Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

Our shooter wasn't elevating to the right angle when we were prepping our bot for a bedford district match, so the programming team was called over to address the issue in the queue. I go down there and upon close inspection, i see a piece of metal that our potentiometer for shooter angle feedback was attached to is completely bent inwards. After locating a pair of clamps from our alliance partners and a little elbow grease the angle was back withing a few degrees tolerance.

What's your best impromptu fix?

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

There probably be a giant list of all the ugly pool noodle extensions everybody made to stop FCS robots from destroying them.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

If I remember correctly, 2169 converted their shooter at a regional to be able to shoot from feeder station and they ended up being really good at it.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

Friday night we decided we needed to extend to 84 inches or as close as possible and we had less than a pound to do it. The final fix worked beautifully and took 20 minutes from conception to final product. I will post pics or video if any of my team has any.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

Pool noodles are lame, try a telescoping corrugated plastic sign meant for the stands.

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?...02921& type=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ly62dYKShOM

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

610's anti-FCS device for Champs.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

I am on pit crew on my team and they went into the quarter finals at a district with a half powered shooter (a short we found much later). The bot was set up for the 2 pt goal and I was up in the stands really sad that our auto wouldnt work, when one of our mentors suggested moving the bot to the 1 pt goal. So I ran down to the field (luckily because of tech-difficulties they were delayed) and told the drive team to move the bot, which gained our alliance 6 pts. After the match was over we stared at the screen until the score 150 to 156 came up and we won by those 6 pts. Pretty Amazing.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

I've been wondering about all those blockers, could one have been made rigid enough to deflect a dull court shot and redirect it into the blocking alliance's goal?

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

This year we lost a chain to one of our shooter wheels in Quarterfinals 1 match 1 at West Michigan, due to the cotter pin on the half link pin breaking.

Back in the pits we found a spare pin but no cotter pins or steel wire to replace it with. We ended up using the pin wire from a button to make the quick fix in time to make it out for or next match.

I also remember replacing an aluminum drive shaft from a drill transmission with a 3/8" bolt we cut down, in 2004.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

I don't know the story behind this, but our scouts show that team 236 fell off of the very top of the tower in a practice match and were climbing again in the next match 30 minutes later. If anybody knows how they pulled this off, I'd love to hear the story.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

Incorrect, 2169 always could shoot from the feeder station.

See their release video for confirmation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT5_RJLG5LQ

After the retooling they saw in Duluth (northern lights) they decided to hide their talents in the Colorado regional, which seemed to work in their favor.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

Yeah, no, I remember seeing 2169's reveal video, and they were already shooting from the feeder station, they could do it since the beginning when they went to the Northern Lights Regional.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

Problem: No time to take robot apart to get a drill bit in to fix misaligned match-drilled holes?

Soution: Vise Grip. For added safety, we zip tied the vise grip to the robot. The sheet metal didn't budge at all.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

We were having problems with two frisbees exiting our shooter at once. Fixed it with a small piece of scrap plastic and some duct-tape to ensure that the bottom frisbee nested a bit forward of the rest in the stack. Problem never came back.

Duct-tape in general played a pretty critical role in our robot this year.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

A rookie team we mentored had a welded aluminum frame for the "superstructure" of their robot. While visiting them at the Mt. Olive District, the corners of this frame were covered with duct tape. Somehow, the welds broke(I don't know anything really about welding, so I have no idea if this is the proper term), so their solution was to keep the main frame of their robot together with ducttape

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

it is interesting that you mentioned that... we were looking at a trampoline type net that would redirect those shots into the two point goal... never panned out though...spin makes it hard to redirect properly..

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

We had an issue with our feeder not being tall enough for the Frisbee, so we pulled a sign off our tool cart.

Before:


After:

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

2252: The Mavericks went to Buckeye, apparently made their robot from then to qualifications, turned out to be the best robot there and won the competition. They got onto an alliance at worlds, too.

There is no magic involved in stories like these. Just FIRST teams doing what they do best: working hard.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

Broken welds is the correct term. Seems like poor welds or violent drivers lol

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

I was thinking something similar to that. But rather than deflecting the shots, it would feed it through their own shooter, directly into their 3 pt. goal. It'd be a pretty cool tactic, although risky because you're relying on an FCS on the opposing alliance.

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

We had one of our VexPro ballshifter output shafts fall out in our last qualification match in Las Vegas. We glued it back in, then to prevent subsequent failure we screwed some oak planks to the chassis to prevent the shaft from being able to slide out of the hub.

Attachment 14758

Re: Best impromptu fixes of 2013
 

Once, our chain broke just before the match. We had no time left, so the drive team zip tied the chain together until we could fix it formally. It worked perfectly.

And we've been using zip ties as quick chain fixes ever since.