VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

As part of our VEXpro 2015 Product Unveiling yesterday, we also announced our plans for Build Blitz 2015.

http://www.vexrobotics.com/vexpro/ex...ild-blitz-2015

Based on the feedback we got last season, we saw that it was important for us to continue doing Build Blitz to help provide teams with resources, instructions, and inspiration to guide them through the build season. At the same time our feedback told us that many teams were concerned that the evolution of these quick designs was having unintended consequences on the community. We hope that by shifting our focus from complete robots to game specific educational resources, we've hit the sweet spot where we can help and inspire many, without removing the challenges we all love and thrive on in FRC.

We'll use this thread to keep the community up to date on all our progress. For full details and updates be sure to check out www.BuildBlitz.com, as well as our VEXRoboticsTV YouTube Channel and our @BuildBlitz Twitter page.

If you have any questions or feedback, please share it with us! Build Blitz is designed for the community and we want to make sure all your voices are heard!

I for one will be looking forward to these videos. VEX only continues to impress me with what they are doing for the robotics community.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

This is an interesting development with Build Blitz. While I personally will miss seeing fully functional robots within 3 days of kickoff, this is a great compromise between the two sides of the argument.

In fact, if you guys develop your educational resources accordingly, we may actually see an increase in the variety of designs for less experienced teams. That's always great to see!

Looking forward to the second edition of Build Blitz :) .

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

The fun just got a little harder ... perhaps ... thanks for continuing to serve the community ... looking forward to the resources.

Will you be sharing the schedule (I assume) you have developed of which specific resources you expect to release on which date starting on January 5th?

I ask because I want to adjust our schedule to take full advantage of your input.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I'm extremely pleased with this development, and think this will be a fantastic resource for the coming year. Thanks for putting such an emphasis on getting and responding to community feedback.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

We want to be careful with committing to any dates prior to kickoff; so much of what we develop is going to be game specific, we don't want to over commit prior to knowing the game. Once we wrap our heads around the game and decide what resources we're focusing on, we'll publish a detailed timeline of what to expect. Now in terms of generalities, we hope to be developing and releasing our Build Blitz resources across the the first week of the build season.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

This idea of not building complete robots and focusing on educational materials is a really good development. I hope the other quick build teams take a similar approach. Having solutions just handed to students has always seemed to me to be depriving them of the valuable experience of prototyping and dreaming. It's all too easy to look at something that works and say "let's do that."

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I don't think that anybody from around my area would outright copy from a CAD file. I would feel the need to improve upon the design or remake it with my own watermark or splice it with other designs. It might vary from team to team, as I live in a fiercely competitive/ prideful area.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

The issue that most vocal detractors of the 3 day builds isn't about teams copy cad files... It's about teams seeing a finished design and copying the whole concept. How many choo-choo's and el-toro's did we see last year? Teams take the finished robots and just say "let's do what they did" instead of experimenting, prototyping and coming up with their own ideas.

Personally, I love this new direction. Focusing on educational materials and prototyping various ideas will hopefully help to increase creativity and diversity in Design, without giving teams an "easy out" of copying a complete robot they know works.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I think this is a good development. Even though I am firmly in the camp that believes the three day builds have been good for FRC. I just spent a lot of time going through our old match videos and trying to grab good pictures of as many of the robots we have played with and against as possible. As a side project I was also looking at robot designs. And one thing that is clear to me is that the last couple of years have seen a significantly higher percentage of functional robots. And once I subtracted out all of the box on wheels (or box on wheels with non-functional devices) robots I did not see a lessening of variety.

That said, if this project helps teams with ideas about how to develop prototypes without complete robot designs I think it will be a positive development for FRC. I think that the biggest problem many rookies have is that limited experience and limited resources often inhibit the development of prototypes. I think that sometimes older, more well-resourced with experience teams tend to forget how much their institutional knowledge plays into their development process, because to them it just is a part of the process. This seems to me to be a good way to increase that knowledge base across the FRC community.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

To be fair, we don't really know the scope of this new Build Blitz, and it could certainly lead to similar things. I initially thought this new version would make detractors of Build Blitz even more angry because we would be seeing multiple mechanisms and ideas prototyped, tested, and built by Vex.

My impression from from Karthik said above (though I'm certainly just speculating here) is that they plan to release game specific designs or ideas, just not a whole robot. Why waste time building a drivetrain when you do more service by building another arm or pick-up mechanism? I think this is a pretty great idea. We'll see later what the full plans are, though I'm currently expecting more than just videos talking about design techniques or documents of educational material.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

The plan to roll out content over the course of the first week, I think, is one of the most important improvements. Last year, I felt it was simply too much, too quickly - much of the important process that led to the designs (brainstorming, prototyping, tuning) were washed out in mad rush of the 3-day build. At the end of it, it was common to have students wanting to copy aspects of the different robots without any firm motivation other than "it looked good on the reveal video."

It sounds like it'll be much easier to parse the information this year (what works well, what doesn't, and most importantly why that's the case), which is very important.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I do not see this as a positive development. I won't go outright and say I dislike it but I feel this will narrow the designs we see even more than in Ri3D.

Now we'll see the same VEX designs repeated over and over by all teams using the same pre-fabricated parts. We'll have some nice looking robots and VEX will have a bigger pocketbook.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I don't think Vex is going to produce the only viable designs, nor, likely, the optimal ones. What it will do, however, is provide viable designs that have already been proven to work for teams that do not have the resources to experiment with many different ideas. This significantly raises the floor of the competition, and I think that is a good thing.

Anecdotally, in 4464's rookie year we did not have the money nor manpower to pursue prototypes if we did not know that they would eventually pan out. The Ri3D two-wheel linear shooter made our robot possible that year - not because we copied it exactly (we didn't - our robot was a full-court shooter and looked very little like theirs), but because they demonstrated a working proof-of-concept and we could purchase the parts for a similar design with the confidence that they would eventually make it onto our robot. That was invaluable.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Exactly. They are doing the same thing as last year but without the robot base. I fail to see how this addresses any of the concerns that the original nay-sayers of Ri3D/Build Blitz had.

I will of course save my final judgement for after Build Blitz this year. But currently, this is how I see it.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Big words from an anonymous account. If you want to attach a name to your post then I might actually consider your opinion.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I'll miss the full robots, but I'm glad Vex is doing what it is doing. It is quite honestly a huge service for the entire FRC community - both struggling teams and the better-off teams who play with them.

While we all love to talk about how events like these kill creativity or hand teams a solution, they really aren't. What it is doing is killing the "creativity" of a team who only had the resources to test one idea and run with it regardless of effectiveness. Quite frankly I would rather these teams be able to play the game at all than "creatively" struggle to complete even the most basic tasks. Clearly those teams making the copies would too.

I don't think a lot of teams who are "well off" realize how huge of a burden prototyping can be on a young, understaffed team. Over the past half decade 2791 has been working more and more each year toward strong, varied prototyping in build season, and it's way harder than it looks. In the absence of well trained students, you essentially need a mentor per prototyping group to really keep everyone focused and ask the right questions needed for the students to push the prototype further. Until this year, perhaps last, we did not have the resources to prototype more than one mechanism at a time.

2791 has enjoyed some relative success in the past few seasons. I don't think it's unfair to say that we are a competitive team at the regional level. But we owe so much of that success to sharing design concepts, learning how other teams' prototypes worked, and some straight up copying of a prototype or two. Our 2014 shooter, 2013 shooter, 2012 hopper, these are all mechanisms that we were only able to pursue with exposure to others' prototypes and having the privilege of being able to choose what to prototype based on those ideas.

The only reason we were able to take our limited prototyping resources and apply them in such a focused way toward a proven good concept? We network with several teams throughout the build season to exchange this kind of information. This is not a benefit that every team has. What Vex Build Blitz and Ri3D do is give every team in FRC access to some viable concepts to start from. I think for hundreds of teams this resource is invaluable.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Exactly this.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I agree wholeheartedly with everything posted in this thread. Because of Ri3D and BuildBlitz, I have seen teams become competitive, if they understand how to create those robots effectively.

I have a question. For 2014, would you rather have 6 different robots for teams to iterate upon (JVN, Copioli, BoomDone, Ri3D 1.0, 1114 2008, O-Ryon), or all those teams to attempt an 1114 2008 robot, which is a good design, but it would lead to less parity in robot design, and likely more boxes on wheels.

I'll ask you another question: In 2013/2014, If you are an "original" 9/10 robot up against three 8/10 robots in qualifications, would you rather be teamed up with 2 2/10 boxes on wheels, or 2 6/10 Ri3D clones?

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I do not see how having an anonymous account detracts from his/her opinion. Maybe they are not on a team or don't like having their name on the internet.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

In 2013: I would probably pick the Ri3D clones, unless I were going against an FCS or two, in which case I would slap on some pool noodles to a box to block their FCS shots.

In 2014: I would probably pick 1 of each, a box of wheels (assuming a working drivetrain) could inbound much quicker than the Ri3D, and then my "original" robot and Ri3D would get it down the rest of the field. 2014 was the year where a box on wheels (albeit with a goalie pole and as the fourth robot) made it to the Championship finals.

I would consider reading this article for more about boxes on wheels.
http://beyondinspection.org/post/972...-dozer-does-it

With the right strategy and preparation, you can win regionals with boxes on wheels. Don't be so quick to completely dismiss them.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Everyone has a right to their opinions, but it is no secret that there is credibility in a name. Gregor (one of the most highly respected students in the FRC community) is in no way attacking the person. I wondered the same thing as he did. It is one thing to voice your opinions, but it is an entirely different thing to make negative and unsupported remarks behind the veil of anonymity. That isn't protecting yourself. That is being a coward. If you have an opinion just say it. Back your opinion. Hiding behind an anonymous account makes it look like you are ashamed to be seen saying what you're saying in public, in which case you should either not say it, or if it is something you feel needs to be addressed, private message the person.

Like I said, I respect the fact that everyone has an opinion, but I cannot respect someone who will publicly make negative and unsupported claims through an anonymous account. If you are going to speak anonymously, message the person anonymously and keep it private. If you're going to be public, be fully public.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I would respectfully disagree.
Looking at a prototype video/pictures of another programs/Ri3D robot isnt necessarily easy to duplicate.
The game last year had a relatively easy task with no end game vs. other years. With all of the support resources available last year, there were still many teams who couldnt play the game effectively.
I think the resources provided by veteran FRC members and FRC suppliers creating fully functional robots was a step in the right direction.
The direction that Build Blitz is moving towards is still fine by me though. A happy medium for everyone.
Lets hope that it continues to translate to better overall robot performances on the field.
The thing that frustrates me the most from a competition perspective, isnt necessarily who I am up against, but instead, having partners that cannot effectively contribute during a match.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I think vexpro highlighting how you can build individual robot "appendages" using their pre-fab is good enough to solve this.

For instance. One of the bigger issues last year wasn't people copying the El Toro intake - but that they didnt know the correct composition and tuning. I imagine Vex would have shown how to build that with pretty much the exact components that they pre-fab and sell so that if a team wanted to just buy a "lego kit" intake they could have. This will increase competitiveness across the board.

I also see it as less restricting on creativity. If vex were to provide 15 different components, then teams would have to do their own cost-benefit analysis of components to get different combinations of robots - vs doing a cost-benefit on the robot from Ri3d they should copy.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

I think I'm more excited about the mention of some in-depth strategy discussion. On a related note, I'd suggest taking a good chunk of time to work through what the rules actually mean, especially the sections many teams don't read (human player rules this past season, for example).

I remember drive coaching at a week one event the past two years, and having to correct other drive teams way too much. For example, a lot of teams last year blindly chased the 0-assist 10-point goal when they could have done 10% better with low goals and just one assist, even before you take accuracy and time-to-cycle into account. Build Blitz last year did bring this up, but never really did anything with it since they were trying to build good solo robots. Since you won't be tied down to a single robot per group, you can explore a lot more options for how to play the game.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Exactly this.
Also, from what I can infer from the website and Mr. Kanagasabapathy's post, the intention is for the Build Blitz team to look at several different ways to tackle the game, as well as potential mechanisms that could be used in those strategies. As far as I'm concerned, this can only lead to proliferation of ideas and designs. Because there will be copies, but there will also be teams designed to beat these copies.
Most Ri3D teams have to determine a strategy early, and build to that design. With BB taking the entire week to strategize and prototype - like most FRC teams do - they'll be able to go much more in depth and breadth with strategy.

I'll be interested to see if there's a gamebreaking strategy uncovered by these fine folks, if they'll make it public or sit on it.
How different would 2010 have been if more teams had pursued a 469-style robot? Or how much money could teams have saved on burnt-out FTC motors in 2011?

Hopefully this exercise will raise the gameplay, and lead to much more refined play and playmaking at the highest levels of competition.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Thanks for the explanation. I will adjust our plan and schedule accordingly to account for including your resources in our decision making.

This has been a very enlightening thread for me and I very much appreciate the conversation. As I mentioned before, I am a big fan of the Ri3D work. I am very optimistic that this approach will be as meaningful to our process and have as positive an impact. Well done BuildBlitz team.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

It helps address my concerns about polluting brainstorming sessions with the slightly delayed release schedule. We should have most of our initial game analysis and the beginnings of brainstorming done by the point where they start releasing material, and the students will hopefully remain open-minded during the brainstorming phase.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

These are bizarrely vitriolic comments directed at someone that said, anonymously or otherwise, only that they dislike something.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

To be fair, Pineapples did make a number of unsubstantiated claims (some of which are easier to agree with/swallow than others):

1: "Lots of VEX copies"- only one way to find out about this. To be honest i didn't see this nearly as much as people claimed it happened last year, but more importantly, there isn't any reasoning behind the statement.

2: "Teams using lots of the same prefab components"- See 4, but thats a decent part of the justification for doing an event like this, and has been since the original Ri3D. It also remains to be seen exactly how many teams will follow the BB/Ri3D resources for this year-- last year I know a pretty large number of teams flat out ignored them, either out of ingnorance to their existence or choice.

3: "Lots of good looking robots"- Lord I hope so, but again, comes more down to taste and opinion than anything that can be backed up by fact or reason.

4: "VEX lines their pocketbooks"- Well, yeah. This is a bit of a cynical statement, but I'm pretty sure IFI wants their VEX robotics stuff to make money. They are after all a company. Releasing ways to build a bunch of cool stuff from their products is probably going to be a nice sales boost for VersaChassis products and will help convince skeptical teams and mentors of the system's usefulness. None of these things were said by Pineapples, but I can see some semblance of reasoning behind the statement.

The end result is a post that reads more like an accusation than just stating that they disagree with it. I also think there's a bit of built up resentment towards some other anonymous accounts that post more often, which may be coloring the reactions to this particular poster.

My personal opinions on this are somewhat neutral. I think there's a lot of potential to the idea and done right it could be an incredible resource for teams-- and with all the great minds behind it I'm pretty confident it will be-- but it also has the potential to just turn into a shameless plug for using as much VEX product as possible. I doubt the latter will happen, but then again the road to shameless capitalism is paved with good intentions. Regardless, I'm certainly excited to see what comes out of this new addition to mass mentoring.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Gunna continue beating the dead horse:

The same criticism can be applied to AndyMark. The build events have always been commercials to me. But I don't see this as wrong. Businesses are going to be businesses and do things that businesses do. Expecting a business to not be a business is silly.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

This is still America, right?

And I like it that more new and under-resourced FIRST teams can roll and score! It is as if VexPro were mentoring hundreds of teams (ordinarily left to flail) which is a good thing. The more students that leave smiling, the better!

As a mentor I liked the concept of ri3d but at the same time seems to squash the creative side. I try very hard to get the kids on our team to think outside the box.

I should have included that much can be learned from the quick build teams though. The choochoo design has been around for a couple hundred years, but until you see it incorporated in new tech people seem to not notice. All the quick build teams do a great job and I will never take that away from them.

Last year I had to flat out tell a couple mentors that wanted to basically copy one of the bots NO.

I mentor for one reason.,. To see the members have that ahh ha moment, when what ever we are working on clicks in their head and they get it, and have learned something new.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Here's the list of resources that we're working on for Build Blitz 2015.

http://www.buildblitz.com/recycle-rush-is-here/

I'll be releasing a strategic analysis of the game this evening, followed by a live an interactive webcast that explains the analysis. Both Paul Copioli and I will be giving our thoughts on the game and taking questions from the community. You can watch the broadcast here:

https://plus.google.com/events/cn261...kk6q9hs5o00t7s

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Here's the Strategic Analysis that I came up with in conjunction with the Build Blitz team.

http://www.buildblitz.com/build-blit...egic-analysis/

Paul Copioli and I will be talking about it in depth tonight at 9:00 PM eastern. We'll also be opening the floor for your questions. Make sure you tune in!

https://plus.google.com/events/cn261...kk6q9hs5o00t7s

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Karthik and Paul are LIVE for their Strategic Analysis here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=coC1j7T0840

Join the conversation, especially the Q&A at the end!

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Thanks for a great session, and for answering so many questions! Tying a rope around the starting recycle bins is truly an outside-the-box thinking idea that I had yet to hear.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

You're very welcome! Hopefully it spurs more outside the box ideas. There's a lot of unexplored territory with the major changes introduced this season.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Thanks to the Build Blitz team! Just watched the Elevator Video/Blog on the Build Blitz Blog page. Can someone tell me how the elevator will hold the totes elevated? ( what will keep the gearbox from back driving) Thanks in Advance

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Potential Solution

This is how The GreenHorns decided to solve this problem.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

We're working on prototyping and testing several different applications of these linear elevator parts. Having a mechanism that can backdrive is not necessarily undesirable, but what most people mean when they discuss backdriving in terms of arms or elevators in FRC is when the mechanism falls due to gravity after the operator controls are released.

To help prevent this form of "backdriving", there are several ways to accomplish this, including using the built in PID functions in the FRC code library to hold the elevator at it's current position. This, combined with gearing the elevator such that the stall current at the motor is minimal (e.g. won't smoke a motor) and adding constant force springs to help counterbalance the weight, will help make a fast and responsive linear motion system.

The current iteration of our elevator prototype is geared to quickly pickup totes (<1 second to bottom stack) with a single BAG Motor and 2-stage VersaPlanetary gearbox, while the motor remains at 25% of stall current with an elevator load (carriage + tote weight) of 60lbs. This is without any constant force springs to help counter-balance the system.

For implementing PID controls, I've had good success previously (most recently in 2011 when I was on 228) using Sharp IR distance sensors for elevator height control. For this, it was as simple as mounting the sensor on the robot chassis looking up at the elevator carriage to measure the height of the elevator.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Do you have any data or rules of thumb on how much current the CIM/MiniCIM/BAG motors can take for how long before they smoke?

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Here's the final product put together by the claw group. It's a remarkably simple solution that can easily be made using only hand tools.

http://www.buildblitz.com/pinchclaw-...drawing-files/

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

Some more educational resources have been posted.

A full guide on how to design a claw for Recycle Rush.

http://www.buildblitz.com/claw-design-guide/

A full guide on how to design a drivetrain for Recycle Rush.

http://www.buildblitz.com/drivetrains-for-recycle-rush/

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

After 12 long days the full set of educational resources, design guides, CAD models, and build instructions from Build Blitz are now available. You can find all of them here:

http://www.buildblitz.com/build-blitz-2015-what-a-rush/

The final set of Recyle Rush specific resources include:

1. A strategic analysis and sample priority list for this year's game.

2. A design concept and CAD models of a simple linear elevator to lift Totes and Containers.


3. A design concept, CAD models, and instructions, on how to build a simple pinch claw to pick up both Totes and Containers.


4. An educational resource on the specific design process for Recycle Rush.

5. Design concepts for simple manipulators for Totes and Containers.

6. A guide to designing drivetrains specific to Recycle Rush

7. A guide to designing claws specific to Recycle Rush

8. A design concept, CAD models, and instructions, on how to upgrade the AM14U2 to get the most out of your drivetrain.


9. A design concept and CAD models of a simple stacking mechanism using a 4-bar.


10. A design concept and CAD models of how to use 6" mecanum wheels with the VersaChassis in Recycle Rush.



We're very excited to provide this full set of resources for teams. There's enough resources to ensure that every team can get off the ground running and come to competition with a robot that's ready to score points and make an impact. At the same time, each of the design concepts has lots of room for iteration and improvement, allowing teams to exercise their creativity and take these to the next level. We're excited to see how teams utilize these resources.

As always if you have any feedback or questions, feel free to post them here and you'll get a response from one of us at VEX Robotics.

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

What gear ratio is the versaplanetary used on the elevator?

Re: VEXpro Build Blitz 2015
 

7:1 x2 for a total of 49:1 from the BAG motor.

-Aren