FTC upcoming kickoff event coming soon.

[ttldomination]

Originally Posted by carl.nartia

I'm wondering if my team has to have experience in FreeCAD in order to have experience with the kickoff event. My robotics director told me that the FTC designs are already made, and that all my team has to do is just assemble it. I'm not sure what's happening right now. My question is if we use FreeCAD, what do we need to design, and is what my robotics director said is true?

P.S. This is my first time going to compete at an FTC event. Need advice and help.

"Already made" is a extremely inaccurate statement.

First off, FTC kick off is simply the game release. You can be a rookie with zero knowledge and still enjoy the event/day. Now, teams tend to take this day to discuss ideas and brainstorm robot designs. However, the amount of actual CADing on the first day is rather minimal.

So, I'd like to explain the "already made" statement. The fact of the matter is that the robots are not "already made". They come in a very strict kit of parts with most of the metal provided, but it's up to you to decide how these parts go together.

Finally, CAD comes into play when you're deciding how to put the parts together. If you have an idea, it's sometimes better to do a CAD rather than to dive right into the build, a concept that is particularly true in FRC. In FTC, most teams don't prioritize CAD because of the relative ease with which you can build/take down things. In the time you CAD a concept, chances are that you could've built it and torn it down already.

Hope this helps,
Sunny G.