[DFTF] The Classic Blunder...

[Peter Matteson]

Originally Posted by wireties

Pretty sure he was kidding...

I know. I was just using Kevin's post to highlight a workaround people may not have thought of.

[Kevin Sevcik]

Believe me, I would love to have a practice bot, but I've yet to figure out a way for us to build one. Practice bots are nice in theory, but we've spent pretty much all of our $4000 robot budget already, and all of the time we had available to build at our shop. At this point of every season, we're pretty much completely tapped on budget and build time and simply don't have the resources to put a practice bot together. And yes, a practice bot will be just about as expensive as our full robot to be any good. We've got 10 Jags, 6 pneumatic wheels, a CIM-sim, 3 BB P60 transmissions, an entire kit chassis, two 6" performance wheels, poly cord, etc. etc. That adds up to a heck of a lot of money we don't have available for a practice bot.

[MrForbes]

I wish we had a good excuse for not having a practice bot, besides "we're lazy"....

I think we're already a few days past "burn out". At least our one robot does most of what it is supposed to do.

[tsaksa]

Originally Posted by frasnow

I have a question for all the people talking about the 30 pounds and how great it is. How can a robot truly be competitive if the electrical team doesn’t have time to test their wiring, the software team doesn’t have time to test autonomous routines, and the drivers don’t have time to practice? I’ve seen this type of thing occur many times at work, and it always delays projects. Mechanical engineers sometimes think the deadline for the project is their deadline and don’t leave any time for integration and debug.

This is my first FIRST build season, but from what I have seen your description is right on the mark. Here is how the build season seemed to run for our team from my perspective as a NUBE.

1. The mechanical team says they are "on track" to deliver the complete mechanical system on time even as they load a mill and three phase generator into the van to finish machining some key parts on the drive to our scrimmage.

2. The electrical team is allowed access to robot for final wiring and integration once the robot is placed on the field. At that point they wrap sensors and switches in freshly chewed gum and throw them at the robot from the sidelines hoping that some of them stick.

3. Using binoculars and what they can over hear from the crowd as to where the sensors landed, the programming team develops a strategy for how to code the software and deploys it over the wireless link just prior to the start of each match.

4. The drive team plays with the controls to see what the robot does when they move each control. This process is greatly aided in the team numbers were painted on the bumpers so that they can recognize our robot.

5. After each match the pit crew gathers up the parts from the field and finds a new and interesting way to assemble them.

This might be a slight exaggeration, but this was my first year, so their may have been slightly more order to the process than what I saw.

[Greg Leighton]

Originally Posted by Joe Johnson

We've got weight for it. We've got space for it. We even have a reasonable concept or two we've sketched on various napkins over the last few weeks. What we don't have is TIME.

Joe J.

Many have said that you should use your 30lb allowance to build your concept, I tend to agree. As to what you build, this time make sure it's something you can build with the time you have. Do what you can and make sure you have your priorities in order (i.e. make sure your ball pickup will work before you make a shooter, can't shoot balls you can't collect).

Originally Posted by Kevin Sevcik

Believe me, I would love to have a practice bot, but I've yet to figure out a way for us to build one. Practice bots are nice in theory, but we've spent pretty much all of our $4000 robot budget already, and all of the time we had available to build at our shop. At this point of every season, we're pretty much completely tapped on budget and build time and simply don't have the resources to put a practice bot together. And yes, a practice bot will be just about as expensive as our full robot to be any good. We've got 10 Jags, 6 pneumatic wheels, a CIM-sim, 3 BB P60 transmissions, an entire kit chassis, two 6" performance wheels, poly cord, etc. etc. That adds up to a heck of a lot of money we don't have available for a practice bot.

I've seen the practice bot debated up and down CD, I tend to get the feeling people are considering it to be a complete replica of your competition robot when it doesn't have to be that close for it to help your team out. During any down time during the season, like when you're waiting for parts to be machined, you can be piecing together a practice bot from spare parts or old torn down bots you have. I can see just a chassis being valuable for practice or in some situations, autonomous programming. None of 2337's practice bots have been exactly like the comp bot, but they've made good use of them for programming and a little bit of drive practice.

[Aren Siekmeier]

Originally Posted by Ekcrbe

I think this game was very easy to over-analyze, and many teams (including us) did. I envision lots of teams adding 29 lbs of stuff at their first competition that they ran out of time to build before Tuesday.

29 pounds of steel to put at the very bottom of our robot? We are that light with full functionality.

Also, we do not have a practice robot this year, but we are very very close, and could have if we had just committed the capital at the beginning of the season. If the entire robot is designed in CAD before any building, the building flies and takes a day or two. So when buying all your parts, you buy twice as much (cuz you should have spares anyway). If you manage to build your first robot soon enough (week 3 or 4), you can wait a bit to get all your second fabricated parts until you see some things you might want to tweak based on your testing. Then you build your second one in week 5 or 6, while practicing and doing code on the first, and you bag the second (cuz it's obviously way better) and the first is your practice machine. It's a little more capital to invest at the get go, but its also invaluable to have robot junk lying around for future prototyping, besides all the spares you now have.

[Aren Siekmeier]

Back on topic, we have typically suffered from this same mistake. Nearly every year there has been some component to the game that we put off until the last minute and it was always a kludge. This year we're doing a lot better, but there are still traces of that approach. Just look at the CAD, and anywhere it doesn't reflect the actual robot accurately, you can bet we spent at least 3 times longer building it than we needed to.

And I get caught expecting a little too much of our team too. I want us to make a great machine, but I have to realize that none of the kids have the design experience to make it happen as fast as I would like, and it doesn't do them any good for me to go home and design it myself. So I was perhaps asking a lot when I wanted the CAD completely done in week 3.

Definitely don't forget about the 30lbs. A ball handling mechanism will be critical to serving an alliance well in eliminations, but it can be the simplest thing on the planet. Somehow attain balls and get them down the court, or keep them away from the the other team. I predict ball starvation to be really effective this year, but you could also make a shooting robot's life a lot easier by feeding balls directly to them. It sounds like you have something to offer in terms of the end game, so now its a matter of doing something effective in the minute and a half before that.

[Joe Johnson]

Our team spent the day on Saturday finishing up an arm with shooter (we may end up being able to score a ball or two yet...) meanwhile back in Michigan, they're popping off Double Triples and making it look easy as they watch the clock tick down for the last quarter of the match...

I will be honest, I teared up a bit watching my old pals playing at the Waterford Mott District Event. I wept for how amazing and inspiring MechWarriors, Las Guerrillas and HOT and others are. Not just this year but year after year.

It was inspiring but it also made clear how far we have to go before out team can lay any claim to being Hall of Fame caliber team.

All we can do is get through this year and do better next...

To HOT and Las Guerrillas, one or both of you are almost certain to make it to Einstein again the year.

I salute you, both.

Joe J.