its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

Considering the fact that this is my first year participating in the First Robotics competition I've been up all night brainstorming. I'm having a bit of trouble figuring out how to think of a design. Any suggestions?

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

Choose a single task and figure out the simplest way to do that one task.

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

I'll bite.

I'd suggest you take a look at the buildblitz site. http://www.buildblitz.com/ They've already posted a lot of good prototypes for launching and picking up the ball. Should be a good starting point. In general I recommend you start with picking up the ball from the ground and placing it back on the ground or rolling in into the low goal. These are all fairly easy task but they can make you a valuable member of any alliance. Assists really are the key to winning and seeding high in this years game. I can't tell you how to design your robot. But I'd define that as a good starting place.

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

consistently ... :)

Start with understanding the rules, move to determining your strategy, start with the thing your team chooses to place highest priority on, and work it til you perfect it. As you conquer that, move on to the next. It is always better to have one thing that works most of the time, than a bunch of things that don't work most of the time.

If you have space, play the game with your team, like they did in the assist section of the videos. Mark your zones. Have 3 team members be robots and pass the ball and one team member be human player. We actually just used some of our old basketball balls for our autonomous parts. But, when they walk through the game, it helps them understand. So the team acting it out would then call on team members not involved in the acting out to calculate and explain scoring. Others were allowed to add to, or debate an answer. We didn't move on until we came to an agreement. Doing this really helped my team dig into the rules, debate disagreements, and figure out what we FEEL is the correct interpretation.

Good Luck & Welcome to FRC!

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

I also suggest you checkout SimBiotic's resource on strategy (that's what I'm using this year).

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

Um... yeah... that whole "Buildblitz" ad on the home page?

Don't just follow it, but drag your team mates and mentors by the scruff of the neck and strap them down in front of a computer.

Not so much to see what solution they come up with (although it's perfectly okay to be inspired by what they have done) but to see the process they have followed.

Jason

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

3 ideas for picking up the ball:

• forklift with a sort of seat belt
• "hug it" with two arms
• bring it into the frame perimeter

as for catching, i thought of having a concave extendable funnel on top

low goal: gust push it (it may need a lift over the 7.5" bump)

to "assist" you just bump it

being a goalie is a waste of time due to rule G23
no idea how to score on high goal
no idea how to bump over truss

good luck to all teams on this complicated game!

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

^^THIS^^

Above all else, whatever you put out on the field, needs to be reliable. Even if you only do a small part of the game, if you do it consistently and reliably you will be looked upon favorably by most scouts.

That and know the rules and don't commit penalties.

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

I have to agree on picking 1 task, and doing it as well (and robustly) as you can.
It's a bit easier this year, because (At the moment [conspiracy theorists!]) there is only 1 task... in a nutshell. Move the ball, kick it.
As opposed to last year where you had Frisbees and the Pyramid...

It's okay not to do everything. :-)

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

Start by identifying CAPABILITIES. What must the robot be able to do? Not how, just what. Here's a basic list to get you started:

1. Drive on carpet
2. Push a ball
3. .....

OK, once you have your Capabilities, identify a MECHANISM to accomplish each Capability. As others have said, focus on consistency, simplicity, robustness, and repairability.

It needs to do whatever it does as well as possible*, every time. If it does it perfectly, but only half the time, it's garbage.

It needs to be simple enough to build by your team. A completely autonomous helicopter that carries balls sounds great, but can you build it?

Once you do build it, do it well. Use strong enough materials, and if you cut something and it's not right, do it over, don't use garbage on your robot.

And last, make sure you can get it apart so it can be repaired, Don't bury the Jaguars under 2 feet of welded aluminum...

Your mentors are great resources for "vetting" (checking the validity of) ideas. Do that.

If you run into problems, (weight, time, etc) start dropping Capabilities, least important first.

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

What makes you so certain about that? I'd like to hear your reasoning because this is not the conclusion I came to.

Re: its very complex this year, well so I've heard.
 

ASSIST points are the 1st tiebreaker in the rankings after W-L-T record. If you want to seed at the top, you need to win all your matches, or win all but one or two, AND have more ASSIST points than the other teams you share a W-L-T record with.

ASSIST points will be important, though I can certainly see elite teams putting up a flurry of points by themselves very quickly to win matches.