Mythical Six Week Build Season

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by techhelpbb

Sure anyone should be able able to assemble the KOP and have a driving robot and very likely an end effector in 6 weeks.

Will assembling that KOP teach you about programming? Not so much.
Will assembling that KOP teach you about CNC? Not so much.
Will assembling that KOP teach you electronics? Not even a FIRST goal for the most part (hence we provide the control system).

My point: what is your goal to merely build a robot to show up on the field?

My goal is not just to build a robot, it's to educate and mentor students in the skills that built that robot. So will I be successful? Sure I will reduce my scope till we succeed at the price of my goals which are larger than the time provided.

I can do this even faster. I can just build the robot myself with 2 or 3 trained engineers and let the students watch and learn how it is done. Accumulating none of the tactile education they could have gotten. Heck I've built military robots I can just show up and hand them the controls teaching them with the right amout of money you can buy someone else's hard work. Military probably prefer this anyway: drone pilots that when they retire no longer have drones.

Again, your missing the point. You can build a SUCCESSFUL robot in 6 weeks. Over the past 9 years, my team has only made significant changes at competition twice. We've been finalists 3 times, winners twice, and almost always play in eliminations (usually as captain or first round pick). And all of that is done with a student led team that emphasizes training and experience over getting the perfect robot out. Sure, if it was just the mentors on our team building, we'd be done in a week. But the mentors do very, very little building.

The point is, the schedule may be a limiting factor to how much you can do, but it shouldn't be a limiting factor in producing a successful robot if your team can develop a good process and plan for the season.