Mentor/Student Involvement Philosophies

[mentorDon]

Originally Posted by Akash Rastogi

He said without a sponsor.

Also, that robot would have won a championship even without pretty lightening patterns. At this point you're just not even trying to look at the bigger picture.

So I'm assuming that the 'school' had a really nice metal shop?

[Pat Fairbank]

Originally Posted by mentorDon

So I'm assuming that the 'school' had a really nice metal shop?

I've met the student who CAM-ed and ran that part on the school's rather unimpressive CNC mill. He was also their operator that year. Please stop with the libel.

[Ryan Dognaux]

Last year we acquired a waterjet sponsor and most of our robot was created by that sponsor from CAD files we generated. This year that sponsor could not support us, but I honestly feel like our robot is actually going to be more competitive. It's all about planning to your design / build resources. All of our robot is being made with a bandsaw and a drill press and I feel great about it. Either way, our students are inspired by the end product.

The best thing your team can do is plan. Download CAD, layout your design, get everyone on the same page. You'll learn a lot building your robot virtually before you ever cut metal in the shop.

Complaining about what others have is a waste of time. Step up and make your team better.

[DaRealSlimShady]

Having a Cnc machine is probably a great experience and helps teams greatly. That being said.

It is one of the sweetest feelings in all of creation to beat one of those teams.
Not because of the "underdog affect"
Because you worked harder
Because you innovated harder
Because you gave harder

I'm not saying this to attack teams that may have above average resources. To the contrary, more power to them because they more than likely went out and earned them. As said before having access to more equipment is just another tool to help teams win. But it's not the only one. If you want it enough no other teams will be able to stop you from winning. The only team that can stop you from succeeding is your own.

[Siri]

Originally Posted by mentorDon

OOOHHH! Life isn't fair I'm told. How many of you squawking that sentiment have access to a sponsor with CNC equipment? Consider yourself lucky. And I'm willing to make a large wager most teams don't. We had one once. But with the economy as it is, they couldn't support us any longer. So we adapted to what we have. And then there is the lack of machine shops. Kansas City use to have shops scattered throughout the city. Not any more. Most of that work has moved to Mexico or China. I started working in a machine shop back in 1974. I have seen and experienced the change. And I don't see NASA building a shop here anytime soon.

As a team working in the back of a physics classroom, and then a garage, a barn (moving in February in Pennsylvania), and then being kicked from warehouse to warehouse literally for years, we raised the money to buy our own CNC. We also grew in many other ways (we learned CAD, bought and taught ourselves welding, started understanding drive trains, prototyping, constantly worked long summers). Won our first award, started making elims. We moved 12 times in 6 years, including during build season. Once we finally got the CNC set up in all that--years after we bought it--we started leveraging it. Our students do all our in-house CNCing. In fact, right now we don't have a mentor with their skill sets. We managed to pick up some small local machining sponsor's time also, but only after we started winning. I've honestly been surprised how much people like to sponsor success.

So to answer your question, we do have CNCing, we earned it tooth and nail, and we still consider ourselves lucky. Accidents of geography are a thing. Success without insanely hard work is not.