Thread: Multiple Regionals
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Unread 23-06-2002, 22:25
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#0047 (ChiefDelphi)
  
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Location: Pontiac, MI
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Sigh
Posted by Dodd Stacy, Engineer on team #95, Lebanon Robotics Team, from Lebanon High School and CRREL/CREARE.

Posted on 4/9/99 8:58 AM MST


In Reply to: Re: watch out.... posted by Ken Patton on 4/8/99 11:56 PM MST:



Thanks to Ken and Daniel ('Ambition...', further down this thread) both for thoughtful and persuasive posts in support of the six week schedule. I will even cop to heaving my own sigh of relief when we ship the bot and then can rest a bit.

But before I drag my soapbox off to another street corner and try to rattle cages there, I'd like to comment on related points from the two posts, product development discipline and KISS. We're all fortunate to work in a profession with niches from R&D through product development to manufacturing and construction, with lots of other areas in between and no heirarchy implied or intended. I work in R&D, so I'm a sucker for gizmos that open new horizons on what we can do with our little metal monsters. We were all set this year to clone last year's chassis/drive/control system - which worked well and was reasonably simple - until we opened the boxes at kickoff and saw those yaw rate 'gyros.' A whole new vista of navigation, mobility, and control opened up, and our grasp on reality went right out the window. Sigh. Well, we're halfway there. We've got the mechanicals in place and working, now to pound down the RF noise and calm down the feedback loops. We'd very much like the opportunity to work on this (in our 'less frantic' rural shop) while others who are able duke it out at multi regionals and carry out their product development in the pits and post mortem periods.

Not hearing a mass uprising in support of giving FIRST a license to another six weeks of our souls, we'll follow plan B - the long term R&D cycle. We'll work it over the summer, try it out in local Invitationals, and incorporate what works into next year's bot. I sure hope we don't have to fly, swim, or play a wall game next year.

See you in Orlando. We'll be the ones trudging down the Appalachian Trail when your team chopper passes overhead. Say, how many can you carry in that thing?

Dodd


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