[Shelbers2486]

My team, 2486, is from Flagstaff, Arizona and we are a 6 year team.

I'm going to address the robot first:

My team started out using one of our mentor's classroom as storage space, and building a robot in the hallway (i'm sure others have done this). As the years progressed, we got our own space, and eventually a bigger one on school campus. We began to slowly involve our school's SolidWorks/Shop Teacher in our team. But untill last season, we hadn't really utalized many of the resources the school had to offer (SolidWorks, CNC Mill, Lathes, Manual Mills, Laser Engraver, etc.) except the standard band saw and drill press. About 10 of our team members learned SolidWorks and we just started machining like crazy. About 200 of the parts on our robot last year were machined by students in our school's shop, and it made us more successful than ever before. I don't think machining is really the main reason for success (though it really did help), but I think being able to go through the process of designing the robot in CAD before actually putting it together was the reason. During Rebound Rumble, we were seeded 7th in AZ and were finalists, while at Championships we were seeded 11th in our division (compared to dead last in LogoMotion).

As far as the path to becoming a Chairman's Team goes:

Our first year as a team, we competed in FTC then FRC. We won the FTC Inspire Award which qualified us for Champs. While we were there we watched our fellow Arizonans 842 win CCA and were inspired to return eventually as a RCA team. So when the next year rolled around, we applied for Chairman's in AZ and won as a two year team.

I think last year was really what got the ball rolling as far as the robot goes, but I don't think excellence only measured by how well a team preforms on the field. Though students graduated and mentors came in and out of our program, the remaining constant was always passion and I really think that that is where excellence begins.