Robots in hometown parades

[tommy0019]

Originally Posted by gyroscopeRaptor

How common is putting the robotics teams in parades?

In the Albert Lea, MN parade earlier today both Albert Lea HS Catalyst (3633) and Alden-Conger Knights (2957) had floats with the robot driving on the road. 2957 made no modifications, but 3633 whipped up a pneumatic candy-cannon in a few days and used it with great results. We plan to have pictures and video of the event.

So, did your team participate in a parade, and if so, to what extent?

Team 2957 had one modification, the american flag that flew on the top of the arm

[Tom Ore]

We've done the local parade two years in a row now (won the Grand Marshall trophy both years.)

We put 3 old competion robot on a trailer and have some VEX robots to drive around. This year we made a custom robot shaped like a doghouse (we're the Swartdogs.) The doghouse robot was a big hit with the crowd. We used two batteries in parallel and made it through the entire parade - it was about 45 minutes drive time I believe.

In the afternoon we do a demo for 2 hours driving last year's competion robot. Overall, it's a really good event for us.

[apalrd]

We (33) participated in a Rochester Chhristmas Parade last fall (erm... winter? it was freezing outside) along with teams 1, 201, and 245 (Juggernauts, FEDS, and Adambots respectively).

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/36014

We borrowed a truck from Chrysler, and decorated it. The parade required all floats to follow a "candy land" theme for the parade, hence the candy. We used our 2007 robot, 201 and 245 (on the other side of the honeycomb wall) used their 2009 robots and exchanged balls between them. The robot in the picture is limp because it is turned off, but it waved the FIRST tube around well once we turned it on (we also tried to get it to throw a tube, but the tube just fell).

We won First Place in the high school/college category.

[demosthenes2k8]

Team 166 just participated in Merrimack's parade - we didn't run it during, but we ran it before at the pancake breakfast. I don't really know what happened, I was serving strawberries in the kitchen, but I saw quite a crowd there!
During the parade, we had the robot posed with a tube traveling in the back of a trailer. In past years, though, we've had our infamous grillbot follow the parade.

[princessnatalie]

Team 2471 participates in their town parade every year. We also have a festival afterward, where we set up games for people to play with our robot. This year it is a timed trial with an obstacle course and the deploying of our minibot.

We build a new robot for the parade, our "MascBot" which is made for our highschools mascot costume to go on it. Last year the parade and festival them was "Wizards" or something, and we made the arms of the mascot spin and the head rise up and down. We actually won second place in the walking float division.

We are from a really small town, and are thinking about being in bigger town parades, specifically the Portland parades that I have never seen our Portland teams be apart of.

[Jack Murphy]

Y'all got me reminiscing now...

I stood with my 4th grade son as we watched the local robotics team drive down Main Street on the Fourth of July.

They handed him a flyer that announced that there would be a chance to see the robot in the park after the parade.
He looked up at me and said "Dad? Can we check that out?"
(he said that a lot but that's to many tales to tell here)

Fast forward.
Georgia Dome!

WORLD CHAMP!

That same little boy (to me) on the drive team. Up there with Dean and Dr. Flowers.


Yup! Parades are good.

[M. Mellott]

3193 runs our robot in our hometown's 4th of July parade the last 2 years. It's a 2.5 mile parade, and both years only needed one battery change. We have a pickup truck lead the way with signs, batteries, the drive controls and drive team. We pass out candy to the kids and informational flyers to the high school kids and adults. It's a great time, and the huge crowd really loves it!

[Phalanx]

1089 Has for the last few years run one or more Robots in our local parades.
We do this as one of several community outreaches we do every year.

This way the local residents know us, and we get to inspire the young child watching the parade. We usually let the young kids toss the game piece(s) so we can demonstrate.

We also talk with the parents/adults along the parade route about FIRST as well as FLL, FTC and FRC. We even hand out buttons/pins to the kids to wear when we have extras.

It's a great way to get yourselves out there.

[Red2486]

We are in our local Homecoming Parade and Fourth of July Parade. We usually just put our current robot on a trailer that we decorate and drive it through the parade while team members hold banners and hand out candy and flyers. We are usually a big hit with the crowd, even without a running robot.

[Tommy.Brown]

Team 1477 - Texas Torque participated in our hometown parade. We just attached a trailer to the back of a van and put a scoring rack and the robot on the trailer. Somehow the rack was the exact width of the trailer and it ended up taking up half the space on the trailer. Part of the trailer wasn't very sturdy, so we could only demo on half of the trailer, leaving us with about 16 sq feet of space to move our robot, meaning that we only had enough space to put up tubes on 2/3 of the rack. We had to put our driver station and everything all behind the rack in an extremely cramped space with 2 people trying to drive the robot. The trailer didn't have a rear end either, so we had to tie a rope across the back to try to keep the robot from accidently driving off the rear end of the trailer (it actually worked considering we rammed the rope with the robot about 3 times while driving).

[Bethie42]

We're getting ready for our parade this weekend, as a matter of fact. The five local teams [all in about a 20-mile radius from three towns] traditionally have one big float + robot-driving display in the Philomath Frolic and Rodeo parade. The local team provides the float, well decorated with robot caution tape, team flags, etc, we stick our drivers and driver stations on that, the rest of us walk alongside or behind with the robots. Of course it's a great new-student involvement activity [we stuck a team flag into the hands of a robotics-minded 8th grader last year]. Last year the whole display got Judges' Choice, I believe.

[Carol]

MOE 365 just participated in it's first parade:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/36966

You can't really see the robot in this picture, but it was on back of a flat bed truck, moving it's arm and running a minibot. The Spirit Catcher mascot is just out of the picture on the right, which drew a lot of attention. Green mints were thrown to the crowd along the path which drew even more attention!

One nice benefit was that several politicians who were in the parade stopped by to look at the robot, including the governor of Delaware. (It's a small state; the local parades almost always has the governor, senators, and lone representative marching in them - especially in an election year).

[lgaroppz]

The firebirds (Team 433) have participated in the Fourth of July parade in Whitemarsh for the last four years.

We have at least one robot drive in it (usually there's two, but one had to ride on a cart this year - technical difficulties).

We've modified our 2008 competition robot to shoot candy at kids and judges.