Re: 701's First Practice Day
 

I had no idea this was an original ChiefDelphi design. I first saw it on Madtown's bot in 2012 at champs. Thanks for the trivia :D

Re: 701's First Practice Day
 

Brando, you've got to warn me before showing me pics of old CD robots man. PTSD kicks in so hard sometimes I can't see for a bit there.

I loved this robot but, ugh, it was a Serial Ball Jammer.

Not the intake, that was beautiful and fine (though you do have to be sure you keep track of how many of those green bands you put on a roller. It is SO easy to forget that each green cord is 2-4lbs of force and with 13 loops we had 50-100lbs on those rollers. YIKES, get some good bearings on those shafts, ya'll.

Back to the Serial Ball Jammer, it was the lift system. We always had a reason why this or that time the system jammed. It was never the design. It was this tweak or that tweak or this unlucky break or that crazy situation. Never never never that the system was just a bad system for lifting balls as designed.

I think it wasn't until we were back in the hotel on Friday night at our 3rd Regional that year* that I spoke to the whole team and said the words, "We are Serial Ball Jammers." and we finally got serious about changing the lift design. Things were a lot better in Orlando once we made some significant improvements rather than playing round the edges.

Also... GET OFF MY LAWN!

Old Man, Dr. Joe J.

*It was at that competition that we discovered a weakness in the Beatty Beast that had the File Card Walking Beam that year (which lead to rule R6 by the way). They couldn't be STOPPED, but they COULD be SPUN!!! We kept them from being able to get the goals into their zone. Sadly, we should have kept this theory to ourselves and only used it at the Championships. With their weakness exposed, clever Team Hammond was able to make improvements to the Beatty Beast that prevented this spin move. Team Hammond and Rage (who basically won the final match on their own when the Beast broke in the finals) won it all that year. Ah well... ...that's how sports work...

Re: 701's First Practice Day
 

We drew a lot of inspiration for this design from the KillerBees and Greybots 2012 bots. Great teams and some great robots each year.

After this first day of practicing, I must say that watching this year's game will have a bit of "NASCAR" mentality, like it or not. Robots catching air, rolling over, or otherwise getting messed up or stuck while crossing the defenses. Definitely entertaining to watch.

In our video you can see us crossing the moat a lot. Practice the defense that scares you the most. We practiced earlier with Ramparts, Rock Wall, Rough Terrain, and CDF. They aren't as bad as getting stuck on the moat, we're making sure that won't happen.

Re: 701's First Practice Day
 

NO WORDS FROM MR. LEE HAVE EVER BEEN WISER