Posted by Anton Abaya at 2/7/2001 10:27 AM EST
Coach on team #419, Rambots, from UMass Boston / BC High and NONE AT THE MOMENT!
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so i headed over to usfirst.org and clicked on every darn webpage every team had.... TO LOOK for pictures that they may or may not announced they had up.
I just wanted to share this info to all you guys.
From the looks of it, there are more limbo machines this year than expected. I saw at least 6 robot pictures of robots that went under the bar.
As for bridge users, there were still a bunch. A lot of robots using the bridge also sorta have some mechanism to bring it down for themselves.
Goal balancers were just as common. A lot of robots had just a hook, some had a conformed frame to hug the shape of the goal, and some had double hooks. How successful they will be in balancing is the other question.
As for ball handlers, I saw around 4-5 who were picking up balls, small and big.
As for speed, from the looks of the bots I have seen, speed will be the same as last year with many of the bots out there.
So in a way, whether or not this information helps, i worried for a while that a lot of the bots are going to be the same. But like any other year, thank god it's not.
One thing I was rather worried about though. If there are two bots who can do the same task, who will do it?
Like say if two bots want to balance two goals....how shall they decide?
Next thing I am worried about is what if the teams who can put balls on the goal (even if it's already balanced on the bridge) decide to be greedy and instead of hitting their buzzer, put a ball on the goal ...wasting precious time out of greediness...will this happen? or will they come to their senses that they'll lose more points if they wait or might even knock goals or unbalance the bridge? what if...
so what good will a robot that can balance two goals ONLY be if the alliance decides on NOT balancing goals and picking up balls for the entire match? Or perhaps say a robot was made to be a bridge keeper, how effective will it be if that's their main/only function if all the robots go under the bar anyway? how often will that happen might be another question...
ahhh..."time will tell." (said the mighty chief).
okay, back to class...
-anton
"I learn the way a monkey learns, by watching its parents." -queen elizabeth II