Most Innovative Teams
 

Who are the most mechanically innovative teams to pass through FRC? What years and what mechanisms?

2010- Winnovation with their brilliant 6 wheel swerve, 67 and 1717's gas spring hanging mechanisms.

2008- Winnovation and Simbotics with their surgical tubing ball launchers (Granted they weren't the only ones)

Could you tell I'm a Winnovation fan?:rolleyes:

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Re: Most Innovative Teams
 

118 in 08 stands out to me. The waterjet cuts, robonaut v6, coaxial swerve, surgical tubing launcher...quite awesome and quite innovative. There week 3 video goes down as one of the best teasers of all time http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAJBC-DDL9w

I'm seeing a surgical tubing trend...:cool:

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'08
1108- Suction ball control with a catapult. Very cool!
2337- We all know "das boot"

'09
1108 (again)- Human fed spiral, with physical switches as indicaters of a pin.
1986- If there empty cell launching strategy had worked better, they would have been unstoppable
525- A shooter that loads like a shotgun round, very cool to watch.

'10
The loopers -
469, 125, 2992
And since 1625's hanging mechanism hasn't been mentioned: Gas shock power :)

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I'm ashamed of myself for not mentioning this in my first post.

1771 in 08 is absolutely the coolest robot ever.

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2007: I guess i have to jump on the Winnovation bandwagon too, their ramp lifter lifted 2 robots AND themselves off the ground

2008: 1771 had the suckiest robot that year ;-) and it worked!

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I think 71 making weight in 2007 was pretty innovative in itself, never mind how good they were. Dual 12 inch ramps, effective gripper and a swerve drive. A lot of teams made tradeoffs to get one of those three things and Beatty had all three.

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254/968 in their huge focus on continuous improvement, efficient design (especially in their drivetrain) and efficient manufacturing techniques.

Unconventional isn't necessarily innovation.

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I really liked 2337's robot this year, I truely thought it was one of a kind :D

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we nicknamed it "ca-chunk" :P thats the sound it makes when it hangs. lol

and the mid-season addition of a double-functioning scoring diverter was nice too ;)

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umm guys...469? EVERY YEAR EVER (okay, done now)

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This year, undoubtedly, 469.

I was irrevocably impressed.

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Aren's right for as long as I can think back.
2005, the giant tower that could simultaneously stack like 5 or more tetras
2006, their shooter that had the abbility to shoot a coulmn of balls
2007, drawing a blank
2008, They had the side roller collectors that were originally on an arm, and then converted to a luancher (the collectoer was quite different)
2009, Multi-column shooter was pretty original.
2010, What did they do in 2010 again?

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2007 - Giant airport landing strip ramp similar to RUSH's. It was nice for wide robots like us that year; one of the few we had no problems driving up on.

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I think that in '08 1771 was pretty much the most innovative. And they have an award to prove it.

In '09, I really liked 111's machine. There was also another team that had a similar implementation of that design and I simply loved it.

In '10, 469 was amazing. I was freaking out when at the bell, the game was tied, and then all of a sudden they score two more goals because of their loop and grabed the win. 67 and 1717 were also pretty impressive with their ability to lift even after the buzzer.

Re: Most Innovative Teams
 

Another addition to my Winnovation list - their 2010 lifter was also gas spring powered. These kids are insane.

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2010: 67 gas spring powered hanger was the coolest thing of the year.
1717 pushing off of the platform was a truly brilliant idea.
469 god bot
2009: 1280 their idea was so simple but gave them such an unbelievable amount of hopper space.
2008:1771 with their insane vacuum system.
1114 just look at it. the way their winch disengaged is enough to earn them a spot on this thread.
217 pvc grabber with surgical tubing that just worked brilliantly at picking up and launching the balls.
2007: 1717 their ramps where just amazing. pushing off the ground with what i believe was gas springs was just awesome
126 had rollers that could acquire the outside of the ringer and the inside.
330 having the bottom part of their pneumatic attach to the bottom part of their grabber made it so simple to fit within the dimensions.
2006: 25 having their shots be intermittent so that they were more consistent was one of the things that brought them so close to a national championship.

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If you are going to mention 1625 from 2007, 1501 also needs to be given credit. They could also lift two robots and themselves but could also do it after the buzzer.

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1717 too. Not sure if it's after the buzzer but since they released gas springs, they probably could.

Any good idea I've ever had in FRC is stolen from 1625.

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71.

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Seconded. Especially 2002.

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2008: I would like to also mention 190, even though it was deemed illegal, our team thought of their design too and it was a very unique loophole that was almost the perfect scorer for Overdrive, a sort of 469 Breakaway for that year

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Chainzilla whatever year the tetrahedrons were, that thing was sweet.

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Minus the part where it didn't work at all.

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I will agree. It was an ingenious design and an engineering challenge, but it didn't work as planned. The most I ever saw was 3 hurdles in one match at their prime. But a rotating double tower with suction cup is amazing nonetheless!

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71 in 2004/ there was also a rookie team in 04 that both caught all the balls in a tarp as they fell onto the field from the driver station.
330 in 04 because they built a sick hanging robot that could strafe across the bar to block other from hanging
and of course, 1771 in 08. Sean did wonders with that robot

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Don't know how this design/strategy worked out, but this was a really cool robot from team 68!

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/14988

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I started FIRST in 2003 and here are my memories of the robots that stood out for me personally:

2003: 111's robot and automode. My first year and I was blown away...
2004: 469 (before I was on the team) with the Chomp Chomp gripper, 67 with the flop bot, and 71 with the huge PVC arms
2005: 66's arm and their automode which scored on the center goal (only saw it on the practice field in Atlanta though), and 233's unbelievable robot.
2006: The triplets, and 703's wide belt shooter
2007: 254/968 for their lightening fast scores and automatic double lift, 1625's entire robot
2008: 27 for their launcher which inspired us to change mid season, 217 and 1114 for two of the most unique and effective robots that year
2009: 111 for their lift, storage dump mechanism
2010: 25 for their fan suction device

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2010: We should probably add 148/217 (added?) to the list because they were the first to build and show off the pinch roller design in the pre-season.

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also their drive train was super awesome

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1114 in 2008. It was stupid simple.

I thought our belts from last year were pretty innovative.

-Nick

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They had to remove the arms that straddled the center field divider, as reacting off of it was not allowed.

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2008: 1114 - best hurdler, best hybrid mode, best at almost everything.
2009: 2056 - could completely fill an opposing trailer in one dump.
2753 - won both Jersey and Archimedes in their rookie year.
2010: 469 - don't think I need to say any more.
67 - hanging after the buzzer + great scoring in general.

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Not to discount anything 2056 has done, but a ton of teams could do that last year. Good, but not particularly innovative.

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Xbot 488 was similar, except their robot was opaque. Unless you were looking straight on, you couldn't tell how many were inside. Simple, not particularly ingenious, but effective.

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How about team 45 from 1999-2002 and their innovations in bringing gear shifting to FIRST. That eventually led to AndyMark, which I'm sure everyone has heard of.

Other good ones:

67 in 1998: the first omni wheel in FIRST.

47 in 1998: the first swerve drive system.

27 in 2002: the first Archimedes Screw ball storer/sorter that I saw.

111 in 2001: the first help-your-partners ramp-bot to be successful.

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My personal experience with other team's robots is limited mostly to New England, but there are a few standouts in my memory from the past few years in the area of mechanical innovations:

2005 - This year, Gael Force (126) built a robot with an awesome robotic arm which very quickly and effectively placed two tetras at a time.

2006 - The Rhode Warriors (121) had a great Archimedes screw-like ball hopper which was a huge rotating turret around a fixed silo. Atop a robust drive train, it made their robot an awesome opponent that year; when they took up a solid position against the ramp, they could simply turn their turret to lock on the goal and fire away!

2008 - Team 121 again came up with a dominating robot in New England -- this time a hurdling design which was much simpler than most, featuring a single-jointed arm (only a shoulder joint) with a combination roller- and spring-claw that made picking up and hurdling balls deceptively simple. Not only did they get this robot ready in time for shipment, but they had it working by the end of week 3, posting videos online of their robot in operation which inspired many other teams (including ours) to come up with very similar designs for their hurdling robots.

2009 - Although not solely a mechanical innovation, Team 40, Checkmate of Trinity High School, conquered one of the most difficult autonomous challenges in FIRST history, being able to score autonomously into moving trailers in Lunacy. They were able to do this through the combination of some incredible autonomous software programming and a sound mechanical system of a turreted shooter atop a swerve drive base. Seeing their robot autonomously hunt down a moving trailer and score into it while driving around the field was incredibly inspiring!

2010 - Although primarily a software innovation and not the first time this has been done, the field-oriented drive system of Team 1058, PVC Pirates, gave them increased control of their robot, making them an outstanding mid-fielder in this year's game.

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Techno Ticks (236) also had a ridiculous Archimedes Screw that year.

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2005: I'm a fan of 254's dual-PID arm with simple wrist joint. I didn't really get to see much that year though and that's only from perusing 254's old pictures.

2006: 25's turret, as seen in the behind the design book. The shooter wheels were suspended and allowed the balls to come up from a single point no matter what direction the turret was pointed.

2007 (overall): Gael Force (or Aces High??) for their inside roller claw. It had 2 wheels that spun outward and had high accuracy even with large driver errors when picking up an innertube. It was incredibly simple and very effective. Our Vegas/Atlanta claws were based off of it.

2007 (needs mentioning) 1731's 5-Degree Of Freedom (dof) arm WITH an identical arm used as its controller. This thing was a beast to see in person. The arm was a 2-dof wrist with 1-dof elbow and a 2-dof shoulder joint. The controller was the same thing except it was much smaller and used potentiometers to sense the desired position. The operator only had to move the control model in order to get the arm to respond. For complex movements it had about a 3-second delay, but for simple operations it was very quick.

2007 (drive train): 254/968's introduction of the ultra-light transmission with teflon-impregnated 7068 aluminum gears. 2-3 lbs (?) for a reliable shifting transmission is unheard of.

2008: 1565's "Twitch" drive which led to some pretty innovative control system techniques in 2009. Talk to 48, 1885, and 357 about for what happened in 2009 (though we all had varying levels of success due to implementation). It's essentially a swerve drive limited to two 90 degree states using omni wheels. The rotary action is pneumatic powered, and when all 4 links are independently controlled some whacky things can happen with the center of rotation.

2010: Nonadrive. Hands down, it's hard to believe there's a way to reinvent a skid steer to minimize all of the typical skid steer faults, but 148/217 did it. Granted it's a high maintenance drive train, but iterative design tends to work out all of the kinks. A team with mid-level skills and manufacturing abilities should be able to make a nonadrive from scratch assuming they understand the basics of traction and c.g. This single fact, imo, trumps 1625's complex 6-wheel crab for 'best' innovation in 2010.

I'm also personally a fan of MOE's tensioning and kicking mechanism in 2010 -- an effective motor winch system without the need of a dog gear.

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What made 25's suction different from the other suction devices? I never got a chance to see it close up, but from the webcasts it seemed really effective.

Speaking of suction devices, I think 3362's suction device is innovative for just being super simple. As a small rookie team with limited funding, they took a fan from their room, put a CIM on it and put a plywood (I think) box around it. It was just as, if not more, effect as 111's at Wisconsin. Here is a picture of it: http://www.thebluealliance.net/tbatv/team/3362

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Yup, that was Gael Force (126).

Like Ken, my perspective is decidedly northeastern.

2004: Hyper (69). I don't know who started building robots that sucked, but HYPER mastered it in 2004. They had huge wheels (for some reason, I can't find a good picture of the robot, but if memory serves they had something like a 12" diameter), and an awesome arm. At the end of the arm was a plunger with one heck of a vacuum. Once they had hold of the doubler ball, you were not going go steal it. At BAE in a full speed turn they whacked another robot with the ball, and it didn't budge. They also were excellent hangers. They didn't lose a match all season when their robot was on the field (2 regionals) but they didn't go to Atlanta.

GOMPEI and HERD (190) Autonomous hanging, bar blocking, doubler ball stealing, own goal capping, oh my! One of the coolest robots FIRST has ever seen. At BAE it had a nasty tendency of flipping over in autonomous though.

2005: Gael Force's (126) robot in 2005 sold me on the 6 wheel drive dropped center drive. 190 had a neat robot with field centric drive, and an auto aligning, auto capping arm (all the operator did was press a button for the number of tetras currently stacked and another button to place the tetra), but much like the 2008 robot it never quite worked.

2006: Drawing a blank...

2007: As mentioned before, Gael Force was pretty neat. I liked 40's robot that year as well (what is their team name? Trinity or Checkmate?). I've always loved how they cheese hole everything so nicely, we tried it in 2005 until we realized we always had cheese holes where we wanted to mount things. :cool: )

2008: 1519 built two robots for the weight of one! That was pretty neat. Sadly, little Speed Racer never got to compete, and 1519 got an angry Q&A response and the definition of robot changed! How many teams can claim that? 95 also had a nifty robot that year. They fought the backup battery bug, so they only got it working in their final matches of BAE and the elimination matches. They had a fast pickup mechanism and a super fun to watch pneumatic launcher though!

2009: 20's rolling canvas vomiter was fun to watch. They few times they went to vomit and the other robot managed to get away, the crowd response was huge.

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It was actually good. It worked from several inches away, apparently...

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I'm not sure on all the details of their sucker, but from what I saw and was told to me, it is a pair of impellers (they look similar to model aircraft propellers) on a pair of Fisher Price motors. From what I saw, they cause the ball to come into their robot from a couple feet away. I have never seen a suction device with as much flow as 25's.

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They also had two idling rollers instead of a cup which I think was a huge part of giving them such a big radius from which they could pick up the ball.

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I'm going to give it to 1625 here... 6 wheel swerve is essentially "the best of both worlds" and doesn't require complicated programming or chaining just to get a zero point turn like most swerve drives. It's also not that much heavier and eliminates the need for transmissions; all reductions are done with chain and a gear reduction on the module. I wanted to see 1625 swerve in front of 469 this year...

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I also wanted to add 1114 from 2009 and the way they funneled the balls, it was really creative.

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It was a little over a pound, 2-3 lbs is really not that uncommon for the same style 2 speed.

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There's still IRI

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2008: 217 for their... what to call it... claw? Simple, but arguably one of the most effective systems. Also, 27 for the way they picked up the ball (and earlier in the season, I believe they knocked off both of their track balls in autonomous)

2009: 1114 could either shoot straight into an opposing trailer or over the top of an opposing robot into that robot's trailer, at the same speed with a turreted shooter. Also, both 70 and 494 could score all 7 balls in autonomous. 67 for their double-shooter.

2010: 469... need I explain? 33 for their drive train and hanging. 1114 for their hanging- does anyone know how they lifted so fast?!

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They used the power from all 4 drive CIM's, and used that to drive a winch that pulled up the arm. When it was up, a second latch would grip the pole higher up to prevent falling.

We only had 1 CIM for the arm, so we shifted it to second to deploy and back to first to lift.

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Using all four drive motors. I believe them and us were the only teams who did it; they actually did it in matches, we only ever did it on the practice field as we were more focused on getting ball control working.

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Yeah, that deserves the title of "most innovative" =]

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217 and 228 also had this. 1114 tended to use it a lot more than 217 did, though, and 228 wasn't really at a level high enough to demonstrate it.

Poofs did it or some variant of it too. They also did it in 2004.

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They only used two motors for their hanging motion.

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79 this year also had a really cool and quick hanging mechanism, sometimes they even went much higher than was necessary (it was cool to see that) :D .

78's rolling hanger mechanism was also very innovative.

71 had in incredibly innovative robot back in 2004! The only robot I have seen to simultaneously hang AND score a 2x ball. Very nice!
They also had a pretty innovative bot back in 2005. They were able to carry multiple tetras similar to 469.

I think the most innovative robot I have ever seen so far was, obviously, 469's robot this year. I don't think I have ever seen a robot in action that could successfully "break the game" like 469 could. I didn't even think it was possible! They had an incredible machine that had the entire FIRST nation baffled as to how they could compete against such an awesome robot.

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All of these robots, along with 236 in 2002 (also were one of the pioneers of the archimedes screw ball management systems), 45 in multiple years for pioneering the "roller claw," 111 in 2003 for their autonomous, and 357 in 2005 (?) for pioneering the use of mecanum drives in FIRST.

Many of the robots mentioned in this had cool robots that aren't typical, but not all of them were incredibly innovative. Power take-offs and gas springs for hanging existed in 2004, though most of the lineage of these devices is lost to time for most teams (so with the exceptions of a few, many of the devices re-emergence in 2010 was due to a new set of innovations). Some of the other innovations mentioned are really cool, but not as concrete in terms of impact. For instance, the greater usage of complex linkages in FIRST bots is one of the cooler sets of mechanical innovations these days, but can be attributed to a number of teams (217, 229, 1565, 1625, etc.) and doesn't always hold true from year-to-year. Random unorthodox mechanisms, while they may be cool, aren't always the most innovative. And "game breaking" strategies is really 71's calling card, regardless of how close 469 came this year.

And on another note, how about 254 and 60 for their pioneering of the concept of inter-team collaboration?

I don't think that "most" swerve drives require either of those things to accomplish a zero-point turn, or certainly not to any greater extent than 1625. The variants in-line with 118's style of swerve drive might, but there are plenty of varieties that do not.

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60 for starting (?) the sleek and efficient cantilevered "West Coast" drive and 254 and 968 for perfecting their process and implementation of the drive year to year.

Also definitely the introduction of the linkage arms and popularization by teams like 217 229

Who was the first team to modify DeWalts for FRC use?
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Most innovative? Off the top of my head a couple of robots stand out in my mind...(and going back a little)

2000: Team 47: Swerve drive. I can't say for sure, but they might have been the first team to use a swerve drive. The rest of the robot was spectacular - and I don't think they ever used their "jaw" feature in competition. I'm still impressed by this robot!

2000: Team 25: The cherry picker robot. While I never saw the robot up close, you knew no one else built anything like it.

2001: Team 267: The only team to LIFT a goal. They may not have had enormous success that year, but those goals were heavy! See the pictures I posted.

2002: Team 71: The walker robot. This is the robot that forced the rule about metal contact with the carpet. Starting from vertical, the robot flopped, grabbed 3 goals and then "walked" to victory. I think it's the only walker FIRST bot built.
...
2008: Team 1114: I don't think most people can even imagine the robot they designed. No other team manipulated the ball the way they did.

2009: Team 148: The way they picked up the balls, stored them and ejected them was amazing - amazingly simple too! While they weren't the only bot of the type, they perfected the design.

2010: Team 469: Duh!

Re: Most Innovative Teams
 

You might notice something interesting about 45 in 1998.

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Agreed, I was tempted to post a definition of innovative in this thread...

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You can also see on Andy Baker's channel that the 1996 game featured at least one roller claw. It looked a lot like 121's 2008 roller claw, actually.

In 2001, 188 lifted a goal to put 4 balls on it, I believe.

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1997: 71 had a detaching mechanism that dominated the game, with the help of the rest of the robot. (The next year, no detaching mechanisms intentionally became part of the rules.)

NBD: I believe that was 47, not sure of the year. (It was before Dr. Joe posted the whitepaper, though.)

With regards to 71 in 2004, 190 in that same year had the capability to steal the doubler from their opponent's goal and place it on their own, while hanging, while blocking the entire bar. I don't recall that they ever actually did it in competition, though, at least while I was watching. Two other teams also tried for the steal, but one scrapped it entirely and one switched to a simple descorer device.

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I remember their 04 robot was plastered with DeWalts. The 03 may have used them as well though.

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177 had a roller claw on our 98 robot as well.

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Actually...after thinking a little more about this, I would like to revise my answer slightly.

To me, while there are many great teams and great robots in FIRST, or great innovative ways to play the game, but if I think of innovation, it is things I see that will forever change the way I think about solutions to robot features.

Maybe these mentions weren't the first or only time for these solutions, but they were the first time for me.

This narrows my answers a bit:

111 in 2003: My first swerve (crab) drive robot.
67 in 2004: My first flop bot.
1114 in 2008: using a transmission dog gear and transmission to wind up and hold with a quick fire release.
25 in 2010: their fan suction ball manipulator. We spent sooo much time with our self-centering rollers and I wonder if something like this would have worked for us. So, from now on if there is a need to grab and hold onto one ball, we will think of this suction type device.

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Most of the responses here have focused on technical aspects of robots, but I am going to "shift gears" a bit.

From my standpoint teams 365 and 1902 have shown innovative methods of team organization and structure that offer great advantages. The 501(c)3 independent non-profit organization structure is an innovative way to run a team.

Both of those teams were very inspirational to 78 in creating our 4-H club based organization. We owe our unique structure to them and the teams like them who have followed this path.

Rob

Re: Most Innovative Teams
 

357 for starting the mecanum wheel craze.

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Can anyone link a picture or video of team 25 robot from this year?

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here's the inside of 25's robot this year

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I'm not sure who the first few teams to do this were, it would be cool to find out. For example, we've been 501c3 since 1997.

Anyone know? Guess?

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Our team is 501c3 under the wings of M.A.Y.H.E.M. (http://www.mayheminc.org/) covering FLL teams Mindstorms MAYHEM, More MAYHEM (now inactive), and FRC team 1519 Mechanical MAYHEM.

I too am interested in who is the first FIRST team to be 501c3 earlier than 1997. 365 was a rookie in 2000 so they can't be one.

I will agree with previous mentions by Ken Streeter and iCurtis. New England has a ton of innovative teams each year who come up with neat ideas to complete a game challenge.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MgdGtwQQIo

One of my favorite videos. Definitely innovative.

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I'll also throw out 217, 229, and 148 (and team IFI in general) for reinventing and popularizing how sheet metal is used in FRC.

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Like detachable mechanisms?
Not entirely detached, but 3-5ft of PWMs or so.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teNYfV8F-rs

"Give them an award, right now!"
Too bad it wasn't very reliable... Very exciting to watch though.

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I saw a video of that, and I'd have to say that qualifies- so amazing ^_^

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Team 33 is a pretty innovative team. Year after year they come up with some pretty crazy, but efficient ideas and they work so smoothly.

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Wildstang has some of the best promo videos! They're the one who made that innovation!