pic: Team 610 - 2013 Electronics Board

[Tmaxxrox97]

Originally Posted by Mr. Lim

I can't really comment about the drivetrain, other than the fact that I really like it, and that student designer Ryan Tam (Gr. 11) deserves a tons of recognition for the design and manufacture of it. He worked under the mentorship of Mr. Stehlik, and there are a lot of neat little details in it that just don't show up in this picture... (i.e. all 4 side plates are identical, how the square channels are securely connected to the side plates with only one fastener, the in-between CIM "floating" encoders + mounts)

It's not flashy, but it's really well thought out, with a ton of detail to maximize ease of machining, assembly, and maintenance.

Is there a CAD file of this drivetrain available? The floating encoders and mounts sound like a really cool idea and I would like to take a look at them if I could.

[Travis Hoffman]

Originally Posted by Gregor

So what was behind the smiley face?

Video of Mr. Lim's dance moves.

[Gregor]

Originally Posted by Travis Hoffman

Video of Mr. Lim's dance moves.

Mr. Lim's dance moves were so fantastic they couldn't possibly fit behind one tiny smiley face.

[FIRST_Parent]

Originally Posted by Travis Hoffman

Video of Mr. Lim's dance moves.

Glad to see you made it home safe Mr. Hoffman.

[jamierose]

Originally Posted by Tmaxxrox97

Is there a CAD file of this drivetrain available? The floating encoders and mounts sound like a really cool idea and I would like to take a look at them if I could.

We will probably upload our CAD to www.frc-designs.com at some point in the future. I would do it now, but unfortunately, I, and many other members of our team, are currently writing exams, so we don't have much time to sort out our CAD and upload it. I'll explain a bit about how our encoders are mounted.

As you can see in the picture, our CIMs are pretty close together. We made a small plastic piece with our 3-axis CNC router that looks like a rectangle with a semi-circle cut out on either side of it. These portions of a circle are made to fit perfectly around a CIM. There was a hole in the middle of the piece for an encoder to fit through so we could screw it on. We then slid the piece in between the CIMs. The friction was enough to keep the plastic piece in place.

We then used our usual method to connect the encoder to the shaft. On 610 we use a technique we borrowed from 188, which is using surgical tubing to connect an encoder to a shaft. We simply slide the encoder into one end of the surgical tubing and the shaft into the other end. It works extremely well and we have never had issues with it.

If you have any more questions feel free to ask or message me! Hopefully we'll be able to get that CAD uploaded soon.

[Mr. Lim]

Originally Posted by Travis Hoffman

Video of Mr. Lim's dance moves.

Who is Mr. Lim?

[rwkling1]

Originally Posted by Mr. Lim

loading photo ...

That is probably some of the neatest wiring I've ever seen...

[DampRobot]

Originally Posted by rwkling1

That is probably some of the neatest wiring I've ever seen...

I bet you've never seen 254's electronics board...

[rwkling1]

Originally Posted by DampRobot

I bet you've never seen 254's electronics board...

I have not! I'll check it out sometime

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by DampRobot

I bet you've never seen 254's electronics board...

Wow... someone can't compliment a robot without you saying "but 254's is better"...

[DampRobot]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Wow... someone can't compliment a robot without you saying "but 254's is better"...

Fair enough. I'm being too harsh. 610 has a great looking electronics board, but 254 is notoriously picky about having straight wiring, etc., so I suggested that he take a look at their electronics bard. In any case, you sure cant argue with 610's results.

[Mr. Lim]

FIRST Robotics Canada did a series of webinars during build season this year, and we did a quick walk-through of our electronics board on one of them. The goal was to show younger teams what a completed board could look like, and how things generally are wired:

Part 1:
http://youtu.be/wRDkPfUYakM

Part 2:
http://youtu.be/BN2ih23KMMc

I think our boards are pretty effective and fairly neat, and there are a lot of little details our students do which make a big difference, but aren't particularly flashy. I won't claim that our boards are the prettiest, or the neatest, but they work pretty well, and are some of the most straightforward I've had to troubleshoot and service. I also think our electronics build process is something that most every team in FRC can duplicate, even low-resource teams.

We tend to focus on things like labelling every single wire at both ends, putting zip-tied strain-relieved disconnects at every motor, speed controller and sensor with standardized connectors/pinouts and pigtail lengths to make replacing components a lot easier. These are the types of time-consuming nitty-gritty things that won't win you a lot of fans or awards, but it'll win you a lot of matches.

As far as electrical board go, I know both my students and I are very proud of the work they've done, but if you're looking for truly inspirational electrical boards, you should definitely take a look at this thread:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=111976

[rsisk]

Originally Posted by Mr. Lim

...
We tend to focus on things like labelling every single wire at both ends, putting zip-tied strain-relieved disconnects at every motor, speed controller and sensor with standardized connectors/pinouts and pigtail lengths to make replacing components a lot easier. These are the types of time-consuming nitty-gritty things that won't win you a lot of fans or awards, but it'll win you a lot of matches.
...

This is the kind of stuff judges look for in the Quality award.