Inducing the green Team LED?
 

Does anyone know of a way to make the RC blink the team color light green?

Just curious about this little "easter egg"... :D

Re: Inducing the green field light?
 

IIRC, If you set the team number to 0 so you are in a constant autonomous state the Team LED will blink Red, Blue, Red, Blue, Green.

Re: Inducing the green field light?
 

Cool, thanks! I'll test this sometime soon. :)

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

I know I saw a picture of a robot that was flashing green during a regional but I unfortunatelt can't find the thread anymore. But there is photographic evidence :)

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

Our LED started to fall off at a couple of regionals, so not all the pins were in contact, and it started flashing Green and Yellow. That was odd. It's possible, but I don't know how to do it on purpose.

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

I know about that thread, that's how I found out about the green light. :)
Unfortunately, that was during a malfunction of the RC, so there's no way to duplicate it through the same method.

Yeah, I wonder if there are actually four LEDs in there (one blue, one red, one green, and one something else, maybe yellow), because there are five wires to the LED module. That should be four colors and a common ground.

Re: Inducing the green field light?
 

I finally got around to testing it and all it would do is blink red/blue :confused:

Any ideas?

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

I'm asuming that you are talking about the LED lights that you mounted to your robot on the sides? If you are, all you have to do is change the wiring around where the wires plug into the RC. I messed around witht hat last week and got ours to bcome white, red, green, blue, bluish green, ect. I will post pics later today If I can.

Josh
Team Driver/Designer

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

AWESOME! Could you please post which wires you put where?

Of course I don't have the RC readily available anymore. :rolleyes: However, this would make a great practical joke for the other members of the programming team, who think that it can only be red or blue! :)

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

Just a point of warning, please don't not alter the wiring of the led blocks that will be used on your robot in competition this year. They are used for diagnostics and by you changing the wire pattern will result in confused technicians and possible issues on the field.

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

Since the LED is supposed to show your alliance color (red or blue), flashing the green periodically during a match to confuse the other robots, would probably be considered ungraciously professional and lead to a DQ. It would be a novel idea as a defensive mechanism and interesting to watch though.

[EDIT] As you can see below, Katie has found the "letter of the law" that addresses this situation.[/EDIT]

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

I realize this, I was using the lights that were on the robot last year. We are using last years robot for testing stuff and I just wanted to mess around with it.

Josh
Team Designer/Driver

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

<R14> Robots must use the Alliance Color LED provided in the Kit of Parts to display their alliance color (red or blue). The Color LED will be used by field personnel during the matches for diagnostic purposes. It must be mounted on the robot such that their displayed color is easily visible while standing in front of the robot in its’ starting position. Instructions for connecting the Color LEDs are provided in the Innovation First Controller manual. The Robot Controller directly powers and controls the Team Color LEDs. The user has no control over the Team Color LEDs and no programming is required.

<R31> No devices or decorations are permitted on the robot that are intended to jam or interfere with the operation of the vision system (i.e. changing robot color to confuse opponent’s vision system).

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

IIRC - Last year on 229 we plugged in the LED plug sideways on the RC pins. This made it a solid green. The IFI reps at Finger Lakes enjoyed picking on me for that oopsie.


-JV

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

Just so everyone knows, I was not going to use this in competition, let alone to jam someone else's vision system in an incredibly un-GP manner! :ahh:

As I stated previously, I just wanted to play a practical joke on the other members of the programming team, as well as unlock this little "easter egg" IFI put in our team color LEDs. :)

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

I imagine that IFI designed the LED to include green and yellow just in case FIRST has four alliances again.

The rookies may not be aware of this but a few years ago (2001 I think, don't quote me) there were green and yellow alliances in addition to the red and blue. At that time the LEDs didn't exist. We used the revolving lights and had green, blue, red and yellow lenses to swap out depending on what alliance you were on.

I don't know why they would turn white though, I've never heard of any robots willingly surrendering during a match yet! ;)

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

It's '01. 4 robots, one alliance, colors marked whose robot was whose and who got a bonus at the end.

Re: Inducing the green Team LED?
 

During practice with last year's controller, one of my team-mates who was not used to being around the robot, was asked to put it into program state. He then proceeded t hold the button for approximately 30 seconds, including while the hex file was being downloaded. This caused the LEDs to blink in a pattern including red, blue, and green.

We recorded a video, I'll try to find it later (doing hw right now, lol).