[Specialagentjim]

Ahh! The arm robots! lol. Practice field at nationals, the one near robot registration and safety check; I'm standing over there, about 15-20 minutes before pits close, with a half-autonmous robot. We've got all the code for it done and we're setting the values (Run motor at x speed for y cycles). 108, along with about 10-15 other teams there, are all getting auton mode finished. Everyone is being about as arrogant as can be, including myself (regrettably), and total chaos has ensued there. For the most part, teams usually give a loud warning before running their robot, usually in the form of "GET OUT THE WAY, We're gonna run it!". Well, we really need our code working, so as I'm holder-of-the-almighty-tether for the moment, im standing behind the robot checking for that weird nosie it just made. Have I painted the picture of total chaotic environment yet? Heh, next I hear the team behind me say "Okay, we're gonna run it, look out". The thoughts in my head are, "alright...im not near the ramp, go ahead and run it, not anywhere near me". I don't however, realize that its an arm bot. They warn me about 2 more times, say "oh well, run it!". That arm comes flying at me, as I finally realize why they warned me. I duck with about a fraction of a second to spare, JUST avoiding it. lol, I was freaked for a second, laughed for another 2, then went back to our robot.

Anyone remember almost knocking out a 108 member? We've got white shirts with a dark blue top of the shirt, with a big pantehr on the front. At the time, someone from their team got a picture of it and offered to send it to me. I sorta was distracted by our robot, and didnt get his e-mail addy. Anyone have that pic? I'd love to have it


Injury-wise: 108 always has em, but we're also known for our "narrowly escaping" maneuvars. Now, we're a technology program at our high school, so none of us are in the greatest of shape. Now, imagine us, moving at speeds beyond we've ever moved, to avoid things flying at us. We've caught wings, drive trains, and various other things juss in the nick of time.


One more to add to this horrendously long post. Our robot, on start up, had a glitch for a while. This glitch would cause the robot on every start up to run the first cycle of autonmous (A glitch no one understood, but seemed to just "disappear" one day). Our mechanical engineer would, of course, be standing in front of the robot watching the drivetrain EVERY time we started it. Everytime it would jump foreward about 2-4 inchs and just about take him out....and evertime he'd look up and say "WHO DID THAT??". We'd then explain, for the nth time, that it was auton, and not us.

hehe...If I think of more, I'll post them..If I'm not banned by everyone for the length of this post. Yeahhh...