How to create a workshop
 

Hey guys!

I'm starting a rookie team and I am currently working on our workshop... But I wonder, what should I prioritize in there? I'd like to know what is useful, useless and some tips to makes sure it's practical and that it looks great!

(Since this is a rookie team, we don't have a that much money... So we can't afford big expensive tools :) )

Re: How to create a workshop
 

One thing we have found valuable with new students (and by definition a rookie team is a group of new students) is to have an exercise we call a 'Week in a Day'.

Many teams have used this approach in the past and have found it valuable. The idea is to pick a previous game (one that has all the game materials available - rules, kickoff video) and have the students approach it like they would on kickoff. Go through the entire game evaluation process including the process of tearing apart the rules, then go through strategy development (what are we going to do when), and come out with some solid ideas. Then take that to the next step to develop some robot ideas and choice points.

We then try to take some time to prototype some of these ideas in a very simple manner (cardboard, tape) to demonstrate the ideas.

We work to do this in one very long day. Stating at like 8am (at the latest) and going until 9-10 at night. It is hard to keep a students attention this long (heck it is hard to keep anyone's attention that long). So break it apart with games (human game simulation) and activities to keep the blood flowing.

Pull together some mentors and other experienced students from other teams around your area if possible, or even by email for the majority of the setup.

We have found that by doing this the new students become more engaged at kickoff and can contribute faster.

Enjoy!

Re: How to create a workshop
 

That's a great idea! I used to to something similar to this with my previous team...

My question was more about creating the workshop (by that I mean the space we work in) sorry if it's not the good word, english is not m main language :)

Re: How to create a workshop
 

This may not be complete, but it's a start of the tools we use most. I'll look around our shop tonight and add some more items, almost certainly -- added in blue, mostly from my notes made in our shop, a couple just copied up from below:

Absolutely essential tools:

• Hacksaw, blades
• Hand drill, bits
• files (metal)
• wrench set (SAE and metric unless you never, ever, buy one or the other)
• adjustable wrench
• screwdriver set (both regular and jeweler's)
• allen wrench set (both SAE and metric again)
• pliers - needle nose & slip joint
• cutting and crimping pliers
• L-square
• tape measure
• gloves (e.g. leather)
• safety glasses
• table/bench
• clamps/vices
  
• Battery chargers (both robot and tool batteries)
• Stapler (for bumper construction)
• level
• Computer (to program robot, and look up parts, and more)
• Wire brush
• Broom, dustpan, wastebasket
• Utility knife
• Vice Grips, several sizes
• Hammer and/or mallet

Next-level tools:

• ratchet sets, 1/4" , 3/8", 1/2" (sockets through at least 1/4" through 1")
• drill press
• soldering station
• chop (or alternately table) saw
• band saw and/or "portaband" saw
• grinder (bench and/or hand-held)
• blind rivet gun
• More pliers - tongue and groove, more sizes/shapes, pipe wrench
• chain breaker/setter
  
• gloves (nitrile, or latex if no one is allergic)
• speed square, t-square
• Dremel tool kit
• Center punch (preferably spring-loaded type)
• Bolt cutters
• Ratchet screwdriver
• T-handle tools (screwdriver, allen, nut driver)
• Reciprocating Saw
• More clamps, vices, and vice grips (can never have too many)
• hammer drill
• Helping hands/magnifying glasses/lights
• Outdoor lights for late construction jobs in January and February
• Shop Vacuum
• Calipers
• More tape measures (again, difficult to get too many)
• Portable radios, if you are working in two or more spaces that aren't really close to each other.
  

Re: How to create a workshop
 

Don't forget hammers / mallets. Hammers can fix anything!
Not really. But almost...

Re: How to create a workshop
 

:)

Re: How to create a workshop
 

Although it may be expensive, my team uses our dremel quite often. We use these:

http://www.amazon.com/Dremel-EZ406-0...l+cutting+bits

and they work very well.

Re: How to create a workshop
 

The workshop is located in my basement... So while cleaning it up I found many of those dremel wheels :) I hope I find the dremel itself :)

Re: How to create a workshop
 

That tells me you aren't looking for advice on finding space, but for advice on what to fill your space with. How much space are you talking about filling? How many people are you expecting to have working there at any given time?

Re: How to create a workshop
 

We have a room of about 16' x 16' with two tables, a few chairs (2 or 3) and a counter with a lot of storage space under it... I expect 2-3 persons to be working in there (very small team). We have another place to use the bigger tools (table saw ect...) but it can't be used to assemble nor program the robot...

Re: How to create a workshop
 

You should have a band saw and a drill press as far as power tools go. Apart from that, GeeTwo's list is pretty solid. I would add calipers to that list; a good 6" caliper is like $20 on Ebay (not plastic, and a brand like Mitutoyo). I got my 12" Mitutoyo's for $23. One thing that is extremely useful to differentiate metric and imperial allen wrenches is to paint them different colors. Some are sold with different color on the outside (like blue) to show metric/imperial.
Avoid screwdrivers and phillips/flathead screws. Keep a couple flathead and phillips screwdrivers available, but don't buy either type of screw unless it's unavoidable. Electrical stuff uses a lot of philips though, so you should stock tiny (jewelers?) screwdrivers and the regular ones as well.
Dremels are fantastic. Socket ratchets are also fantastic. The latter can be cheap and is usually very, very useful, especially for had-to-reach locknuts (which sometimes can't be gotten to any other way).
The next power tool I would get is a mini mill like you get from HarborFreight. The "Seig" manufactured mills are pretty handy. It can even replace a drill press if you're ok with only one person on it at a time.

Re: How to create a workshop
 

One thing we've found useful: Make your build space your pit space. We keep our pit table set up in the shop, and when we go to competitions we just rearrange some plastic shelving to suit. Very easy.

Also think about where you're going to hold non-build meetings. If you don't have that space elsewhere, you're going to want to leave an open space for that (and perhaps some seating). 4901 has reasonable access to classroom space since we're on a college campus, but we still hold an occasional stand-up meeting in the shop for expediency.

Re: How to create a workshop
 

This hasn't been an option for us in the past, as our build space had to become a classroom again after each build session. We also tend to do most of our cutting outside to keep the noise down; Slidell has reasonable temps and precipitation for half to 3/4 of build season, depending on the year.
Now that we have a dedicated build shed, this is something we will definitely consider, though given that we're building heavy workbenches for the shed (2 down, 3 to go), and that we build two "identical" robots since last year, a 10x10 area within the shed won't be our primary work space. We had a 10x10 area marked off on the plans for a "test space" in the shed - with a 7-1/2' ceiling and an irregular floor sloped about 2 degrees to the back, we aren't going to be using the shed for real driver practice. I suspect that about the time we need to go to the classroom or the parking lot for driver practice, the "test space" will become our "pit layout". We can even drill rolling the storage shelves and benches in and out, as long as we keep things below that low ceiling. We can do the full-height drills in the classroom. After stop build day, we can build the pit in the shed and note whatever we use that is not stored in that space to adjust the pit loadout. I like it!

Re: How to create a workshop
 

These are good lists. I would add:

A Vise
Spring loaded center punch (makes drill presses MUCH more useful)

Good luck!!

Re: How to create a workshop
 

Do not forget about any of the following:

-Storage space. The amount of random parts that a FIRST team accumulates over time is truly impressive. Making sure that everything has a place to live takes a lot of planning ahead. Invest in a whole lot of drawers, large and small, to keep everything organized, and a quality toolbox or well-designed pegboard for all your tools.

-Table space. You can never have enough open table space, as many elements of the robot will be being assembled in parallel, especially during the prototyping stage.

-Open space. This can't be forgotten about either. Whether for storage of large items like full size prototypes, for testing, or just for freedom to move around, it's important not to fill your shop to the point where there's no free room.

Re: How to create a workshop
 

I'm almost done cleaning and making space for it... I'll show you guys a picture soon to give you an idea :)

Re: How to create a workshop
 

Here it is :) Still need to move the pinball machine to a corner or something and to bring a few things to other rooms :)

Re: How to create a workshop
 

It's too late to edit the original post, so I've quoted it, then unquoted it, and will add more stuff in oh, green. I'll also correct vice to vise, though having a bit of vice around the workshop is sure to keep things interesting, if neither G nor P*. I have not addressed electricity, climate control, stock, supplies, storage, or practice space, all of which are important. Stock and Supplies could be it's own list - everything from metal bar to fasteners to connectors to wire to zip ties to tape to wood, noodles, sailcloth, and staples - yes, it would be its own list; perhaps for another thread next week.

OBTW, nice build space. It looks about as large as our new space (20' x 30'), with a more regular floor, and a bit of useful furniture already in place. (We kept two teacher's desks and one rickety table for programming, and threw out way more than we kept). Here's our progress through 11 or 12 hours of work in our new space:

• Day 1: start of day
• Day 1: end of day (6 hours) - we'd cleared out most of the junk, and moved our stuff in willy-nilly
• Work Day 3: near end of day (11 hours total) - beginning of organization. Shannon is brazing a "pipe rack" for long stock to fit in the patch of bare floor in the right-side corner, and I'm leaning on the nearly-complete workbench #1 of 5 (3 sizes, this is the largest). The only visible pieces missing from the workbench are 4x4" skids along the short sides, and some pegboard inside those end legs.

Absolutely essential tools:

• Hacksaw, blades
• Hand drill, bits
• files (metal)
• wrench set (SAE and metric unless you never, ever, buy one or the other)
• adjustable wrench
• screwdriver set (both regular and jeweler's)
• allen wrench set (both SAE and metric again)
• pliers - needle nose & slip joint
• cutting and crimping pliers
• L-square
• tape measure
• gloves (e.g. leather)
• safety glasses
• table/bench
• clamps/vises
  
• Battery chargers (both robot and tool batteries)
• Stapler (for bumper construction)
• level
• Computer (to program robot, and look up parts, and more)
• Wire brush
• Broom, dustpan, wastebasket
• Utility knife
• Vise Grips, several sizes
• Hammer and/or mallet
  
• Miter box (maybe can be skipped if you do a chop or table saw)
• Wood-cutting saw
• Basic tap and die kit
  

Second-level tools:

• ratchet sets, 1/4" , 3/8", 1/2" (sockets through at least 1/4" through 1") - both SAE and metric, as above
• drill press
• soldering station (regulated iron, solder, sponge, "sucker", small helping hands, desolder braid)
• chop (or alternately table) saw
• band saw and/or "portaband" saw
• grinder (bench and/or hand-held)
• blind rivet gun
• More pliers - tongue and groove, more sizes/shapes, pipe wrench
• chain breaker/setter
  
• gloves (nitrile, or latex if no one is allergic)
• speed square, t-square
• Dremel tool kit
• Center punch (preferably spring-loaded type)
• Bolt cutters
• Ratchet screwdriver
• T-handle tools (screwdriver, allen, nut driver)
• Reciprocating Saw
• More clamps, vices, and vice grips (can never have too many)
• hammer drill
• Helping hands/magnifying glasses/lights
• Outdoor lights for late construction jobs in January and February
• Shop Vacuum
• Calipers
• More tape measures (again, difficult to get too many)
• Portable radios, if you are working in two or more spaces that aren't really close to each other.
• electric jig saw
• Much larger tap and die kit
• Real crimp tools, for automotive, Anderson Power Poles, Molex, Dupont (0.1" pitch headers), Anderson battery connectors
• Hole and thread gauges (can be bought or built)
• More drill bits. Yet more drill bits. Even more drill bits. Roboteers eat almost as many drill bits as pizzas.
  

Third-level tools (beyond my fifth-year team, but on our short list for expansion):

• Lathe
• 3-D printer
• Mini-Mill
• Water-cutter

* - For rookies reading this, GP is "Gracious Professionalism". If you don't already know this term, seek it out!

Re: How to create a workshop
 

Very nice! It might get a bit cramped, but if you only have a few people it looks great. The chance to organize from the beginning is valuable. Make sure to take full advantage of the freedom and organize! :D
As far as taps and dies go, a basic set should give you what you need; we never use anything over 1/4", and if we do it's from a COTS part and we can order the tap at the same time anyway.
Are you going to be working with metric or imperial mainly? We use 8-32, 10-32, and 1/4"-20 screws almost exclusively (excepting some electrical stuff), so close metric sizes would be M4, M5, and M6 screws. If it's easy to source locally, go metric. The single thread pitches will make things easy to organize. On the other hand, some electrical components use imperial screws, but sometimes those are small and/or replaceable with metric.
I didn't see it mentioned and forgot to mention it, but combination squares are very handy. I use them whenever I have to cut stock.

Re: How to create a workshop
 

Thank you :) I'm pretty happy with the result (after spending around 10 hours on it :yikes: ... It's a small space for a normal team but, like you mention, we are not a lot :) We also have a space of around 10' x 10' that I need to clean too to practice driving on...

I don't know what we will be using. Probably both metric and imperial hahaha (We'll use what we have!)...

Re: How to create a workshop
 

Honestly, if you can make the break towards pure metric (or perhaps metric + 10-32 and 5/32 allen cap screws and 5/16 nuts) right now, I suggest you take it. It may cost a few more dollars in the short run, but in the long run the time savings from not having to spend dozens of hours distinguishing among nearly-equivalent bolts (and throwing away stripped nuts and bolts damaged by high school students who don't pay close enough attention) will pay off. Here in the mesolithic USA, we're pretty much stuck between the SAE rock and the metric hard place, and can't quite commit one way or the other.