WD, Basket vs. Direct Feed Ball Collection, etc.)
By Friday, the drivetrain and frame will be designed. (That's a personal goal, really.) By the following Saturday night, I'll have a clear idea of each mechanism that will end up on the robot. On Sunday night, I'm moving to Seattle. :)
Then, a lot of long distance collaboration begins.
Yan Wang
30-12-2002, 14:10
Sunday, us few (5) elite members of the team are gathering at one of our homes. We're going to watch the taped NASA broadcast, then rip through the parts and rules. We'll discuss pretty much everything we can and need to discuss before presenting it monday afternoon to the rest of the team. Can't have those noobs messing around with it first! :D
Saturday, we will discuss strategy alone - as I found last season that some students on the team didn't grasp the concept of the game until weeks after regionals began. This year, I want to make sure that everyone understands the nuances of scoring so as to be sure that mechanism designs are coming from knowledgeable groups with an understanding of how to play the game.
This year, we're going to have two written tests, one on the game rules, the other on strategy. Those who want to be part of the strategy sessions or driving squad are going to have to score a minimum on these tests.
We've had the same problem every year, where even the drivers have not necessarily read the rules!
Andrew
Team 356
jonathan lall
30-12-2002, 17:20
We're very informal as compared to other teams. Basically, we take a break after the kickoff and the 'team leaders' convene at a central place (this may happen differently now that the EduBot competition is going on, so we may do something different). Usually what happens is we sit around looking at the kit and discussing potential strategies and basically how the game works. Last year for example, we figured out all the types of robots there'd be, contrasted that with how we'd work cooperatively, and basically calculated throught logic and math what would be ideally the best way to go. This of course changes later on in subsequent brainstorming meetings where the team splits up into groups and offers ideas. For the first week, no prototypes are built, and nothing is assembled (except perhaps the gearbox, which is ongoing).
Melissa Nute
30-12-2002, 17:26
Saturday we all meet at one of our sponsors in a conferance room to watch the kickoff, its mandatory to attend so that everyone can know what this year's game is from the beginning. When we get home saturday we are suppose to think of ideas and such in order to dicuss and plan sunday at our planning meeting.
DJSKRABL22
30-12-2002, 19:51
eh u know, we just sort of chill. No pressure. :cool:
On Saturday, myslef two other students and an adult will be attending the San Jose Remote Kickoff site. We will then come back to either SLAC (Our sponsor) or the school to inform the rest of the team of the game. we will then decide what general functions we want the robot to do, ex: pick up balls, handle goals, etc. On sunday, the entire team will meet to barianstorm mechanisms that will complete our shosen task. monday-friday of the first week, a few select students and advisors will start designing the actual mechanisms. after that we will protoype/build the base/drivetrain, move on to manipulators, and then any extras, then testing and driver training
Cory
For the first few days after kickoff, we split into 2 groups: the field building group, and the strategy group. The field building group machines the parts, and assembles the field. While the strategy group decides what our robot will do this year.
Originally posted by Mike Martus Making styrofoam models to play the game is very important.
Heck. We don't stop at styrofoam, last year we build two full goals. It took forever because we had to re-cut the threads on all the flanges by hand :)
Aaron Lussier
30-12-2002, 23:56
Well the way were doing it this year is:
Day 1: Go to BAE to watch live satellite broadcast, then take lunch to think about different aspects of the game, after lunch the entire team gets together in one big room to talk about the simple stuff relating to the game i.e. Wheels or Treads, Shift or no shift and basic chassis designs, we see what needs to be done to score points and then decide roughly what we want our robot to do, then we split in to groups to go in to deeper designs, grabbers, pincher lifters, launcher.. whatever
Day 2 - Day 5: The teams design the specific robot that they think will be the best robot for the job, each part is brought before a committee of engineers and veteran students to see if with what drafting hours we have and what machine shop hours we have, they ask will we be able to do this under budget.
Day 6: The designs that passed are brought before the entire team,only new student can make the presentations of there teams robot, then the team votes on the best parts of all designs and puts them together
Day 7- Shipping: Draw all parts, make all parts, make all parts fit, wire, and hopefully test.
usagi1483
31-12-2002, 00:03
We like to get the whole team together at the shool where we build and we connect a proxima to the computer and the whole team will watch the broadcast to start brain storming.
After the broadcast we will talk about it for a little bit, and then it is off to the University of Miami Convocation center for Fund Raising.
The following monday after classes all the students mentors engineers coaches and parents will come and we start to vote on what the best approaches are. :D
SlamminSammy
31-12-2002, 00:25
In the past: nothing. This year, however, we made a resolution to finish the robot AND test it before it ships. Therefore, we will meet and watch the kickoff together Saturday morning and brainstorm strategy that afternoon. Within 1 week, we hope to know what the robot will do and how.
Wow, all of you teams seem to get the whole thing done rather quick, and perhaps hasty. My team takes a week or week and a half just to decide strategy, then we spend the next week discusing robot design then the next 2 weeks prototyping. It just seems kinda pre-mature to be prototyping and even wiring and testing in 7 days like some teams say they do.
Robb Gerber
31-12-2002, 00:46
Our whole team will be at the Ontario Science Center for the live kickoff and eating Krispy Kremes as we wait for our kits.
This year we're going to organize the design process by grouping people into sub-design teams. Rather than having the regular groups get together they'll be split up and mixed so that there'll be someone from media. mobiltity, function, game crew, etc in each desing group.
This will give everyone a chance to work together with other people they'd usually not have a chance to.
All the design teams will present their ideas/ models and after all
the ideas are in everyone on the team will vote with post-its.
Got this idea from the people at IDEO (www.ideo.com)
Goal/ Game Stuctures are also built during the first week.
By Wed/Thurs the robot requirements will have been developed-
this includes the mobility chassis, drivetrain, function, and strategy. Prototyping will occur for the next 3-4 days during which time the parts for the drivetrain get ordered and its Fab begins. If the designs workout we'll be fabbing during the week 2 & 3.
Originally posted by Gope
Wow, all of you teams seem to get the whole thing done rather quick, and perhaps hasty. My team takes a week or week and a half just to decide strategy, then we spend the next week discusing robot design then the next 2 weeks prototyping. It just seems kinda pre-mature to be prototyping and even wiring and testing in 7 days like some teams say they do.
You build your robot in TWO WEEKS?!?!?!?!?!? that is crazy. we spent four building ours, and it still wasnt running when we shipped it, although we did waste time on a turret and tether tat never worked. Still two weeks!!! how do you get any testing/driver training done?
well, we used the same driving style as a robot we built in a previous year so the drivers practiced the basics on the old robot while the new robot wasnt available....2 weeks isnt bad, as long as u have sound prototypes that work very well, all u have to do is go re-machine them with some very minor tweaks and then bolt them all together....
i also wana say(not to brag on my team), that our driver, Lance Taylor, was one of the best drivers i saw all year long....GO LANCE
hacksaw692
31-12-2002, 02:09
well, this year we're kind of starting off a new...
friday: there's a meeting and i hope to have everyone separated into sub-groups. i know, should've had that done earlier, but due to circumstances, that didn't happen...
saturday: four of us are going to san jose for the remote kick off to pick up the kit. it would be nice to have everyone together to see the live broadcast, but the school is closed during the holidays. someone else's house would be out of the question since we are a commuter school. so i'm hoping that anyone who can watch it is going to watch it and record it.
two friends (lead strategist and programmer) are going to spend the night at my house so that we can go over the maual thoroughly together and start some early plans. i can already tell that it's going to be a long night...
sunday: we are meeting at our worksite and (hopefully) watching the recoded broadcast. those of us at the kick off will explain any extra things about the game. we'll start brain storming all the possibilities. just basically get all the ideas out in the open and leave them to settle over night.
then for the next 5 days after school, we'll narrow down the ideas. pick what functions we want the robot to do and start designing what it will look like. there will be also a group to prepare anything needed for the field (goals, ramps, etc etc).
by that saturday, hopefully (if all goes well) we'll get the drive train started. if not, at least buy anything needed. i guess we shall see though...
everyother week after that will depend on what we want the robot to do...
Rich Wong
31-12-2002, 11:08
[QUOTE]Originally posted by M. Krass
[B]A team member is going to record the NASA TV broadcast to VHS while teachers and myself attend the remote kick-off in Brooklyn.
-------------------------------------------------
Bring an A/V cable, the NYC R-Kickoff MAY have a place for you to connect your recorder.
They are working really hard on adding additional output jacks (RCA) from the Satellite downlink.
:D
Originally posted by Rich Wong
[QUOTE]Originally posted by M. Krass
[B]A team member is going to record the NASA TV broadcast to VHS while teachers and myself attend the remote kick-off in Brooklyn.
-------------------------------------------------
Bring an A/V cable, the NYC R-Kickoff MAY have a place for you to connect your recorder.
They are working really hard on adding additional output jacks (RCA) from the Satellite downlink.
:D
Okay, great :) Thanks for the head's up. I'll try to swipe a VCR that isn't being used and bring it along.
jonathan lall
31-12-2002, 13:41
Originally posted by Robb Gerber
Our whole team will be at the Ontario Science Center for the live kickoff and eating Krispy Kremes as we wait for our kits.
No Krispy Kremes this year. I know, the highlight of last kickoff is missing, but the Science Centre is catering. :mad:
BBFIRSTCHICK
31-12-2002, 20:26
What Team #1077 (former members of Team #59) are going to do the first few days are. On Saturday we are going to meet once our adults get back from the remotoe kick off. We all will then go over the game and start throwing out ideas for how the bot is going to be designed. On Sunday we will continue to do what we were doing the previous day, and we will begin building our to scale model of the playing field. That's about it... So the first week ideas, and designs will be thrown around. At the end of week one going into week two is when all the fun stuff begins. We all split up into our separate teams (Mechanical, Electrical, ect) and get to work!
-adriana
PatMoran
03-01-2003, 23:49
First, we go to BAE to watch a telecast of the kick off, then we go back to FIRST Base (our meeting place, the school has no room) and eat lunch while tossing around ideas.
Then we split into basically two groups. The first, GOD Squad (Governing, Objectives, Driving) frantically memorizes the BIG BOOK. The rest is the brainstorming team, they go over the basics and think of what best ways to approach the game.
Then we write down on a huge piece of paper what functions our robot could perform, and later slim down the list according to the best strategy to win the game the GOD Squad came up with during the memorization process.
It' s a crazy process: organized on paper, frantic in action, and constantly changing.
DanLevin247
04-01-2003, 00:11
Well, in typical 247 fashion, it will be a disorganized mess for the majority of the time. That problem has always plagued our team.
Although once class has met and we have some ideas in our heads, and we go to U of D ( local college where we actually build our robot ) We talk more in depth and in a less hectic manner, and actually get out stuff together, and hopefully like last year, make something great.
Jay TenBrink
05-01-2004, 22:06
Sat. am we will attend the remote kick-off. Later in the afternoon the whole team will replay the tape of the kick-off and we will have some discussion about the game, rules, scoring, etc. over pizza. Homework is to absorb everything you can and start incubating ideas.
Sun the exec committee will meet for some general discussions regarding game rules and strategy, likely 'bot construction variants, the field, etc.
Mon. The whole team will brainstorm how to play the game: offense -vs- defense, autonomous mode, etc. The team will reach a consensus on our "functional objectives:.
Tues. The whole team will brainstorm robot designs and construction methods to accomplish the functional objectives set on Mon. and decide on a design direction.
Wed. - Thurs A full scale mock-up is built of the entire robot and the various detail sections that will help to prove out the design concepts. This will be made of wood and foam core board held together with screws and hot melt glue.
Fri. A representative section of the field is complete, and a review of our functional objectives takes place. Overall design concept is critiqued, and we prep for a multi-team design review on Sat. Components are ordered and hard design begins. Whew!
danielkitchener
05-01-2004, 22:11
Curl up in a fetal position, cry, whimper, and pray that the Gods of FIRST give us some sort of inspiration. Then, we put off the inevitable and finish up the robot last-minute.
Marygrace
05-01-2004, 22:35
Right after the kickoff airs we watch it again and then people can ask questions if they dont understand something that someone else does about the game. Then normally once we all understand the game to its full extent, our two mentors return with our kit, we go through everything that is in it and invetory it all....(Dont know how to spell it) Then we go around the room and everyone has to give an idea, no matter how crazy, every idea is considered. This part is meant for like inspiration for the next thing. We then go into groups and come up with a general design as a group, so then we have the designs narrowed down to about 6 or 7. A person from each group presents it, then we all vote on the best designs. We could get 2 or 3, or if we are lucky we all agree on one. But if not we discuss wut could be elaborated on each design, the pros and cons. Usually imbetween all of this we get off the subject of the design and talk about the strategy. We always plan to have a general design and general groups decided for who is going ot work on wut by the end of Sat. We have a head student and mentor for each group. We chose those based on who can be there almost everyday that we have build season meetings. And it is required for everyone to be in a robotic group, (Like drive system, electronics, etc) and a non-robotic group (Fundraising, spirit, Chairmans award, etc) Then on Sun. we are in the auto shop, we all discuss wut each group needs to accomplish and get the design more detailed. Then each group breaks off, works on their part. Getting it drawn out and stuff. Actually, usually sunday, the mentors kind of get distracted because they think up ideas over night and discuss them and all of the engineers are debating and coming up with ideas. I love how excited mentors get, they love this just as much as we do, and that is a GREAT thing. By the end of the weekend we have our design and we start building prototypes on Mon. CAN'T WAIT TILL KICK OFF!!!
BTW
You build your robot in TWO WEEKS?!?!?!?!?!? that is crazy. we spent four building ours, and it still wasnt running when we shipped it, although we did waste time on a turret and tether tat never worked. Still two weeks!!! how do you get any testing/driver training done?
I SECOND THAT! Two weeks is crazy. Wit us changing our design through out the build period (Like changing the frame design four times, every time right after i finish welding the previous, URGGGG) LOL
Yeah, two weeks? we would die. Even with the five weeks we spend prototyping and building we still end up staying up till like 2 in the morning, some do all nighters during tha last week. (Bless everyone that did that one all nighter before the practice comp, they didn't get sleep for 36 hrs) Yep.......I can't do that, i stayed till two and i was still like dead. LOL, i fell asleep in the middle of the pits while everyone was cleaning up. k....Ill stop going off subject now. LOL
MichalSkiba
07-01-2004, 22:02
We're going to do the same as last year: we'll pull a massive all weekender (we meet to depart for the competion at 7:30am on Saturady and go to sleep at 7pm on Sunday). Following the kickoff, we go over to someone's house and dump all of the kit parts onto thier living room rug and start brainstromming. On that weekend, which ends up being an exec meeting after the first 6 hours, we decide on a drive system and what game strategy we want to persue. On Monday we'll inform the rest of the team and finalize from there.
New approach --> !!! No design idea can be presented without coresponding scale drawings in CAD or on graph paper !!!
Our goal is to have the ENTIRE robot on paper before we start. We're hoping that with a clear plan we can build the robot in 1-2 weeks (seriously, we could have built last year's robot in a week had be CADed everything). It will save us time for making spares, we'll be focused and we'll be able to distribute our tasks better.
Our current schedule is: 1 week design. 4 weeks build. 1 week test. [if we can't design it in one week, its too complicated to build in 4, so we leave it for next year :D ]
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