Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

Thank you for this info. Where exactly is the bolt-head located? [On the metal pipe, I assume...how far from the top of the tower?]

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

There aren't bolts on the metal pipe below the plane of the bottom plate, but there are four bolts holding the two pieces of plastic "together" (you can see them here). I don't have an exact measurement of where they are, but I would guess about an inch or inch and a half from the edge of the circle. I wouldn't risk hitting the plate anywhere but within two inches of the pole, just to be safe.



EDIT:
You're right that the bolts don't move with the bottom plate (I forgot to mention that), but I'm pretty sure that those bolts have been there from the beginning. I was the one who modified the towers at Waterford, and I don't remember adding them.

For those wondering what the fix was: we were sent a package with replacement parts. The limit switches were removed and replaced with aluminum plates. When knocked into what used to be the limit switch mounts, the plates shorted against each other.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

They added four bolts to the sensor assembly to act as linear slides. These bolts don't move with the lower plate and create an issue when a mini bot hits them instead of hitting the plate itself. It adds to the randomness of what should be a simple yes or no decision of saying the mini bot hit or not. I know order of contact could be an issue with human interaction but a unexpected bolt should not keep you from wining a match.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

One thing that I don't think has been mentioned yet is the issue with the towers mis-triggering has been fixed (or so it was at WPI). They still had refs watching the towers as a backup though.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

It wasn't fixed entirely at WPI. We would trigger some poles but not others.
We were still awarded the points though.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

Also with those towers, referees are having a difficult time determining the legitimate deployment of a tower. There is a LOT to look for:
1) Did the minibot cross the plane of the tower base before 10 secs
2) Did the robot provide power to the minibot
3) Did the minibot begin creating energy before 10 secs

We had a qualifying match where our tower was disabled for deploying too early. Even with a video showing the minibot as it reached the tower, I couldn't tell if it deployed early (it didn't affect the match, but I like knowing when I screwed up as a driver). I saw one referee almost disable a tower when a team started deploying at almost 5-6seconds left in the match before realizing the tower was solid and not blinking. With everything in the match going on and then having to pay attention to all of the things with the towers and minibots and the exact time left, its got to be towers.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

Defense is hard to play without getting penalties. :(

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

I was driving at WPI over the weekend and it was unbelievable how many penalties teams were getting. It was commonplace for alliances to have 3 or 4 penalties EACH in the qualifications rounds (although that dropped off significantly in eliminations). At the front was lane violations - it was commonplace for some teams to have one or two lane violations. Penalties got so bad that it got to the point where the announcers would say something like "It's a miracle guys, we have a penalty free round!" Amidst a sea of lane violations, yellow, and red cards, a few matches did actually have no penalties. A shame, really.

On a lighter note, we noticed that during the qualifications having a minibot was generally enough to win you the match. Tube hanging rarely made a difference because the matches were so one-sided. There were matches where if your entire alliance made a single logo you would have won. Several robots could make two or three logos single-handedly if given the chance.

In eliminations everything changed because mostly everyone had minibots. The race might have left teams with a 25 point deficit on occasion, but sometimes it was closer and it was up to the tube-hangers to make the difference. The alliances that were most successful had everything covered - minibots, tubes, and autonomous.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

As the alliance captain of the alliance you're accusing of misconduct, I'll attempt to assure you that your incursions were not a result of our intentions. 1540 and 399 were focused solely on placing game objects, not keeping you in the zone. We reviewed our match footage afterwards (for the exact reasons that you've expressed, to verify whether we should have incurred a red card), and affirmed that the referees got the call right. We were playing the game. The penalties were called after 589's robot did not immediately attempt to get out of our zone. Per <G32>, by playing defense in the red zone, 589 received a red card. I realize that you may ignore this post, but at the very least, this is what I observed from the other side of the glass.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

I forget to mention this in my previous post but if your having any problem connecting to the field or your robot shuts down in the middle of the match, please talk to your FTA. Team 108 was having the same problem where we would lose communication for a while and get it back and then lose it again, sometime just completely die. We spoke to our FTA and she was really helpful. She looked through all the errors in one match and saw that we had "Watchdog" errors. We fixed it from there and never had an issue with our robot connecting to the field.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

First of all, congrats for all your team's accomplishments. But it too was our design flaw. The motors were stalling and overheated to the max (one motor per side and having a match every 5 minutes got the motors burning hot. and at one point in the match before we got DQed, the motors stalled on the middle of the field) and the combination with a buggy code (our mentor did not allow us to upload any code to fix it due to the success of our drivers, he wanted everything to be the same. So essentially, we were running the same buggy code for 2 days. It was a fix that was fixed after the first match of the first day. But we never got to upload the code.) We physically could not get out. We were pushing the robot full speed and stalled the already burning motors. It took us a while to regain control and we got pushed again into the zone.


Well the bottom line is that the past is teh past and all we can do is fix our problems for LA and dominate.

edit: where can we see the videos?

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

Thank you!

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

I love and hate that last phrase. I love it because it feels good saying it; I hate it because our arm was still too slow to be effective in Teleop, and our minibot never, ever worked, and thus we lost.

Minibot's are the name of the game. If you can deploy the fastest one, you're bound to be on the best alliance.

Edit: Plus, never take a win on the towers for granted. Our #2 alliance at Lake Superior should've won the Finals hands-down. They had a small point disadvantage at the end of the second match, but their minibot easily beat the other teams by over a second. Unfortunately, the towers glitched out, and never registered who was first or second. As a result, their supposed victory at Lake Superior turned into defeat as they lost the next two in a row.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

Don,

See TU16.

Blueabot1 Pushes Redabot into the Blue ZONE, and eventually, into contact with Blueabot2. This series of actions, according to <G32> and exception to <G61> lead to a "one move win", because it would cause Red to receive a RED CARD.

TU16 fixed this by stating that this would be considered a violation of <T09> and give a RED CARD to the Blue Alliance, taking precedence over the RED CARD given to the Red Alliance, and the Red Alliance would be declared the winner of the match.

Re: Week 2: Any new lessons learned?
 

TU16 doesn't apply in this case, it was the right call. TU16 introduces a very specific set of circumstances (in elims, Redabot exiting its lane, presumably after loading up a tube, pushed by Blueabot#1 into the zone & Blueabot#2) where the pushing bot (Blueabot#1) can be Red Carded along with Redabot. Red Alliance wins, despite all its members being DQed, because Blueabot#1 achieved the rare status I call "UberDQed", which trumps all other Red Cards and is clearly made of epic fail.
(Note: I apologize if you can't take the language in that last sentence seriously. Unfortunately, my head hurts when I try to think about TU16 logically and seriously :rolleyes:. This is my coping mechanism)

TU16 is there to prevent alliances from intentionally trapping an opposing offensive bot (minding their own business trying to score more tubes) into a "one move win". Defensive bots which seek contact on the opponent's side of the field should not expect G61 or TU16 protection, because they are utilizing a strategy that clearly involves the risk of penalties and cards. Remember, in scenario described in TU16 Redabot is assured a Red Card for contacting Bluabot#2. TU16 referees have the discretionary option of "UberDQing" Blueabot#1, if and only if they deem the pushing of Redabot to be particularly egregious behavior outside of normal game play. Do you think the refs will consider an offensive bot pushing a defensive attempting to reach its scoring zone to be "egregious behavior" or normal game play? Seems pretty normal to me, happens constantly in elims. Considering that, I would heed Don's warning:

Stay Far Away!