Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Team 254, NASA Ames Robotics "The Cheesy Poofs", proudly presents our 2012 robot: Skyfire.




Skyfire will compete at the Silicon Valley Regional, the Central Valley Regional, and the FIRST Championship.

Team 254 is sponsored by NASA Ames Research Center, BAE Systems, Ooyala, Gilbert Spray Coat, Pacific Coast Metal, Good Plastics, Polytec Products, Stalfab, S&S Welding, Modern Machine, Vivid-Hosting, Pricewaterhouse Coopers, Berger Manufacturing, WS Machine, Airtronics, Lumenetix & Bellarmine College Preparatory.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Wow! that is cool!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

that is a beautiful looking machine :yikes:

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Looks like the result of 254 2006 and 254 2009 having a night of passion.

Can't believe it's been 4 weeks of competition season and we are seeing the poofs for the first time. An amazing robot as usual.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Similar to 2056 and 341 but love it. Cant wait to see it in action!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

The wait is finally over!

Is that 6 motors on the drive?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Fantastic! SVR will be fun indeed! :)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

The conveyor system reminds me of the one used by 1747 and 1646 in 2009... the only differences were which direction the shooter was facing and that they were based on wide, not narrow chassis.

IIRC 254's 2009 bot also had a similar system.

Looks like a slick design...

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

We originally had 6 motor drive, but have since pulled the 550s and reallocated them to other places.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Is there a camera anywhere on that beast?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Gorgeous. Well worth the wait.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

This is about the sleekest robot I've ever seen. (Well, barring 254/968's 2008 robots.) Good luck at SVR and Central Valley!

I too wonder about the location of the camera on this robot.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Video or it doesn't exist :)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Nice looking bot! Video to follow? :D

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

If Pat, Tom, and the rest of the 254 crew is alright with it, I do have video of Skyfire and Encore from a few weekends ago.

If you guys have a reveal video in the works, I'll save it.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

The plan is for a reveal video to be released in the next week or so. The whole team has been iterating like crazy to boost the performance of this machine and we haven't had time to make the video quite yet.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Nice looking robot as usual. I can't wait to see it perform at SVR. The intake is (very) similar to 971's, and still a very good idea. What's your shooter setup, and what kind of ball detection do you have in the belts? Our programmers had me include over a dozen limit switches this year, and they are some of the most annoying things on the robot.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

We will have something to come after SVR.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I have been waiting for this one for awhile. It looks incredibly similar to 1538's robot http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...highlight=1538 with the exception of the pickup in the back.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Your bumper mounts look interesting, care to detail what you use?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Great looking machine, I can't wait to see it in action. Will there be a release of the build blog again this year?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

All i have to say is "wow". That thing looks amazing, best of luck at SVR, CVR, & Champs. :)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Am I really tired, or did I not see a camera on the robot?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

We will likely do that at the end of the season.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I saw a camera temporarily attached right in front of the flywheel of their practice bot last week.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

looks like it can do a lot... can it fly? ;)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

A temporarily mounted camera points to a potentially under-developed autoaim and autopower software. In my experience, these two pieces of code can make a decent robot a superior robot. I know that the Space Cookies were having difficulties with their code at Davis, which could imply similar difficulties for the Cheesy Poofs. Anyone from 254 care to comment on the software features of this robot?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

We'll show you...

In two days ;)

at any rate, it's our opinion that relying on technology to improve your driver is a bad thing. We utilize the camera, but it will not make or break us.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I really want a closeup of the linkage in the bridge manipulator, curious what the motion path of it deploying looks like.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Awesome looking robot.

Some thoughts:

1. That bridge handler/ ball collector looks farily optimized to take balls off the bridge in auto with little effort.

2. There appears to be lots of room for a bridge balancer on this robot. Knowing 254...

3. two position hood means they shoot from the front of the fender and from the key.

4. Those "legs" on the collector maybe also somehow act as an incline to help the robot get over the barrier?

5. I'm glad we don't have to worry about playing that robot this week!

Regards, Bryan

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

They don't need a camera, they just use their brains. who cares if it takes 3 times as long for a lower quality.

looks good though i wonder is balls can fall in the electrical panel.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I'm looking forward to seeing this in person at Championship.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Looks great, can't wait to see it on Thursday!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I like this attitude. My opinion on vision targeting is that it's something to do if your programmers have nothing else to do. Even so, most years it's a waste of time. This year I was so sure that vision targeting would be necessary, and it turns out it is not.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

When do programmers have nothing to do??? :confused:

Anyways, great robot 254! You never fail to impress me! This just makes me want SVR to come that much more.

See you, and Skyfire, in a few days!

Also....what's with the wedgetop tread? Going away from blue nitrile for some reason?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Funny you say this. In the past, software augmentation of the driver seemed to be a large part of 254's success. For example, 2011's "90 degree turn" feature allowed the robot to turn under software control. A human driver simply wouldn't have been able to react as fast as the C-Rio, because of your drive train's crazy speed.

I do look forward to seeing you preform at SVR, camera software or no. As everyone's said, this looks like an extremely strong robot.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

In 2011, we did not have any drivetrain automation in teleoperated mode and our drivers had no issue turning under speed. The one exception is that the auto-score routine would back up the robot slightly after a tube was scored on the bottom rack (but scoring on the bottom rack was rare for us). We have advanced control software designed to make the drivers' lives easier but we avoid removing control from the driver.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Thank you for the correction. I guess I was mistaken.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

There's a difference between software that acts as a crutch and software that enables a good driver to do more things.

We prefer the latter.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

How many hours did cory spend on the CNC this year?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Looking good :)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Sounds like you are taking the "Boeing" approach to controls as opposed to the "Airbus" approach (in terms of who has ultimate control)... I like it.

Especially if the only shots are from the key and fender, to be resonably sucessful, all one needs is a good driver, a live camera feed with crosshairs (I wrote code for that last year), and decent shooter controls via a turret or super-fine drivetrain control and a decent combination of coarse and fine shoot trajectory controls. All in all, not that much compared to full auto camera code.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I've spent the last 10 minutes trying to figure out if this picture is a render, a photo, or some kind of combination.

I still have no idea. Some parts just look too perfect to be a photo.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Will those controls allow the driver to deliberately miss? That would be kind of analogous to how Boeings are more willing to let you depart controlled flight (with persistent warnings); Airbuses will just refuse those commands.

In truth, on both aircraft types, the computers are firmly in charge of the fly-by-wire controls. Boeings just provide tactile feedback through the yoke and throttles; Airbuses don't.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

254 isn't just good at building their robot. They're also good at taking pictures of it.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I can't figure out the timeframe either. Looking at the polycord, pneumatic cylinders, and some other things, it looks impossible to be real. But then looking at the bumpers, it looks too real to be rendered. This can't be their competition bot (yet anyway), but that plastic looks too perfect to have been used for practice.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

The picture was taken on ship day of the competition bot. It will look a little different after some modifications are performed on Thursday at SVR.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

But...but...Skyfire was an Autobot! :p You must be using the he was originally deceived by the Decepticons loophole. /80'snerd

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

He was originally a Decepticon.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I really love how this robot resembles your 2006 machine but is a totally different beast in itself. You guys have really outdone yourselves in terms of robot finishing this year, I believe.

Out of curiosity, how do you intend on using your open hopper? Is it for catching your own missed shots, human loading (ala 2006) or both/neither?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Something tells me the bot competing this weekend will have improvements to make it even more deadly than the one we're seeing here :rolleyes:

Awesome job as usual Poofs. Your robots are some of the most beautiful pieces of technology assembled in FIRST.

Good luck in the next 2 weeks, your east coast friends on 125 are pulling for you.

-Brando

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Bridge mechanism - I'm calling it.

But wait! Why is it on the blue alliance?!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

meh, I guess it's OK...:rolleyes:

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I would not say it is necessary, but to reach a high shot accuracy, camera auto aim is a must.

We tried having our driver (who is quite good) aim it himself. It took much more time, and yielded much less accurate results then using the auto aim. This could be very bot specific, but this is how it has worked out for us.

Looking forward for the reveal video guys!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Beautiful machine. I too am interested in how you guys are going to use your hopper.

Looks like there's room for a stinger on there too.

Congrats guys, I see a return to Einstein again in your future.

-Nick

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

The two-tone effect of a blue frame with smokey polycarb is always a really nice effect that highlights the elegance of the 'Poof bots. I really like how it looks as if it could be sold as a product.

Now for some fun speculation:

1.) The drive train looks like it'd bottom out on the bump -- the wheels are too small and spaced too far apart. Of course, it does look like they could put 6" wheels on there without a problem.

2.) It looks like the legs on the bridge lowerer have an extra hole. The Cheesy Poofs don't usually do random extra holes. I expect some 'secret' manipulator will go here...

3.) Given the pneumatic cyllinder that lowers the intake, and the fact that the balls rely on the bumper for lift into the robot, I don't know if this robot can pick up directly from the bridge. The legs will always go to the ground, and the angle of the bridge may cause too much compression on the balls that are on the bridge for them to come into the robot. This is at first study though, so who knows.

4.) This bot will possibly be the best 'rebounder' bot in the game, given the open hopper in the front. The rebounds may be rare, but they'll be pretty awesome to see if they look like they're done on purpose.

I look forward to seeing this bot in person!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I would expect them to have something similar to 971 and 1868...a chassis lift skid to let them absolutely fly over the barrier.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Bet you their ball manipulator appendage doubles as a bridge manipulator and possibly something to pull other bots up the bridge, similar to 1114's, as seen in this video (http://youtu.be/-QTX__5JzN) at 4:14

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

You don't need a camera to have extremely high accuracy (but it certainly helps increase confidence in ramping up throughput).

If you have a repeatable shooter, then pick your hot spots on the field, line up, and execute the shot the same way every. single. time. Practice makes perfect.

Every shot our robot took in the Wisconsin finals was manually aimed, with no camera present on the robot. We hit every shot we took and made at least 5 shots in each match. Tyler, our pilot, found an aiming method in the semis that is very intuitive for him, one he is eager to continue using. Now he just has to collect ammo better/faster so we can fire more salvos. I'm actually impressed by what he can do with our *piddly* little single-wide inside the frame perimeter collection method, but I know we can do better - guess what we're working on this week? :)

A skilled and practiced drive team (I can't imagine how much practice time 254's crew has been getting at home!) operating a machine with the potential capability like 254's could do even more damage in full manual due to faster/easier collecting and shorter times between salvos (provided the ammo is there to collect). I have no doubt that 254's machine can be killer when manually aimed.

Now develop this kind of manual driver skill and then add a layer of automatic aiming control on top of it, with the ability to quickly bypass the system during any malfunctions? Then you are truly deadly.

Think of it as Top Gun for robots *flashbacks to 2004 IRI talent show*. Don't rely upon missiles only. Learn how to dogfight and maneuver for a shot.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Myself and another mentor on 2826 argued this on several occasions leading up to the Wisconsin regional. Since on our practice field, vision targeting was working perfectly, it seemed a moot point.

Upon arriving at WI, we immediately had issues with our vision and the FMS interfacing in an unknown manner, forcing us to abandon vision tracking. Using the Axis camera and a well calibrated crosshair on the DS, we were able to score an average of 11 3 pt shots from the key through elims with a max of 13 made of 16 shot (last 3 missed accounted to driver pulling away as shots were fired).

Basically, I second that vision as an augmentation can be a benefit, but a well trained drive crew can pull off some amazing things when push comes to shove.

Good luck with Skyfire. The poofs are undoubtedly a role model for us all!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

100% agree with this statement

Totally thought it was a rendering as well. Crazy.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

I can give a bit more insight into how our software process works.

For the most part, we try to find mechanical solutions to everything. Once we get our robot to the point where extra mechanics and driver practice starts to result in diminishing returns, we start adding automation on top. We try not to do anything in software that the driver can't do on their own, in case of failures. It would be terrible for our camera to come unplugged during finals and be a sitting duck because of it. Sure, the software will make it faster, but that's just gravy once you have a properly trained operation crew.

We do have auto aim on our robot. We use it in autonomous and the driver has a button to activate it in teleop. To tell you the truth though, he hasn't really needed to use it. Between intuition, practice, and a live feed from the camera back to the DS, auto aim doesn't save enough time to justify the risk of practicing with it. We plan on improving this part of the code as time goes on and maybe our strategy will change, but for now it makes sense to give more practice cycles to the drivers than the programmers.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

A few quick fixes were made in Photoshop to make some of the weird looking things appear correct, but this is what it looks like inside the bag for the most part. I did some color corrections and some minor touch ups, but this picture is 95% as-photographed. The practice bot is beat up and abused in comparison.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

No surprises, the Poofs have a beautiful looking robot. I have one question for you (and any other teams that have a hopper.) Is there any worry of incurring a G22 by balls falling into the hopper when you already have three? Is there some mechanism I'm not seeing that prevents this?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

It appears that your video link is broken... :(

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Is all the tubing on that bot 1/16" wall? How light is this guy?

Beautiful machine yet again.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

With all the planned updates SKYFIRE is going to be a heavy weight.

EDIT: The drive chassis is mostly 1/8" wall and the super structure is almost exclusively 1/16" wall

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

It looks like most of the upper structure is all 2"x1" tubing...I've only found that in 1/8" wall. Did you guys find that type of extrusion in 1/16" wall?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Yes. It is very common and can be found at almost any metal supplier (at least around here). Online places like McMaster often do not have it.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Cory beat me to it.

And absolutely awesome robot you guys. Inspiring as always, I can only dream that my team one day will be able to produce a machine of such elegance but that is why we do this. Cannot wait to see it on the webcast.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Interesting. Thanks. The supplier I go through only has 1/8" wall...I'll have to do some hunting.

p.s. great bot guys. very clean and looks like it will be killer as always. i'll be by in st. louis to check it out.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Is it 6061 or 6063? (Online Metals and many others have it it in 6063-T5 or -T52, which aren't especially strong compared to 6061-T6 or similar.)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

6061.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Finding 1/16" wall 2x1 extrusion in Georgia is nigh impossible. It seems all you Cali teams grab it all up out there.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

If u have any engineering companies for soponsors, ask them if they use it and if they do, how they get it. companies often learn about side channels that can be used.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Same up here as well. All we've managed to find are a few places willing to do it as a custom extrusion.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

As is also the case in Ohio.

Maybe we're overlooking the obvious thing to do - request that 254 contact their metals source and see if they can offer the material for sale to other teams?

Looking at their robot pic and the sponsors on the side, you might also be able to guess which of them are the likely sources of their metal materials. ;)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

We buy our 6061 from Coast Aluminum, a chain with a number of locations on the west coast.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

For those in the Los Angeles area,

We order from Coast Aluminum as well they have a warehouse right next to... Mcmaster-Carr!!! Totally a dangerous combination! here is the url http://www.coastaluminum.com/

Though for our 2x1x1/16th we have been using a small outfit in American International Metals in Anaheim. They have been great to the team. http://www.americaninternationalmetals.com/

For those of you out of state I do know these places will ship orders. I would suggest ordering prior to the build season. We ordered a bunch of thin tubed material prior to the season. As we typically use thin walled 1x1 or thin walled 2x1. We know eventually it will get all used!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

We're going to start doing that. It seems difficult to get 6061 .062" wall 1x1 down here as well without shipping it.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

They also have the infamous 2x2x1/16" wall.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

nice

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Another Coast Aluminum customer here. Difficult to get a receipt out of those folks. Insanely high prices for small orders too. But, they have what we need and deliver it to my shop floor.

Coast Aluminum for open shapes, Fry Steel for solid shapes (SO inexpensive).

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Why is that infamous?

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Its practically the holy grail of aluminum tube. Nearly impossibe to find.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Hmm sorry.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QTX_...ideo&lr=1&ob=0

Heres this.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Confirmed, saw it in action today.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Wow, look who was right? ;)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

How useful are these (on 1114 or 254)? Are they actually pulling up their alliance partner? Or is it primarily a way to stay together/not tip off opposite ends of the bridge? (Or something else?)

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong but, I believe, at least in the case of 1114's, it makes double balancing much, much easier. If you look at how it's used it essentially allows one robot to do all of the balancing work versus having two independently moving machines.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

This robot is so much smaller in person...

Good luck today 254! We'll be cheering for you!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Not all that dificult... we got some from Alan Steel. Although we had some issues with crushing, it has helped us drop 3 pounds!

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

This isn't my experience with them at all, when we order a single tube we still get free shipping and the same price as when we order $5k.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Interesting. One of my orders with them came to over $11/lb for what I ordered (6061 box tubing, just a couple 20ft pieces). I had three orders and never received a receipt for any of them until after numerous requests for them. Perhaps it's a difference between credit card purchases and account purchases.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Same here, the fresno branch has been quite friendly and more than helpful to us.

-RC

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Sooo is there any video of this machine out there yet? I'm dying to see it :D

I have one or two questions about it but those could potentially be answered by video so I'm waiting to see one.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

There are a few, though unfortunately too few, videos of eliminations at SVR on youtube. QFs show them shooting exclusively from the key, Semis are entirely from the fender, and I believe Finals were a little bit of both.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

604 should have vids of SVR up soon.

-RC

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Video of 254

Heres some video of them at SVR last week.

Re: Team 254 Presents: Skyfire
 

Found this video today: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjDQWCc-HSE