New member, new team, questions.
 

OK, soo, i find this forums, this is the first year my schools done USFIRST, and i have some questions.

First, i see all these teams here that have already built, or almost built, their robots. I was told that the ship us parts in January and then we have like 3 months or so to build it from those parts - are you allowed to recycle robots from lats year? are we hopelessly behind? please set me straight.

Our teacher/team coach/ MIT-grad-who-knows-his-stuff is also new, but he said that, as he understands, we can only use parts that come in the big kit, or that we purchase through a US FIRST supplier (THE supplier?), but i hear teams talking of using file cards as added traction on their robots, and I'm wondering how stictly we must stick to that, or expect other teams too. Are note cards legal? will they be?

This last one is about cost. We recieved a 7000 doller grant from NASA, as about 2/3 of everyone else did, and, as I understand, 6000 of that went to USFIRST to enter the contest, pay for EDURobot and the box of stuff they send us. The other 1000 can be used for extra parts. what did other people spend on their robots above and beyond the 6000 doller initial fee. I am wondering if I should begin calling local companies for grants. Help and answers are much appreciated.


sidequestion: does a team of highschoolers, mostly Juniors, a few senriors, and one freshman, maybe 10 of us in all, have any chance of building a winning robot in 3 months? Hell, i can't remember if its months or weeks, but i hope its months.

Anyway, thank you all for your time, and remember, its in your own self intrest to help us, in case you wind up allied with us . . . . . . . . . . .

speaking of which, i watched the videos of last years competition, which involved big upright goals, with robots putting balls in them and trying to push them down to their oponents end of the feild. I also understand we don't find out what we do this year until the ship us the parts . .. . . am i right, or is it going to be the goal thing again. If everyone knows the task 'cept us, we should probably get going on design.

Again, Thank you all.


-Frank (Aflak is just a nickname . . . sounds like my last name sorta)

First, i see all these teams here that have already built, or almost built, their robots.
You are probably looking at robots from last year, no one has started this year (except for prototyping)

are you allowed to recycle robots from lats year? are we hopelessly behind? please set me straight.
NO and no, you cannot recycle robots or parts, and you are not hopelessly behind, once January rolls around you will be where everyone else is.

Our teacher/team coach/ MIT-grad-who-knows-his-stuff is also new, but he said that, as he understands, we can only use parts that come in the big kit, or that we purchase through a US FIRST supplier (THE supplier?), but i hear teams talking of using file cards as added traction on their robots, and I'm wondering how stictly we must stick to that, or expect other teams too. Are note cards legal? will they be?
You can use the parts that come in the kit in January and other materials that are included on the additonal materials list that you will recieve in january, restrictions etc. will be outlined at that time too.

any chance of building a winning robot in 3 months
I wouldnt worrying about making a winning robot your first year in FIRST, worrying about getting one done, if u complete that task you are truly a winner.

Hopefully someone else will add on to what i put.

:D

Better Reply
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Re: New member, new team, questions.
 

1.) If your team is sending a team representative to a remote kickoff, or the Manchester kickoff itself, that person will be picking up a kit of parts at the kickoff event. In the event where you can't send another to kickoffs, I believe you can arrange something with FIRST and have them send you the kit of parts.

2.) You have 6 weeks to build the robot, before you have to ship the robot to an desinated storage place on Feb. 17th or 18th.

3.) Things you are allowed to build your robot with: The innovation FIRST control system that came with the kit of parts, all the motors from the kit, and some structural material included in the kit as well as some small parts like gearing and shaft collars, etc. And you will get a list of addition hardware, where you can look up the allowed material you can use for your robot. It usually include "any kind of gears and sprockets, chain", or like aluminum extrusion up to a cross section of 2" by 2", or limited size of timing belts, etc. You will have to look up that list for specifics parts you can use for next year when you get the kit. Finally, there might be a company FIRST allowed you to buy things from, such as the small parts inc. from past years (although they are no longer FIRST's sponsor). And you are limited to a certain amount of money you can use at Small parts. The filing card Team 71 used last year are from small parts I believe.

The most important restriction for the robot is two things: a size limit, 2.5' by 3' by 5' in the last two years (which they might change), and a 130 lbs limit.

4.) You can only use past year's robot parts if FIRST allowes you to. For example, I believe old motors from old robots are ok, as long as you only use the limited number of them on the robot at a time, and that they are the exact same model. Otherwise, you may only use parts you manufacture DURING the 6 weeks and the allowed time after competition every year.

5.) You are allowed to raise as much money as possible for your team, for team traveling, spare parts budget, raw material, etc. There is no limit on that.


One more thing. Feel free to ask question on this forum. There are plenty of people willing to help. Its much different from other competitions where each teams are for themselves only.

Hope it helps.

-Ken L

Re: New member, new team, questions.
 

I don't think that many teams got NASA grants, mostly rookies and some 2nd year teams, (the list) . You proabably want to start contating some compaines, our team is rather big (50 students) and we are going to Midwest and The Championship, but we figure we need to raised about $50,000 (the more the better) to compete successfully this year, we have gotten $5000 from our school and figure aboout $20-25000 in corporate donations, and we'll fundraise the rest (candy bars, pizza, etc.....)........


And the build is about 6 weeks, :p

Clarification re: "File Cards"
 

Just a clarification, as I have seen some confusion in recent posts regarding this...the "file cards" referred to as being used by Team 71 in 2002, more specifically, are wire cleaning brushes for your average wood/metal file. I didn't get a real close up look at them, but I'm guessing something similar to the wire brush on this page:
http://www.engineeringfindings.com/cat22/cat22pg450.pdf

or perhaps the "file card and brush" seen here:
http://www.engineeringfindings.com/cat22/cat22pg398.pdf

Questions hmm..
 

well, in regards to your last question, about cost, i would be fundraising, or looking into grants. 7000 is hardly enough to run a team, and your kit of parts is pretty limited. My team has done over 25000 in fundraising for this year, and we have the money we get from GM too, and its still not quite enough. But, that is after all, a veteran team your comparing to. Weve been in this for 7 years, and it takes a little more to run a team like 68, good luck to you though.

Alex

Re: New member, new team, questions.
 

http://www.usfirst.org/robotics/doc_updt.htm

I highly suggest you go to that site and study last year's documents.


Other than the game, the documents change very little from year to year. Read them and you will be the master of the competition. You don't necessarily have to memorize them. But, if you read them, you will know where to look when you have to look something up during the build.

Granted, when the new competition comes out a new rule book will be published, but it won't change a whole lot. You'll still want to read the new one.

There are many local kickoffs on Jan.4th which every team should be attending to 1) Find out what the game is and 2) pick up some of the kit of material. At some of the sites there are seminars scheduled to share information (cooperation and sharing experience are encouraged in the FIRST - by the way, it's not US FIRST anymore since there are many fine teams from Canada, Brazil, England and other countries). Back to the seminars - You should see if the place you are going for the kickoff has a "Rookie Camp" - this is where a veteran team or teams will generally outline the "Do and Don'ts" to help the Rookie teams from going off and doing something that would be detrimental. Lastly, use our Forum to "Ask questions about whatever - but please check out the existing threads because once this thing gets rolling in January the sheer # of posts will astound you and we get many redundant or nearly redundant questions. As a service to "Just the Rookies" I'll see if Brandon can add a Forum where Rookies can ask questions without them being intermingled and lost in the other threads - sort of a Place where Rookies can ask questions that Rookies always ask" - Have fun and Best of Luck this year!

Website to look at
 

Here at Georgia Tech, we are preparing the new Georgia rookie teams for the season and have put a lot of good information on our website. We had our Rookie training session last week, the presentation for that is also on the website. Please feel free to take a look at it at www.robojackets.org.

You would probably want to raise at least $2000 for robot building as well as travel money for the team. Teams also usually have some kind of uniform (t-shirts, etc) and have buttons to give away at the competition. These are things you can work on now, or after the robot is built. A rookie robot can be very competitive, just try to keep your design simple come January. Don't try to do everything and you'll be fine. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions. Good luck!

I know Nate said something about this but I'll clarify a bit more.

The file cards aren't something such as in a library shelf of cards. They are used to clean out metal files (to grind down pieces of metal). A note card wouldn't improve traction, but I'm sure they are legal.

In the past, all games (except the very first one) have been played on a specific type of carpet. I don't know a part number or anything but keep that in mind when thinking of ways to gain traction while you build. (i.e. note cards have a very flat surface and don't mesh at all with carpet, therefore almost no traction other than the weight of your bot).

Read through in the 'Technical' forums here, you may get inspired

That would be great for a lot of teams, not just rookie teams, but teams with rookie students. What you mentioned is kinda like my idea of making a question forum (which the WRRF web team will work on during christmas).

It would be great to have a sub forum or something just for rookie FIRST participants to ask whatever questions they have, no matter how silly they are. And once the question got answered, it would be closed so discussions won't be clogging up that forum. If people choose to discuss the topic, then they can post a new thread in other forums and put a link to the original question.

One thing I am not sure about is if the answered questions should be moved to the appropiate forum, or all stay in the forum where people asked the questions. It would be easier for the person who asked to find his/her answer if they are all in one place.

Everyone here has been more than helpful, and i'm looking forward to building with your support, and possibly seeing many of you at the events.

Thanks

Frank

Also frank, look for teams in your area, try and get some mentors

906 NASA/The University of Missouri - Rolla Robotics Competition Team & Rolla High School Rolla, MO USA

931 NASA/Emerson Electric/Ranken Technical College & Gateway Institute of Technology/Cleveland NJROTC St. Louis, MO USA

(taken from FIRST site, MO people willing to be mentors, I'm sure there are more also)

Ill mention that to our faculty guy, Rolla's kinda far, but i think Ranken is this little tech school, the kind you see adds for on TV, in town. iiiinteresting.

I have no idea whom they are, I'm in Michigan, just grabbed their info from USFIRST.org