Inspection Stories

[kstl99]

For the first time I volunteered to be an inspector at the NE Utilities Regional in Connecticut. It was a very enjoyable and rewarding experience. All the teams I dealt with were pleasant and respectful. I would like to hear stories from inspectors about their experiences. Two stories stick out in my mind.

Right after the pits opened on Thursday we checked robot bags and signed the papers so that teams could unbag their robots. Then we went around and did an unofficial check of the bumpers, knowing that had been an issue this year. The first thing I noticed on one rookie team's bumpers was that they had parts of the bumpers with the plywood shorter than 8 inches. This meant that they had to remake four sections. Later in the day when they were ready for full inspection I noticed that they were about 1 inch too high. Although I could understand the frustration for the mentor who had been told by someone before they bagged the robot that it should pass, the students tore the bumpers apart again and got it done. I returned later to apologize for not completely inspecting the bumpers the first time. Friday, one of the students thanked me for helping them and introduced me to her school's principal. Saturday the lead mentor was looking forward to off-season events and planning for next year. In spite of the long hard first day the students I talked to told me that they learned a lot, enjoyed the experience and were looking forward to next year.

Another team that had a long Thursday was an inner-city team from New York city that had a recent alumni of the team who had returned when he heard they had no other mentors. I had not inspected them but was asked if I could help them with some ideas of how they could get their robot to pass. After working all day Thursday they were able to get their sticker first thing Friday morning and did not miss a match. At the end of the event they found me and thanked me for helping them.

Sorry these ended up like books but helping teams through the process and seeing them able to compete are some of the reasons I will probably volunteer again.

[Peck]

Don't apologize for "books". These kinds of stories are best when they go as in depth as possible.

[Chexposito]

My FIRST time being in charge of electronics and programming, we went into inspection. Our robot had a "ground" that was within the tolerance, but I didn't nor did anyone else know that it was really ok. So we unhooked everything trying to find it, several times... CIMS ground after use, so after getting new CIMS the electronics mentor and I were rushing to put the robot back together (because we had a team breathing down our necks, some helpful some shoving video camera's in our faces) and we accidentally crossed the battery connection to the main power distribution board. We did not catch it until we went to fire up the robot (he was fixing the field at this point)... After a second of the circuit breakers sounding like crickets we shut the robot off. We ruined $1000 worth of jaguars (some of which he and another student were able to fix over the offseason). We got so much help from other teams loaning us parts, our school principal personally delivering the overnighted jaguars the next, and so many others we went on to pass inspection, we returned all team loaned jaguars and had only one pit admin borrowed on the robot. Little did we know our optical sensors were also fried, so we had "autonomous issues". After figuring that out our autonomous was perfect. We went on to win the regional. I won't forget having to go rip the pit admin jaguar off the robot while it was sitting off to the side of the field in the middle of the awards ceremony

[ksafin]

This just happened at the South Florida Regional this thursday to us:

First a little bit of background:
During build season, we were focusing on building a launcher. About week 3 or 4 we decided to make a backup dumper bot in case the launcher wasn't ready or was inaccurate. Needless to say, the dumper bot was far from done when build day came around, and the launcher bot was untested.. So we ended up working from stop build day to the competition day on our 30 lbs of withholdings to finish up our bagged bot.

The story:
Thursday we come to the tournament, weight our witholdings (which was pretty much the entire robot frame) to be about 25 lbs, and we get to building. We spend about 2-3 hours attaching all the witholdings, and reworking the mechanical kinks, tightening, etc. Then we start mounting all our electronics.. This took about another hour. After this all, we turned on the robot to start testing. We were glad, because we had been done before practice rounds started. We got through about 3/4 of inspection before the electronics were on, the remaining 1/4 being some minor bumper issues, as well as power-up and pneumatic checks.

So, we started it up and began testing the program. Reason being, we stuck our pneumatic cylinders randomly into solenoids, so we needed to run the program to check which were plugged in wrong, and fix accordingly. After turning it on, our RSL didn't go on, which was odd. Next odd thing was that we couldn't drive, our conveyor didn't work, etc. Neither did solenoids. Point is, NO motors worked. And as mentioned, neither did the RSL.

We were perplexed, but thought it'd be a simple fix so we got down to it. We couldn't figure out the problem, so we called an event volunteer from the Help Desk they had set up. He came and began to help us. We did many things: tried to use a second digital sidecar, used a PWM tester to check for bad PWN cables, using motor controllers in different modes, switched wiring to various amp fuses, used several batteries, as well as use about 20 different code deployments.

We had been looking for the problem for about 3 hours with this volunteer when another robot inspector came up, as well as mentors from another team (801). So, we had about 4 robot inspectors and 3 team mentors looking at the problem. We did pretty much the same exact thing as we had before, with some small achievements:

With some new code, we managed to get our drivetrain to turn on, which was powered by 4 jaguars. (4 CIM drive). After that worked, we tried to turn on our other motors, which used Victors. They turned on for a split second, spun one rotation, and stopped. So, we switched one victor for a jaguar. BAM! It worked. We were ecstatic. So team 801 graciously lent us jaguars to exchange our victors with. We tested each individually, and everything turned on!

Not so fast. As soon as we tried to turn on all the motors, nothing worked again. Dead silence. We were about on the verge of collapse, working on the same problem since 12pm, missing every single practice round, never having really drived the final bot whatsoever, and it was 7 pm. We weren't even done with 1/4 of inspection, not including sizing or weighing.

Then came Kowalski. He was a Robot Inspector. He looked at the digital sidecar and noticed that the 5V light was on, but 6V wasn't. He thought it was odd, and asked where the DS was plugged into for power. We checked for him, and told him it was plugged into the 5V slot on the PDB. Wow. That was the entire problem we had for the past 6 hours. We changed our entire code 20 times over, used another digital sidecar, 30 different PWM cables, and even switched our victors for jaguars. But the only problem was that the DS wasn't in 12V.. ugh.

We should have figured it out earlier, the symptoms were obvious, and i'll tell you why. A PWM signal is about 5V, which is why we were able to get our drive to work. The Jaguar's are very power efficient, able to run on the meager 5V. A Victor, however, is less efficient, and uses slightly more, primarily, 6V. This is the reason for a 5V and 6V light on the DS. So, Jaguars would run, but Victors wouldn't. Even then, when using 7 jaguar's, the 5V wasn't enough juice apparently. The RSL should have been another indicator. It was working the day before, but suddenly it wasn't. It also needed 12V.

However, Kowalski saved us, and we got the robot to work. With the help of about 5 inspectors, we were speedily rushed through a thorough inspection in about 45 minutes. They even helped us fix all the problems we ran into, if any.

[RufflesRidge]

Originally Posted by ksafin

The Jaguar's are very power efficient, able to run on the meager 5V. A Victor, however, is less efficient, and uses slightly more, primarily, 6V. This is the reason for a 5V and 6V light on the DS. So, Jaguars would run, but Victors wouldn't.

As a note for clarity. The Victors do draw a bit more current from the PWM signal line, but neither controller uses the center pin power line which is connected to 6V if a jumper is placed on the 2-pin header next to that port. The 6V is meant for servos being run of the PWM ports.

[Lavapicker]

My team took a year off four years ago because of a lack of funds so I went over to the Honolulu regional from the Big Island and volunteered with my son who was majoring in computer engineering and had done all the electrical and driving for our team. We were both so busy, he more so because of his skills, that when I came across a team that needed major help I grabbed people from other teams to assist. My son spent almost his entire time rebuilding a bot that was not going to make the field but they got it going somehow. I will never forget Elliot (I hope I didn't forget his name) from GRT 192 who single handedly got four teams on the field. One team had nothing working and stood around their robot as if at a funeral. I brought Elliot over and when he looked at their code using windriver he asked if it would be ok to write it all over in Labview since he knew it better. The team said "sure, nothing works as is anyway." He typed away like a madman and when he was done some 5-10 minutes later he told them to fire it up and test the joysticks. You would have thought they'd won the world championship as they jumped and screamed when their joysticks finally worked. I watched this amazing young man never turn down my request for help as he went from team to team and worked his magic. I'm convinced four teams would not have made the field without his help. One team had already had several experienced mentors tell them several things to try but none worked. I tried to tell all the judges about this and was sorely disappointed that he didn't get a special award but I will never forget it. I felt so bad about taking him from his team so many times that I appologized to them to which they jokingly told me "no, please take him as much as you can!". I have always held 192 in very high regards since this and when I saw this thread felt it was the perfect place to re-live this experience. I hope and believe there are many incidences like this at every regional we don't hear of.

[Grim Tuesday]

I feel like the inspectors never get the recognition they deserve. The Refs and field personnel always get recognized on the field, but the inspectors do just as much work.

[pfreivald]

Rob Heslin at FLR is awesome. He comes to the Rally (hosted by 1511) and "pre-inspects" everyone's robots, with special attention to the rookie teams. His focus is not only on whether or not the robots will pass, but also on best practices and practical suggestions for improvements based on common problems (such as re-positioning radios to reduce the possibility of dropped communication due to unintentional Faraday Cages or electrical noise).

At FLR he's always very busy, but still takes as much time as he can to not only inspect robots, but also help get them as functional as they can be, proactively seeking out teams that appear to be having problems on the field and helping them diagnose and fix problems.

I think it is because of his efforts that the entire inspection team at FLR has adopted this overall methodology, and they all deserve a great deal of gratitude. So Rob, Dan, everyone else, if you're reading this -- you rule!

[legogeek24]

I'm still just a student on my team, but I have to say, helping other teams is one of the most gratifying things about FIRST. I somehow became known as a "LabVIEW expert" at the Utah Regional (not sure how this happened, but hey!) and was called on several times to help out a few different teams. It was mostly simple stuff, downloading code, programming a solenoid, etc, but every time I helped a team to drive their robot, it's instant gratification, and that's what I love about FIRST. Not an inspection story, per se, but along those same lines. It's the reason we continue to be involved in FIRST year after year.

[Seth Mallory]

Elliott was one of 192's all time greats. At each event he would write code for other teams. He was as nice as they come.

[DonRotolo]

As a long-time mentor, I felt it was time to be a first-time inspector at Mt Olive last weekend.

One rookie team has bumpers with 5" long elements next to their ball intake, which unfortunately gave them a competitive advantage. The nearest veteran team was MORT team 11, so I (literally) grabbed a MORT kid, marched him over to the robot, explained the problem, and told him "Please get this fixed for them". He grabbed some Team 75 folks passing by and they went at it, rebuilding two sets of bumpers in under 30 minutes. This rookie team couldn't believe it, and they were so happy they could compete. (They ended up winning an award, too).

Another much older team shows up Saturday morning late, with a robot that looked like it was designed without any regard whatsoever for the rulebook. The compressor was connected directly to the solenoid valve - no safety shutoff, no switch, no nothing. How did they pass inspection at their previous event? Also, their bumpers were (literally) touching the ground. sigh. A mentor from Team 75 was passing by, and I grabbed him (I seem to have a problem with that) and asked if he could help them pass inspection. I mentioned this in another thread, but a sea of red and black shirts descended upon this robot like a plague of locusts. Although this was the last robot to pass inspection, they missed only 2 matches.

Then there were the heartfelt thanks from several of the teams that I inspected and had to fail because of one or another rule. You'd think they'd be angry with me, but their honest and heartfelt thanks says different. THAT is what keeps me going in FRC.

[JustinRueb1891]

I don't know the inspector's name who judged us at the Utah regional, but he either loved or hated us by the end of Thursday. We didn't realize that we had removed the only place on the robot where our team name was painted (on most robots it's on at least 3 places), and the result was a heated debate with the inspector on whether or not my sharpie'd "Team 1891" was "proudly displayed" on the robot. In the end, he let us get away with it, and I'll never forget how passionately we defended our "proudly displayed" team name in sharpie.

[Lavapicker]

I love reading these stories! I'd like to say "right on" to LegoGeek and to keep it up. I know you felt great but you never know how much impact you had on the teams you helped and how others look at you and your team differently now too. Look, I remember Elliots deeds all these years later and even if my team takes a year off I still look to see how his old team 192 is doing.
Thank you too Seth. Would love to know how Elliot is doing today. I heard he went Ivy League? I'm sure he will change the world! I wish I could buy stock in him??
To Don, I can totally relate to your experience. It sounds like these kinds of things do go on at every regional. FIRST should collect these kinds of stories. They are the true examples of gracious professionalism and go unheralded which is probably how those helping would want it but they are very inspiring. They are the spontaneous acts of kindness that are done without any thought for reward. Maybe the inspectors who see these kinds of things can create a new award. Can you imagine reading what someone like LegoGeek or Elliot or the crew Don talked about read to the audience and then recognized with an award they could not possibly apply for. It may inspire more spontaneous acts? Then again, it would probably be hard to limit it to one group/act sometimes which could create hard feelings. Perhaps anyone/any team that helps to point of getting a team on the field should be recognized. Teams could perhaps nominate an inspector/team/person who went above and beyond in helping them. All good stuff this!!

[Gray Adams]

Originally Posted by Lavapicker

Look, I remember Elliots deeds all these years later and even if my team takes a year off I still look to see how his old team 192 is doing.
Thank you too Seth. Would love to know how Elliot is doing today. I heard he went Ivy League? I'm sure he will change the world! I wish I could buy stock in him??

He went to UCSD and helped found Getaround. I'm sure you could get in contact with him if you'd like.