Off season projects

[kuraikou]

I was wondering what off season projects other teams are doing now that FRC is over. I know that 4183 is making a NURC robot. What are your teams doing?

[seg9585]

4276 discussed working on a swerve drive, various pneumatic applications, and onboard vision tracking techniques.

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by kuraikou

I was wondering what off season projects other teams are doing now that FRC is over. I know that 4183 is making a NURC robot. What are your teams doing?

Have a meeting to discuss the successes and shortcomings of your season with all team members and mentors present. I can attest to the fact that 15 year old teams are still finding new and exciting ways to fail and therefore are always seeking to improve after every season. Maybe you should formalize training, draft an official business plan, start or add functionality to your website, rebuild parts of last year's robot, connect with local teams at offseason events, draft legislation for a local or state official to sponsor for FIRST, talk to radio and TV stations about broadcasting your team or local events, try out different drive trains or game piece manipulators to learn more about the advantages and disadvantages of core functions you can apply to actual future competitions...

You need to play to your strengths and eliminate weaknesses, and it's best to uncover and target necessary change specific to your team.

I wish you success.

[Chadfrom308]

We have arduinos that we might start experimenting with, especially because we are switching to labview next year from C++ and you can use labview with the arduinos

And I know that I want to lay out a robot guideline for next year like
-whether or not we really need floor pickup
-Transmissions
-Drivetrain
-Height
-Electronics and wire routing (something we have never done ever.)
-practice designs in AutoCAD

We are also going to code last years robot and this years robot in labview for practice

I also hope we do fun projects like making a go-cart with first materials and making a quad-rotor with arduinos

[Zuelu562]

3623 is planning a few offseason activities (into the school year). We have only 3 students who did not graduate returning, but we already have 10 or more joining the Boys and Girls Club JUST to do Robotics next year!

We want to build something (ideally a new drive system, maybe a mechanism), do a few thought excercises (give them an old game manual, give us the first thoughts; go over an old robot and give us negatives) and obviously training.

[Gdeaver]

We need to work with our returning and new students to make sure that they can take over for our seniors. A couple off season events should help. I would like to see our programming team take on field centric robot control for our swerve drive. Can an inexpensive IMU give accurate heading for an entire match? This is a big challenge. Are they up to it. We have used carbon fiber cloth laminated on .25" birch plywood for many things along with pultrusions. Do foam core composites and honeycomb composite panels have a place on the robots. Can we master the fabrication methods? I have a few students in mind for this project. Can buss looks to be taking on a significant role in the future. May be it's time to play with can. We have avoided it til now. There are always more robot studies than time and we don't want to burn everyone out.

[stodor23]

Originally Posted by Chadfrom308

We have arduinos that we might start experimenting with, especially because we are switching to labview next year from C++ and you can use labview with the arduinos

Ironically enough, our team is thinking of switching out of labview and into C++

[asteb27]

Originally Posted by stodor23

Ironically enough, our team is thinking of switching out of labview and into C++

If you switch, go to Java rather than c++. We recently switched from c++ to Java and liked it a lot better.

[saikiranra]

Five students from Team 696 recently launched a near-space weather balloon with 3 Go-Pros and a multitude of other sensors. More information will be posted soon!

[coalhot]

Team 3929 is completely rebuilding their robot. It looks nothing like the one that went to competitions.

The mentors are fooling around with their own projects, among them are R/C toys (personally own a quadcopter, rally car, micro quad, toy plane), and some of the other mentors have some other fun toys.

Oh, and all of us like to volunteer everywhere we can. It's good for the soul.

[mman1506]

I'm working on a telepresence robot with an integrated scouting program on a tri omniwheel drivetrain.

Our team is working on a sheet metal chassis and doing some cad training.

[Malachi]

Originally Posted by Chadfrom308

We have arduinos that we might start experimenting with, especially because we are switching to labview next year from C++

Personally I would not change from C++ since Labview (with the restricted bandwith) becomes quite laggy at times especially with a larger code, and also you can do a lot more with C++ and it is commonly used in the business world.

[mman1506]

Originally Posted by Malachi

Personally I would not change from C++ since Labview (with the restricted bandwith) becomes quite laggy at times especially with a larger code, and also you can do a lot more with C++ and it is commonly used in the business world.

I don't want to start a debate but +1 , Labview is meant to be a programming language for non programmers. If you know C++ stick with it.

[sarahg2543]

Team 2543 will be working on a golf robot and fundraising events, such as a summer camp for kids. Right now we are working in organizing and cleaning the shop, moving the tables around and such to work more efficiently. We have been brainstorming for offseason ideas, but nothing concrete yet.

[ehochstein]

Team wise we will be doing the following;

• 2470 is working on a summer sheet metal chassis for off-season events
• 3081 is designing and building a outreach robot that can shoot tshirts, basketballs and frisbees
• 2470 is creating a sponsorship packet to hand out to local businesses
• FTC #5943 is working on recruiting sponsors to start 2 additional teams

Personally my tasks after the season have grown;

• Recruiting and Training new mentors for 2470
• Working with FTC in MN
• Growing GOFIRST at Dunwoody
• Running/planning outreach events for 2470/3081
• Creating team infastructure with 3081 mentors
• Helping out other local teams with programming and recruitment
• Wishing for districts in MN so we can have more matches