North Star Regional...
 

Let's get the discussion going...

The Minnesota Regionals (10,000 Lakes and North Star) will bring in over 120 teams to Minneapolis next week.

In the North Star Regional it looks like only 2 are Rookies are in. It looks like the return of the venerable FRC 2169 KingTec team along with a very strong team in the Fighting Calculators (2175). Along with these teams, we have FRC 3928 (The Neutrinos) and the Iron Lions from Ames, IA (FRC 967). From what I have seen - this could be a regional that is up for grabs within these teams.

My guess for the top three after qualifiers is this:
1. 2175
2. 967
3. 3928

Anyone want to take a stab on the finals?

Re: North Star Regional...
 

I was going to start this thread up tommorow :p

-North Star has a total of 60 teams competing this year, 10 of which are 1st and 2nd year teams.
-It will be the second regional for the following teams:
967, 1816, 2169, 2175, 2177, 2220, 2472, 2491, 2574, 2883, 3042, 3130, 3206, 3298, 3883, and 3928
The following teams reached the elimination rounds at their first regional: 967 (SF), 1816 (QF), 2175 (W), 2177 (QF), 2472 (QF), 2491 (QF), 2883 (QF), 3042 (QF), 3130 (QF), 3206 (QF), 3298 (QF), 3883 (F), 3928 (QF)

Based on the scouting I've done:
-967 will be a force in qualification matches due to their 2 ball auton and elite level scoring ability. I would expect them to be a top 3-4 team and a very early pick or alliance captain.
-2175 may be the top scoring robot at the regional and really showed it while they were in Duluth. They are an FRC Top 25 team and it wouldn't shock me at all to see them in the number 1 spot after qualifications.
-3130 has an excellent robot this year and is a very efficient scorer. If they are paired up with 2175 at all during quals it should be a fun show (the two teams share shop space and I'm sure they work extremely well together). I would be shocked if the errors don't make eliminations.
-3928 competed at a highly competitive Greater Kansas City regional in which they put up 300pts with 1986 (Team Titanium) and 118 (Robonauts). They have a lo g and effective truss shot as well as a very effective ground pickup.They should be a top pick or alliance captain by the time eliminations role around.

Top 5 Robots (in no particular order):
2175, 3928, 967, 3883, 3130

Overall North Star should be very competitive and I'm incredibly excited for it all to start! :D

Re: North Star Regional...
 

967 is very excited to be coming back to Minneapolis for this event. After watching some videos from Duluth, I think 2883 and 3206 will also be in the mix.

I hope everybody brings some key spare parts, because this game is tough on robots. It will hopefully be a little less rough with the new rule tweaks, but I still think the teams that go all the way will have to patch the robot up multiple times to keep it working.

Re: North Star Regional...
 

Once again, the Fighting Calculators will be webcasting this regional. It can be found at http://fightingcalculators.org/webcast and on the Blue Alliance Game Day. We are excited to participate in the North Star Regional and are excited to see teams we haven't seen in a while as well. Good luck teams!

Re: North Star Regional...
 

Team 3293, the OtterBots, are excited for Thursday. Honored to be competing with these great teams.

Re: North Star Regional...
 

I know 2220 will be bringing in a few weeks worth of improvements to up our game and try to keep up with the competition. Looks like it will be a great weekend for some robot action!

I'm also excited to see 2169 joining us at North Star-- they've been absent the last couple years and the last time they competed at North Star was in 2009. If they can get their swerve drive working, I don't think it's a stretch to say they'll come out swinging.

Very excited to see how the tournament shakes out.

Re: North Star Regional...
 

We are very excited for North Star! We worked out some of the issues with our drive-train, and hopefully will be able to move on the field all our matches (knock on wood :D ) Ps. Don't do swerve drive

Re: North Star Regional...
 

You know, I talked a could of MN teams out of doing swerve this year... too bad you guys didn't ask me for advise!

Re: North Star Regional...
 

Trust me, I know. "Don't do swerve" basically sums up 2220's entire 2011 season.

Re: North Star Regional...
 

I was wondering what the deal was until somebody else mentioned you had swerve drive this year. It seemed like your collector and catapult worked well in the videos. I expect that 2169 will show up and be really formidable like usual.

Our experience is that drives can give us gremlins even if we think we're picking something simple. I can only imagine all of the evil things that a swerve drive can do to bite you.

967 also has some tweaks to make on Thursday. I'm guessing that a lot of teams have been busy in the last month - it will be very interesting to see what everyone brings. I did some more poking around the web to see what some of those 44 teams that haven't competed yet have been up to. Definitely some good robots in that bunch, too - can't wait to see the whole lot of them.

Re: North Star Regional...
 

Haha, we thought that it would be easy to implement using the pre-fabricated wild-swerve modules, but we had issues with slipping on the encoder mounts and losing our zero mechanically, making us immobile in half our matches. It also didn't help that our shooter is very pneumatically dependent, because we had leaks as well. Some matches we would not start with enough pressure for auto :ahh:

Re: North Star Regional...
 

Well said. Sometimes keeping it as simple as possible is the best solution. Swerve drive is something that requires an off-season to prototype and work out, as we know now. Going into the six week build with no prior experience was a big no no haha

Re: North Star Regional...
 

This should turn out to be a great regional. 3883 has some tweaks to do to our catapult so hopefully we can actually get a reliable shot into the 10 point. If all else fails then we can still play some hard defense and truss shoot. The programming team is now working on encoders and gyros for aton. Cant wait to see all the teams and the final matches. I am really impressed with the kit chassis this year. It was simple to put together and is a solid base. As for swerve I cant even start to think of all the work, time and tuning that would need to go into it, but when a team has it right it just looks amazing. Hope you guys can get it going, no one like to see a robot sit through a match.

Re: North Star Regional...
 

As captain of team 2883, we are so excited for this weekend at North Star! After working out our harvest issues, we are one team of rednecks that are ready to shoot some exercise balls! Go Fighting Rednecks!

Re: North Star Regional...
 

Who do you think will win Chairman's? 2220? 2169? 2175?