Visiting new teams

[Malinowski]

As some of you may know, there is already a third team from Brazil registered in FIRST, their number is 1382. They are from São Paulo, about 700 miles from our city (Porto Alegre).

They came here a few weeks ago to see how our team works and take a look at the robots. They also visited the other Brazilian team, 1156, that is also near our school.

Next week we (0383) are going to take our 2002 robot over to their school and show it on an EXPO held at their school.

What you guys normally do in this meetings? Any tips on what is important to show them? We will be there for almost 4 days, so time won't be a problem.

Thanks

[sanddrag]

700 miles and 4 days just to do that? Wow, you guys are really devoted (and the new team too). Keep up the great work!

[Rich Wong]

Originally posted by Malinowski
As some of you may know, there is already a third team from Brazil registered in FIRST, their number is 1382. They are from São Paulo, about 700 miles from our city (Porto Alegre).

They came here a few weeks ago to see how our team works and take a look at the robots. They also visited the other Brazilian team, 1156, that is also near our school.

Next week we (0383) are going to take our 2002 robot over to their school and show it on an EXPO held at their school.

What you guys normally do in this meetings? Any tips on what is important to show them? We will be there for almost 4 days, so time won't be a problem.

Thanks

Usually the veteran team will bring over the Kit of Part bins and as many parts as possible to show the rookies and one of their old robot. A couple of hours is spend reviewing the parts and the robot. Also bring examples of your six week schedule (you do have one?) and prototypes, drawings, FIRST documentation, and game rules, etc.

Anything and everything can be helpful to a rookie team. Since they are 700 miles away, contact will only be possible during your six week of crunch time via e-mail.

Good luck!

[GregTheGreat]

Originally posted by Malinowski

What you guys normally do in this meetings? Any tips on what is important to show them? We will be there for almost 4 days, so time won't be a problem.

Thanks

If I were in your shoes, I would see if you could transport a field with you. If enough space is not a field, it might be a good idea to make a "1/3 of a field" which is just like a 1/3 of the ramp, and get like 15 bins or something like that, and run some "fake" matches. Don't be afraid to test the limits of your robot, remember this is off-season, if you break a piece on a robot, that a great op. to teach the new kids how to fix the problem.

I would suggest getting 2 robots there at least, and put them in a head to head duel, we recently ran at the Indiana State Fair, and when we pushed our robot to the limit in an all-out "fight" with Purdue's bot it really got the crowd interested. People like to see the bots hit each other hard and fight for the top of a ramp, it will get a lot of people interested, and will make many spectators come back day after day to view the robots.

A word of advice....
If you are going to run for a few days make sure to bring back up motors, mountings, wheels, tools, and anything else that could break on your robot. It would be sad if something broke and you have the stuff to fix it 700 miles away. I would rather spend an extra hundred buck on a truck rental and bring everything you need, than to not bring everything and end up immobile after the first day.

I wish the best of luck to you and your team. New teams are always the best thing to see in the FIRST robotics program.

Good Luck,

-Greg The Great

[Manoel]

Hi,

Thank you all for the replies!

There are some pretty good suggestions here. We already showed them the kit of parts, and they inspected our three robots through fully.
We'll take this year's manual to show them what are the basic rules that rarely change from year to year.
Although time is not an issue, money and space is, so we can't really take the field and other robots with us. It ain't cheap to transport a 400 lb crate to a place 700 miles away, in a short time frame.
We are taking the 2002 robot with us, it puts out a much better show by itself than this year's robot; stacking in front of people is boring, and not having other robots fighting you really takes the fun of it. Collecting balls is much more amusing.
We may also take the new EDU Kit to show them, if they haven't received it yet.
Above of all, we will make sure some of their team members register into ChiefDelphi.

Please keep up with the suggestions!

[GregTheGreat]

Originally posted by Manoel
Hi,

Thank you all for the replies!

There are some pretty good suggestions here. We already showed them the kit of parts, and they inspected our three robots through fully.
We'll take this year's manual to show them what are the basic rules that rarely change from year to year.
Although time is not an issue, money and space is, so we can't really take the field and other robots with us. It ain't cheap to transport a 400 lb crate to a place 700 miles away, in a short time frame.
We are taking the 2002 robot with us, it puts out a much better show by itself than this year's robot; stacking in front of people is boring, and not having other robots fighting you really takes the fun of it. Collecting balls is much more amusing.
We may also take the new EDU Kit to show them, if they haven't received it yet.
Above of all, we will make sure some of their team members register into ChiefDelphi.

Please keep up with the suggestions!

If you have some kids that can throw this strip one of your robots down to just a frame, and motor, that you might be able to transport 2 robots, even if one only weighs 30 pounds, and it strictly driving. It would make a nice display if you could have 2 robots often head to head.

-Greg The Great

[Aignam]

When we do demos, we usually bring our most recent robot, in this case Evil Machine, and one or two of our more exciting past robots, like Robo Kong, the crowd-pleasing somersaulting robot, or Cradle Robber, the 12-foot National Champion arm, though now old and falling apart. We'll often put two of the more closely-matched robots head to head, as it is exciting to see a pushing match, even if the robots weren't intended for such. Whatever you do, try to teach about the ideals of FIRST and some technical aspects, but make it fun and exciting. You want to catch their attention and convince them that they too can build a successful robot in just 6-weeks.

[Malinowski]

Thanks you guys a lot for all your help, tomorrow we will finish packing up all the stuff we are going to take.
We will leave tuesday 4AM.
Next week we post the pictures.
We expect to be posting updates from there also.

Thanks

[GregTheGreat]

Originally posted by Malinowski
Thanks you guys a lot for all your help, tomorrow we will finish packing up all the stuff we are going to take.
We will leave tuesday 4AM.
Next week we post the pictures.
We expect to be posting updates from there also.

Thanks

Good Luck, try to get some sleep on the way there, you don't want to be falling asleep at the helm of a robot. lol

-Greg The Great

[Malinowski]

Here are some pictures of our visit. They welcomed us very well over there. We made the local TV news .
They got a great team over there and are already getting the spirit of first.
Thank you all for the ideas that made the visit even better!

[I'll put a link to the pictures as soon as Brandon approves them. ]

EDIT: Here are the pictures

[Malinowski]

Take a look at my hand on the disable button... can't be to safe...
lol

Malinowski