Future FRC Technologies?
 

What technologies would you like to see implemented in FRC in the future?

A couple I would like to see,

1. Field view network cameras
A camera mounted on a pole above each driver station. The camera streams are available to each robot and each driver station. Each camera would be setup to view roughly half the field.

Overhead cameras are proven technologies in other events such as Robocup but doing the same for an FRC field would be very difficult. Driver station mounted cameras could be installed for every game without adding any complex overhead rigging.

The autonomous options would be very useful. We could also remove the need for teams to bring their own camera and pole setups like we had this year.

Dedicated cameras that are part of the field, would also allow FIRST to standardize a video replay system for use by the referees.

2. Faster wireless network connections
The eventual move to AC or other faster wireless standards should let us remove or increase the bandwidth cap.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Advanced vision systems

A while back, I saw a team who was using a KickStarted LIDAR camera to do their vision. While I think there are some very powerful things you can do with just a camera, having a full 360 view, with depth sensing of the entire field would be an awesomely powerful resource.

More automated scoring

This is less for teams use, but to stop the "Ref, I'm SURE I went over those ramparts! I swear!". This ties into your field view idea, which could help, but frankly, as much as we all love our local refs, no one is perfect. This of course depends on the game,too. A fully auto scored game would be useful, refs just to catch fouls.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Brushless motors

Having a few small, low power brushless motors and a certain brushless motor controller being legal could allow students to learn about different types of motors. They are also more efficient and have greater power to weight ratios over even the most advanced brushed motors.
Inexpensive Chinese Brushless Motors ( ICBM’s) are also widely available.

Battery technology

In the past decade(s) there have been significant advances in Lithium-Polymer battery technology. Some small battery packs now have 65C ratings. Lithium Ion batteries such as 18650 cells are used in a vast array of devices ( laptops, cordless tools, Tesla vehicles etc.)

Although there have been these advances in battery technology I firmly believe that at the moment those technologies are far too dangerous to be used for a replacement for the SLA robot battery currently in use. Even a small error, especially in a large battery pack( such as would be used in FRC) can be extremely dangerous and can lead to large fires and explosions. The SLA robot battery certainly has enough stored energy while remaining quite safe, and is something that does not need replacing.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Modern batteries
Sealed lead-acid batteries are heavy, have poor energy density, and have a shorter lifespan than lithium batteries. For the high-amperage, high discharge rate application that FRC usually presents, I hope the standard SLAs can be phased out in favor of newer battery technologies.

pilleya has a good point about fire safety though - FRC's success is heavily reliant on its ability to keep participants safe, and until lithium batteries can become less dangerous their arrival is understandably far in the future.

Usable simulation tools
Gazebo/FRCSim's low-profile debut in 2015 was disappointing - I saw more threads on CD about installation issues than usage questions. Catalyst/similar games are useful for understanding the field, but don't effectively allow teams to consider the potential designs and strategies of different robots during alliance play. A low barrier-to-entry simulator which combines accessible 3D modeling and good interface design could increase the level of play for many (especially low-resource) teams.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Just as a note, the first time this was tried was '06. A number of mistakes later, the automatic scoring was backed up by human counting, and a pause was inserted between auto and teleop to allow a live double-check. In 2010 and 2012, the scoring was much more reliable and didn't need the double-check (other than maybe referees' gut sense); 2016 BOULDER scoring was fully automated. I want to say that '08 had automatic robot scoring. Come to think of it, 2010 had an automatically-applied penalty!

Now, that being said, all of those games had an element that the referees still had to check--with the exception of 2016, the robots' position at the end of the match was it. 2016 added in the robots' motion through certain areas...

And, just to elaborate on some of the mistakes in '06, most of them weren't necessarily the sensors' fault, but the field design caused some problems. Balls jamming on the low goal's corral and working up towards the sensor--and onto the sensor--could easily confuse it (15 balls scored when only 10 could have?), and the high goal that year had a tendency to jam.

Things have certainly gotten better, with more linear counting systems and better feeds to them, but there's still a ways to go.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

But here’s the thing, I really don’t see weight being much of an issue. Yes, they do have a shorter lifespan than lithium batteries, but they are also cheaper than Lithium batteries of comparable capacity.

The FRC battery is capable of high-amperage( much higher than the 120amp breaker allows), but do we really need it, as I see it the SLA can give out enough power to run the robot just fine. Higher discharge rate simply means more potential for danger.

Higher energy density means that batteries are capable of causing more damage and injury.

At one regional event I attended I saw two or three batteries swell up, because they had been shorted out by teams. The fact that the batteries swell when shorted and then pop, is great compared to Lithium-ion and Lipo batteries that just get hot and create a big fireball.

This is a competition for students, and students make mistakes, as do parents and mentors. What do we want the outcome of someone making a mistake with a battery to be, having the battery destroyed and need to purchase a new one. Or have the battery destroyed, and have it create a big flame/fire that can really badly injure people.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

This project appears to be trying to fill this role: http://bxd.autodesk.com/

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Sort of along with this, eventually lifting the ban on wifi. I understand that right now the technology is not there, so this change would not happen for a while, but when it is possible, it will make scoutung systems and other things much easier to implement. I am also curious about what creative new things teams would develop for competitions if they are able to use wifi.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

From what I can tell, it's just easier for FIRST to not allow it whatsoever. Only having to worry about Field Coordination for Wifi rather than Field Wifi & User Wifi can quickly run into Quality of Service dropping dramatically, something I'd rather now happen during Einstein F3.



Plus, you get teams be more inventive about scouting data transfer (audio / QR / Bluetooth / Network over USB / etc.) I think the learning process actually teaches more when writing scouting apps. Difficult challenges produce inventive solutions, kind-of like the competition itself.

A potential alternate-use would be to switch back to non-Wifi transceivers for Robot ==> DS comms, though you then get back to the issue of if you lose your driver-station transponder, you're out of luck...
Full Disclosure: I tried to write a scouting app and wanted to throw my desk out a window...

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

More to the point w/ the wireless discussion....

Lock the FRC wireless comms to the 5GHz, prohibiting any other uses, and let 2.4GHz be used by the teams for non-field use.

It's increasingly difficult to get connectivity in venues, especially if you need to use cellular, other than via WiFi hotspot (the old USB modems haven't been updated in a long time and don't match the current frequency bands of most providers)....

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Perhaps the largest contribution I could see for FRC tech is to open-source & allow the Driver Station to run on ALL major operating systems, rather than just Windows.

In addition to not having to worry about Windows updates as much, it'd allow teams running Linux or macOS (for any number of reasons) to not use WINE / Bootcamp / Parallels Desktop. The fact that WPILib is open-source, as well as The Blue Alliance, many team's robot & website repos, and QDriverStation & FRC Drive, just to name a few, and yet the Driver Station remains a close-source and OS-exclusive piece of software seems almost counter-productive.

A Short, Collected List of Opensource & FRC
https://github.com/gluxon/DriverStation.js
https://github.com/the-blue-alliance/the-blue-alliance
https://github.com/Team254/cheesy-arena
https://github.com/WinT-3794/QDriverStation
https://github.com/AquaMorph/FRC-Drive

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Robots on the same alliance directly communicating with each other. I have explored the thought myself but it isn't currently feasible, as it requires core robot design principles to be pre-arranged by multiple teams, and that assumes they both make it to the same alliance in playoffs anyway.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Flotation Devices, Propellers, Waterproofing, Etc

You know what I'm taking about

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

*WHAM!* OK, back to the regularly scheduled thread. :p

Propellers, Airfoils, etc.
*WHAM!* OK, back to the regularly scheduled thread. :rolleyes::p

I'll take a wireless communication system that doesn't take nearly a minute to boot and connect to the driver's station.

Brushless motors would be nice, I think, but the biggest problem is that in many FRC applications, stall is a very present issue. And many brushless motors hate stalling, at least in the power range that FRC would likely use. Tough challenge.


Something I'd really like to see isn't a technology item at all, but fits with automated scoring (and instant replay, which I see as being a few years out even if used): Field-element indicators. What I mean by that is something like that nice black line above the low goals this year: Something built into the field that can be used as a height/distance/size reference. It's really nice to be able to tell if a robot is too tall when it tries to do a chinup on the truss, for an older example. Could have used something like that for height checks this year. If they're there, they're great. If not... it's a little harder to make the calls. That could work in the teams' favor, or not.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

This would actually be a good one to try to tackle, but perhaps not to the extent that you are hoping for. Currently, the programming for FRC is largely done by implementing the predefined abstract functions/methods/VIs(?). The same main code runs on every robot, more or less, and only the implementations of these functions vary from team to team. If there were a handful of such abstract functions that teams could use to provide the field with a standard set of parameters, combined with some additional (non-abstract) functions that allow the robots to query these parameters as reported by their alliance partners, basic information sharing would become possible. Additionally, since it would just be more of the same type of programming that teams are already used to, the added burden to the teams would be reduced compared to more complex cooperative schemes.

For example, If robots were to report when they lacked/desired more game pieces, a game-piece-harvesting robot could hold onto its collected game pieces while periodically polling how interested its alliance partners were in receiving them. The other alliance partners would independently write their own code for when to activate this signal based on their own strategies. While other game-piece-harvesters would likely never signal a need for game pieces, an exceptionally rapid scorer might always indicate a need for more. Other teams might tie this signal to a sensor in the robot or control it manually from the driver's station. Regardless of what the method of controlling the signal is, the response of the harvester would be the same. Perhaps the harvesting robot has an automatic turret that auto-aims towards the scoring side of the field, and launches game pieces towards the scoring robots without human interference, allowing the harvester's driver to continue to concentrate on harvesting.

It would work best if the game was designed to encourage the use of such a system, but it could definitely be done.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Heads-Up Display (HUD) Driver Stations

Something we always joked about making one day on 624, but the reasoning is entirely all too real. We would make the effort of lighting our robot with addressable LEDs so drivers don't have to look down at the computer to understand the state of the robot - they could stay focused on what's going on in the field. A HUD would give a lot more information than what can be shown in 32 LEDs and in a much visually clearer way as well.

Besides, eventually when these things get fancy enough - who doesn't want to feel like Tony Stark in front of a Jarvis UI?

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

From an electrical engineer perspective, I find FIRST somewhat limiting. This is a chance to remedy the situation.

Perhaps consider allowing or facilitating access to devices such as FPGAs or PLDs. This could provide the opportunity to bring VHDL or Verilog designs into the robot design process.

As for brushless motors, they would be a great addition to these systems. They will increase, perhaps significantly, the wiring requirements on the robots. Additionally, care must be taken to manage the new failure modes; the motor drive commutates the machine, and not the brushes!

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I'm personally partial towards the coaches shouting at each other "Pass me the ball" method.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

The Driver Station is closed-source for a reason. FIRST wants to have complete control over robot communications for safety reasons. I believe OS-exclusive is just to make things easier for FIRST. According to the internet, it appears that around 90% of consumer desktops/laptops run Windows, so it is not surprising that FIRST doesn't find it worthwhile to support other OS's.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

More Battery Stuff
Having backup batteries, super caps, or at the very least sturdy boost/ buck regulators on the RIO and whatever wireless router we're going to use after the FCC nonsense would go a long way towards allowing more complex/ power- hungry mechanisms to be used, and would likely significantly decrease comm/ response issues.

3D Printing/ CNC/ Laser Cutter/ Waterjet Services
Though my team is very lucky to have these provided to us by our local sponsors, and even has some of these capabilities in our tool shop, i know that many other teams may not have these privileges. This could help to level the playing field a slight bit, if FIRST or some partner organizations could provide these services at a relatively low cost to teams. I think this isn't really unreasonable, especially with the ever- decreasing costs of machining and making complex custom parts. Some convenience would be lost, of course, but it would still give many newer or less privileged teams the opportunity to make awesome custom systems and components.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I believe the current issues with hobby grade BLDC motors are mainly in the motor controllers. Sensored BLDC motors perform identically to brushed motors of the same power. However it is still hard to find affordable, reliable, BLDC motor controllers for sensored motors. Regardless, sensorless BLDC motors would likely be perfectly fine in flywheel-type applications.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

One thing that immediately comes to mind is 148's 2015 robot. That might be the greatest potential for teamwork that was never fully utilized.

In regards to code, I'm not sure. Wireless communications are very strictly locked down while on the field to prevent field signal interference, which I understand, but I think is quite harmful to the growth of control systems within FRC, and I can only dream of the day teams are more free to implement their own wireless communication systems (provided it doesn't flop as hard as the Kinect idea :rolleyes: ).

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

You call this a flop!?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaOiaC0I8pY
They saw the opportunity, and they took it!

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

In light flywheel applications.

I also believe CTRE was demoing a sensored BLDC controller at CMP.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Yeah, they had one of their magnetic encoders connected up to a cheap brushless DC motor. It was quite cool.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

New, lets go back to the good old days. Backup batteries for the radio to help prevent problems with brownouts. Say connected and there's less need for quick radio reboot.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Sam, perhaps I missed it, but you have the first post I noticed that mentioned a separate controls battery that was not specifically lithium based. I'm all in favor of a more dependable power source for control circuits, but I'm not sure that Lithium is ready to be that source. +1, at least.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I would really like all robot communication to be on 5ghz. So that 2.4 ghz hotspots will be viable for teams that need to get online. And also, better bandwidth for the bots themselves.

I agree with more automated scoring. While I noticed this in a few matches, I remember one particular match, I know for a fact I fully crossed the ramparts three times (from neutral to opponents court yard), but the ref only counted it as once, and we lost the match due to that.

I realize a game like this year makes automated scoring of crosses hard. For example if we did some sort of sensor that detects movement, than a boulder rolling over might trigger it etc. I just wish there was a better solution.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

IMO lithium polymer wouldn't be a good choice for FRC. BUT Lithium phosphate or lifep04 is what FRC should switch to. Teams would have to buy fewer batteries and the same battery could last 2-4 matches!

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I don't think I can ever get myself to not change out a battery between matches :D

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

How about this for a new FRC technology? Scanning LiDAR

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Ability for the robots to access the live scoring data from the FMS.
Teams could build their own score overlays into their dashboards or future HUDs.

Robots could actually confirm that a scoring task was complete, very useful for auton.

Lots of other uses I can't think of right now.

Central Stat Database
Sports are better when people have better information. Most other sports (Basketball, baseball, etc) have people that are keeping stats of each player and relaying them to the announcers, and teams. We have dozens of people each match taken down information but we don't have good ways to collect, and verify accuracy. How much better would Einstein announcing be if they could pull up shooting percentages, and shot charts for robots?

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I don't see there being good per robot stats until FIRST starts scoring by robot, which I totally understand why they do not.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

We already have systems that attempt to calculate robot stats (OPR, etc). Once wifi is allowed in the stands TBA or another system could be expanded to allow people to submit robot stats. Those stats could be rated or vetted based on how accurate previous submissions were etc. I'm not expecting their to be volunteers in charge of this, I'm talking about crowd sourcing it from the teams that are already collecting the data anyway.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I've seen this in a few places already and want to correct... When on the field all robot communication is already over the 5GHz Wifi spectrum. There is an associated 2.4GHz network for the FTA, but that is not mission critical and is subject to the extreme congestion of the 2.4GHz spectrum at many venues.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

In the future, all robots will be programmed in Javascript.

I am kidding and I really just wanted to link to Gary Bernhardt's talk because I find him hysterical and this thread reminded me of it.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

That would be absolutely awesome. It was hard as the drive coach this year to keep looking back and forth between the field and the screen to see what was happening. Having the ability to display the current match statistics (not just score but tower strength, defense strength, and time remaining) would be a game changer.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

QFT!

A123 cells (LiFeP04) would provide a much more reliable and capable power source for FRC robots. They have significantly higher energy density and power density than current batteries, but are still affordable and safe to operate.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

LiFePO4s have one significant drawback, though.*

Whoever is in charge of shipping them has to have certifications of some type to ship 'em. And that means that if a team should have to ship their robot--you know, like maybe they make one of the Champs--they need to find someone to handle shipping their batteries. Or get certified, which I have no clue on how to do at this time.

If y'all are interested, I happen to know this because of shipping a robot running a pair of LiFePO4s as its primary power source. I wasn't directly involved, but I know that to get the robot--and its batteries--home, arrangements had to be made at that robot's competition for someone to assist.

I'd put those as 2020s technology, most likely. Love 'em, but I don't think they're quite practical enough to use for FRC just yet. I particularly like the fact that they'll run at pretty much the same voltage for a long time before suddenly dropping out--great for embarrassing any battery-changers that forgot that it's every 3 matches instead of every 5 matches.


*Ignoring the price, that is. They aren't all that cheap, yet.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I agree. This would be a clear case of over-engineering. If we go to higher energy density, I'd much rather have a battery that came in at 25%-50% of the weight of current batteries but was fully capable of lasting a hard-fought match. The full-weight, long-lasting batteries would be great to have for demos and practice time, of course!

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I'm new to LiFePO4, is this the type of battery people are thinking of?

http://www.batteryspace.com/lifepo4-prismatic-battery-12-8v-20ah-256wh-10c-rate-24-0---un38-3-passed-dgr.aspx

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

There is not that much science to shipping Lifep04 batteries, if you use fedex or ups you just need a sticker and normally a declaration on the packing slip. There is also a weight requirement and they may require you to ship separately. Nothing crazy, a bunch of hobby shops ship lithium polymer all over the world for drones, rc cars etc.. LiFeP04 is a factor of million safer, also according to our fedex rep lithium phosphate will soon follow under its own declaration and no longer require a sticker.

I also do a bunch of shipping of lithium phosphate batteries from Shenzhen to the US, which has also been NP.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

This is the cell I like the best. I have not found a good mass produced enclosure for them yet.

http://www.a123systems.com/lithium-i...rical-cell.htm

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

There are two main types(most commonly used) of LiFePO4 cells 18650’s and A123’s

Laptop Batteries, cordless tool batteries(lithium ones), Tesla car’s etc.
Use 18650 cells.18650 cells look like big AA batteries.

The safety of 18650 cells is well documented, like all high capacity batteries they have the potential to be very dangerous. Most battery packs which use them, such as in laptops or cordless tools, have a lot of protection/safety measures built in to prevent problems. If FRC was to move towards LiFePO4 batteries, for safety reasons I would say that the some elements of the electrical system would have to be redesigned, to limit the potential for injury/error.

I would definitely not suggest using the battery that you linked as it is made up of 4 large single 3.2v 20a/h cells rather than conventional small cells.That battery is only capable of providing 40 amps continuously, so I believe it wouldn’t be suitable for FRC purposes.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

There isn't a lot stopping you from using LiFePO4 batteries on your robots for demos and practice time out of competition, it'd be good for demo's but there would probably be a performance difference between the SLA's and the higher capacity LiFePO4's, most likely related to voltage. If a LiFePO4 battery can supply 12.8V constantly, and the SLA quickly drops to 12V, then your motors are going to become 1.14 x more powerful when using LiFePO4 than with SLA.

12.8/12(increase in speed) x 12.8/12 ( increase in torque)=Increase in power.

If you are wanting to have a longer period of time between battery changes for a practice robot, you could put an extra SLA in parallel if you have the space( since this is a practice robot you could fabricate a different battery holder etc.)

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Stepper motors. The most common robot technology I can think of that we are not introducing to our students.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I don't get it. I get that this is a system going out of control, but I don't get what this has to do with the first non-lithium post I have seen.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I believe it was an addition for emphasis of lithium batteries' dangers.

(And yeah, I wouldn't dare entertain a lithium battery that wasn't in an OEM hard case. Nor am I looking forward to the safety advisors' job the first couple years they're out there.)

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Not really, you make the controller part of the pack, just like with laptop packs and the like. Even add a push button charge indicator for extra functionality at a low marginal cost. The hardest part would be the current sense circuit, as we're talking pretty high peak currents compared to most packs. Not to say it's not doable (it almost certainly is), but it would take a corporate partnership for this to happen in FRC. Unless somebody already makes rated packs with a sufficiently robust casing, in which case, half the work is done.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

A Backup Battery.
Supplies power to the cRio and Router as backup to the main battery. Less time lost in router or cRio reboot.

The VEX cortex has a backup 9V battery that behaves in a similar manner.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

For more complex games, like stronghold, project the relevant game data on the driver station window. That way the drivers/coach don't need to rely on the audience screen, which may or may not be blocked by field elements.

A simple game, in the kit off software bundle, that allows a person to walk through the game field. Allowing teams to get a clearer understanding of the field elements before building them. Also if the move part could be animated and/or have it set up for VR, that would be great too.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

FYI, FIRST did try something similar to this in 2014 Aerial Assist. They used a spare ref panel screen to display zones credited for possession. From here:

Not quite the game data in each DS window, but at least they tried :)

I don't think it was used very much.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I find it ironic that at MSC, I found myself looking at the arena jumbo-tron for the score instead of that panel even though the panel was only a couple feet from my head.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I do think we are overdue for a central database where teams can upload their data after the event (and could be used during the event). Similar to TBA but for data, I think it would be a huge help at pre-scouting events. I always find it a waste that teams spend hours collecting data at their event and rarely look at it again, while there are other teams spending hours watching videos of the same matches to prepare for future events.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I've been reading this thread all weekend on Mobile and it's been killing me... On desktop now and can reply.

Working at the system level, I'm responsible for designing and implementing (often lithium based) battery systems for motion control applications.

Lithium ion as a generic name, and Lithium Iron Phosphate (LiFePo4) as a specific chemistry are two very different things. Lithium ion is to dog as LiFePO4 is to german shepherd.

Lithium ion is commonly used as the name for most 18650s and cell phone cells, which I believe are commonly Lithium Cobalt Oxide, Lithium Manganese Oxide or some combo of the two. These cells are optimized for energy density (not power density) and not safety. There is a relatively low temperature thermal runaway condition that can be caused by physical damage (as this allows the anode and cathode to directly short) or temperature increase.

Lithium Polymer batteries (very popular in RC industry, and make a great show on battlebots) are different in that they use a polymer electolyte instead of a lithium salt. They are capable of higher power density than the cobalt and Mn lithium ion, but are often less energy dense. These also are not optimized for safety, and have the same thermal runaway condition.

Both of the above are used far more commonly than LiFePO4 and are made safe by the system design. They are spec'd where overcurrent is not a concern, they are balanced during charging (and sometimes during use), often have external current monitoring to prevent over current, temperature monitoring, etc... All of this with the goal of preventing thermal runaway.

Now let's get to the good stuff!

LiFePO4 is a very safe chemistry as compared to above, and comes in cell and pouch style. Some 18650s are LiFePO4, and a 26650 size was popularized by A123 Systems... but they do come in all shapes and sizes. LiFePO4 are far safer (which mostly comes from about 1/3 the energy density of the above). They are optimized for power density and safety.

LiFePO4 are commonly penetration tested (nail, etc... inserted entirely through the cell and out the other side) without any flame event, and often with the cell remaining perfectly functional. There will be some capacity loss, but it will keep trucking. They can be overcharged and discharged to 0V and recovered without safety issue (do not try this with other chemistires...), just some capacity loss.

LiFePO4 is a great option for FRC batteries as they are commonly used in SLA replacement applications where you you do 2/3 as many SLA cells with LiFePO4 cells, and use the same equipment. This isn't what I would recommend for FRC, as I believe we should still have a balance unit but it would work.

Considering the SLA batteries we use are essentially 4-5Ah batteries (see spec and explanation of law), a LiFePO4 pack could be made that would safely run an FRC robot for 4-5 matches and have a retail price of $200-250. The battery would last for a great deal more cycles than the SLA batteries as they aren't affected by the deep discharg nearly as much. Our team goes through 12 SLA batteries per year, and would we switch to probably 3-4 LiFePO4 batteries and one new one every other year. Most teams could just run 2 and buy a new one every 3 years.

Lithium Titanate would also be another safe option if we stay in the stone ages long enough and price comes down...

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Agreed! But I think this is something the community can come up with no? It shouldn't be that hard to come up with a server and an API to allow teams to upload their stats. We can do it, we have the skills :)

I've always thought that it was a bit crazy how much redundant data entry gets done at competition. I love ideas like this where we can all benefit from working together. The harder problem is convincing teams to share when they might want to guard their data to maintain a competitive advantage. There's also the problem of someone intentionally or unintentionally uploading misleading stats. It would need some kind of account system where we can reward contributors, and moderate abusers. Not easy, but doable....

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I think the hardest problem is convincing teams to all scout in a similar way. Right now, every team scouts differently and collects different data, but for a system like this to work and be accurate, you would need multiple people per event collecting the same data set. I think a lot of teams will not like the data that the system would collect and will end up doing their own thing instead.

As far as ensuring accuracy, the thing with a similar problem that comes to mind is Waze and their crowdsourced road condition reporting. They also have a relatively small (I presume) amount of reports for each event and need to make sure they are as accurate as possible. I don't know exactly what their system is, but I think it would be a good starting point for anyone who is interested in making this happen. FRC has the advantage of being able to also reference the FIRST match API for some things (Ex: If someone reports that each robot on an alliance makes 5 high goals in a match and the API reports 7 total, you know something is wrong).

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I'm not sure what problem that would fix anymore. We could get rid of the brownout conditions if we had one, but most radio and roborio reboots are from physical disconnections and which aren't immediately solved by a backup battery.

I do think backup batteries are a good idea because you could then switch out batteries during demos without needing to reboot the radio/RoboRIO.

This system doesn't have to completely remove redundancy, in fact it works better when more teams are scouting. What this would do would allow teams to see real stats from events they aren't attending, as well as the general public.

This system wouldn't be comprehensive, teams are free to track whatever stats like personally but many of them could be added to the this central database. Largely teams track things such as high goals made the same way or at least can easily produce that stat for every robot they scout. There are other similar stats that most people agree on each year and if there are some less tracked stats, the system could show how many people/teams have submitted for that stat and possibly have some way to rank if you should trust that stat or not.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

While that would seem useful during the match, what would then constitute a replay? If the updated score/details didn't make it to your system within 10ms? 100ms? 1000ms? If the data wasn't updating on your DS because your DS was either AT or NEARLY AT maximum CPU utilization (and how would you prove that?!)? Would anyone then easily accept a backup DS from the FTA?

I do agree that having the data published to the DS in the same manner that the match timer is published to the DS would be considerably beneficial, but I'm not sure that it would be reasonable to *depend* on that data in-match. But, even unofficially, it could be incredibly useful to have that data in real-ish-time.

-George

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

The FTAs have to make a replay call as it is on a whole host of issues that may pop up during a match. It could easily be said in the rules, that this system is not guaranteed to work. Also this information is already available on the field network (not to robots and DS) but to computers running the Audience Display software.

People have custom driver station software as it is, that makes running a backup DS less than optimal but teams still do it when they have to. Also the majority of teams would not utilize this feature, just like the majority of teams don't use custom dashboard widgets, etc.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Allen's pretty close.

Replays, per FRC 2016 rules, are given if the following conditions are met:
--Field Fault. (FTA determination, usually)
--Affects the Outcome of the Match. (Head Ref/FTA determination--primarily Head Ref)
--Requested by Affected Team.

I think that for the most part, and without seeing the technology in place... Probably many requests would fail on the "affecting the outcome" part of that. The ones that were, actually, a field fault, that is.


On top of that, there is sort of a "standard warning" that many game announcers apply that the shown scores may not be accurate at any given time, and are not final.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I think it would fall under the same ruling as the current method getting match time through code. Don't rely on it, it's not legal for replays, and use it at your risk.

Source: http://wpilib.screenstepslive.com/s/...input-overview

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Great information! Thanks for that.

It also may be worth noting that these batteries could potentially be charged from dead to full in a few minuets between matches.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Here's the heads up display we used last year.
https://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/s...d.php?t=136401

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Hom many lumens was the projector that you all ended up using?

Future FRC Technologies?
 

It seems like a really cool idea.

Any chance you have a photo from the driver's perspective? I saw several requests in the other thread but no photo.

Also, have you considered using a "pico projector" or something smaller?

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

The IFI control system's backup battery relied on a different connection to the robot controller. Thus you had to have two connection failures for a disconnect to occur, greatly decreasing the probability of occurrence.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

Could that be duplicated by giving power through the RJ45 and the power plug? I wonder how the radio would react?

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

They are redudant that is how we powered the radio, all year and it worked flawlessly.

And yes the old backup battery did have another connection but it added completixty, in having keep another battery charger and replacing it when needed. The main problem it solved was avoiding brown outs, the current system does that well without the need for the backup battery. (at least that is how I believe the system is intended to work).

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

While it may not be as truly redundant as a separate power circuit, I agree that it makes more sense from the volunteer inspection standpoint (which needs both simplicity and safety) to allow robust voltage regulators (and boosters where needed) to ensure a steady voltage rather than a separate power source.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

The primary issue is a sufficiently robust casing is it would have to be built out of metal (work experience). Then again, I also have a different view on what I consider safe with regards to batteries since we sometimes do our penetration testing with bullets (conventional workplace hazard).

I am seeing integrated controllers as pretty common and one option a number of them do provide is current charge limiting. Some of the options allow you to provide the battery a straight 14.4 volts and the battery will current limit to whatever is programmed.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

I think they had mentioned that they had tried a pico projector but that it wasn't bright enough.
Personally, I've been wondering about the possibility of taking a pico projector and mounting it so it projects onto something the driver wears like a safety Faceshield so that the mount doesn't interfere with the drivers visibility, effectively making it an AR visor. That said, I think you would have to get creative to make everything focus properly.

Re: Future FRC Technologies?
 

1000-1500 Lumens
The student/alumni that came up with this concept doesn't remember the exact specification. He said it was or was similar to the NEC LT260 DLP Projector with an old bulb. Something he picked up at a school auction.

Adding a coating to the 45 degree viewing window or reflective car tinting might also help, we used clear polycarbonate.

The one thing about this setup was it was very heavy and awkward to carry around between matches.

No pictures that I can find, sorry.
We did try a smaller projector but it wasn't bright enough to be usable.