Team 1114: Engineering Notebooks

[Giffgiff27]

What was the evolution of your shooter? Did it start out as just a claw, and then worked its way into a shooter and then into a passing robot? Or did you know from the start the basics of what you wanted the entire thing to be able to do? Also, when you were building it, did you ever think about using the height of the robot to block shots, or did you just block shots if you truly needed to, so that you wouldn't risk possible damage to your shooter?

[Karthik]

Originally Posted by Giffgiff27

What was the evolution of your shooter? Did it start out as just a claw, and then worked its way into a shooter and then into a passing robot? Or did you know from the start the basics of what you wanted the entire thing to be able to do? Also, when you were building it, did you ever think about using the height of the robot to block shots, or did you just block shots if you truly needed to, so that you wouldn't risk possible damage to your shooter?

After kickoff weekend, we decided to prototype three different types of scoring mechanisms. In priority order they were:
1. Wheeled Shooter
2. Linear Punch
3. Catapult

The wheeled shooter and linear punch both appealed to us because they lent themselves to geometry such that we could integrate them right into the intake/claw, similar to what we did in 2008 with Simbot SS. The early wheeled shooter prototypes immediately showed a lot of promise, thus we quickly decided to move in that direction. Our early design priorities included scoring from 18' out while standing still and having a deadly accurate shot. We knew distance would be easier to achieve using a stored energy solution (like the linear punch or catapult), however our past stored energy devices (2008 shooter, 2010 kicker) were not particularly consistent, especially when factoring in the wear on the surgical tubing. As such, we ended up sacrificing a bit of distance to gain the consistency that came with the wheeled shooter. Granted, when we made the tradeoff, we were still very confident we could score from a standstill at 18' from the goal. It took us until the second half of build season to fully abandon that goal.

Yes, blocking shots with the height of the claw was always a huge consideration for us. Once we realized that our shooting geometry was going to make us a tall robot, we knew we were going to take advantage of it defensively.

[Michael Hill]

Thanks for posting this, it's a really good read. I'm curious, can you go into how your team decided to approach the game this year? I saw 254 had a spreadsheet that tried to "predict" scores of matches that would happen if certain strategies played out and used that to drive the design. Does 1114 do anything similar? How did your strategy evolve throughout the season? Week 1 competition is obviously different than a week 5, so how do you adapt your strategy to robots that aren't as "polished" in early weeks vs. later weeks?

Thanks

[IKE]

Excellent resource. Thank you so much for posting.

[NWChen]

Any chance of 1114 releasing the code for Simbot Evolution?

[Karthik]

Originally Posted by NWChen

Any chance of 1114 releasing the code for Simbot Evolution?

The current plan is to port over all our code to the RobotRio during the upcoming Beta Test. We'll be releasing everything we do during the Beta Test, similar to what we did in 2007, so it will all be available at that point.

Originally Posted by Michael Hill

Thanks for posting this, it's a really good read. I'm curious, can you go into how your team decided to approach the game this year? I saw 254 had a spreadsheet that tried to "predict" scores of matches that would happen if certain strategies played out and used that to drive the design. Does 1114 do anything similar? How did your strategy evolve throughout the season? Week 1 competition is obviously different than a week 5, so how do you adapt your strategy to robots that aren't as "polished" in early weeks vs. later weeks?

We didn't do predictions that were as detailed as what the Poofs did; our process for that is a little bit less formal. Typically during brainstorming, we do talk about average regional match scores and average Championship match scores, to help try an establish a baseline for what's reasonable, and what's needed to be successful. In terms of evolving strategies, I think the addition of the goalie stick for Championship is the best example. By Championship we knew there would be enough teams with two ball autonomous modes to allow us to comfortably head back to the goalie zone.

[Anupam Goli]

Hey, just a quick question.

In the notebook, I read that you put your speed controllers on the base of your claw to minimize the distance the wires have to travel between the speed controller and motor. Is there an observed difference in performance when having the speed controllers wired farther away than when they're wired closer? I'd imagine the difference would be small enough to be corrected by tuning the feedback loop a little more.