Did you make a second robot? [POLL]

[Michael Corsetto]

Originally Posted by RoboChair

Yes they do, most of the time. We tear one of the 2 practice bots down for spare parts(KOP and COTS) before we compete somewhere. I forget if we are using the RoboRIO from our 2015 bot(s) or not however.

2015 Comp Bot is mostly together (minus a few speed controllers that got replaced)

2015 Practice Bot got gutted for parts for one of the two practice robots.

All three 2016 robots have full control systems. It was a marginally extra cost this year that will level out for next year.

-Mike

[PayneTrain]

A practice robot is a great way to keep a lot of students involved throughout and beyond build season, as we have learned. Through donations, contests, FIRST Choice, and remarkably little cash, we can run 3 separate control systems like 1678 and should the opportunity ever arise, we would build a third robot. I loved watching student engagement soar this year through a marginal expense when compared to a registration fee. I would *almost* recommend teams deciding between multiple events or multiple robots to pick the latter.

[Libby K]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

A practice robot is a great way to keep a lot of students involved throughout and beyond build season, as we have learned. Through donations, contests, FIRST Choice, and remarkably little cash, we can run 3 separate control systems like 1678 and should the opportunity ever arise, we would build a third robot. I loved watching student engagement soar this year through a marginal expense when compared to a registration fee. I would *almost* recommend teams deciding between multiple events or multiple robots to pick the latter.

Same here. Although our third base, a driving-trainer/defensive-play-practice-opponent, has a mix of new & old control components.

Our practice robot(s) have done wonders for the level of student engagement. With 114 kids, there's just no possible way all of them could get their hands on one robot if that's all we built. We would still build two+ machines even if there weren't bagging restrictions.

[cscottm]

Team 2502 Has built Practice Robots for the past three years (since 2014) and they are always built before the competition bot, and thus they are used for testing of systems, and game practice. Our practice bot always ends up different then the main robot as weight is not a concern, nor is strength, but it is always as close to a mirror of the main robot as possible.

[novamx3]

Originally Posted by cscottm

Team 2502 Has built Practice Robots for the past three years (since 2014) and they are always built before the competition bot, and thus they are used for testing of systems, and game practice. Our practice bot always ends up different then the main robot as weight is not a concern, nor is strength, but it is always as close to a mirror of the main robot as possible.

Rebound rumble (2012) was the first year we (2502 Talon Robotics) built a practice robot. The rest of this statement is accurate.

[philso]

Originally Posted by Thomas610

This year, we designed the backbone (the superstructure of the robot and the claw) of our robot to be easily removed (and lucky it was under 30lbs ). This lets us do maintenance and upgrades of our bot without having to make a practice bot. If you look at our robot between GTRC and ONWA, we managed to get our high goal shooting nailed down (pretty huge change in performance) by working on the real claw for our bot. Kind of a nice balance between making a practice bot and not.

Did you mount the backbone/superstructure on something like a chassis from a previous year so you could drive it around and simulate it being on your "real" chassis?

[philso]

Originally Posted by Type

We built a practice robot that uses similar controls to our robot and similar function but looks entirely different and drives different. It's essentially just to test code, like we used it to figure out how to use two autos, then we also used it to work on vision tracking. It's not as good as our actual robot, but it's better than nothing.

Originally Posted by engunneer

Count us among teams that build two non-identical robots. the first one had a few dimension and construction issues, and we've built 3-4 complete shooter assemblies by now between pre-bag and various withholding allowances.

The second bot was made better, and used what we learned on the first, but they are similar enough that the code transfers with few modifications between them. Electronics mounting is another story, and the practice robot only has a front bumper because our intake requires one.

Originally Posted by nuclearnerd

Last year we built a second chassis from an old c-base kit and withheld our mechanism to get a practice robot on the cheap. It worked out really well, but we spent a lot of time during the first day of regionals putting our robot back together.

It seems that most teams that do build practice robots make them fairly close to the competition one.

For those who build practice robots that are not close to identical to the competition one, what are the pros and cons for the practice robot being different? What are the major differences (other than cosmetics)? Would you continue to build practice robots that are different from the competition robot?

[Thomas610]

Originally Posted by philso

Did you mount the backbone/superstructure on something like a chassis from a previous year so you could drive it around and simulate it being on your "real" chassis?

Ya, that's exactly what we do. We've just made an adapter that holds it in the same rough position as on our real bot.

[hutchMN]

Originally Posted by cscottm

Team 2502 Has built Practice Robots for the past three years (since 2014) and they are always built before the competition bot, and thus they are used for testing of systems, and game practice. Our practice bot always ends up different then the main robot as weight is not a concern, nor is strength, but it is always as close to a mirror of the main robot as possible.

*2012... know your team history

[Type]

Originally Posted by philso

It seems that most teams that do build practice robots make them fairly close to the competition one.

For those who build practice robots that are not close to identical to the competition one, what are the pros and cons for the practice robot being different? What are the major differences (other than cosmetics)? Would you continue to build practice robots that are different from the competition robot?

So we have a fairly rookie team this year. There are only 2 students returning so we tried to make a T shirt robot to learn more about building a robot before season. We used last year's KoP to do it. We never finished it so we decided to use it as a practice robot. Currently, we are using rhino tracks for our competition robot. To move our shooter on our arm up and down, we have 2 dart linear actuators ran with cims, our practice robot has an entirely different type of shooter setup. Our little shooting basket that would be impossible to load during a match is ran by a window motor and a threaded rod basically. Our practice robot can't do defenses, can't shoot as accurate, and doesn't even look close to any robots you will see this year but we use it to test code . We have rookie programmers so we use it to figure out how to do things. Next year I'm hoping we can make an identical replica so we can practice driving and code. Most of our improvements we design in CAD so we don't really need a practice robot in that aspect.

[The_BEVR]

Team 4778 does build a practice bot, and it certainly helps.

[Russell2144]

Funny story, so we made the practice bot after Build season ended, then before our first comp we realized that we didnt have enough spares, so we took the bot apart and brought it with us

[Charles Boehm]

2175 has built a fully functioning practice bot since 2014. (I'm unaware if we had tried to prior to then) This year we planned to do work on it in the four weeks leading up to our first event in regards to auto and shot aiming. But instead we spent about 3.5 weeks fixing crippling drive train weaknesses.

Had we not have had that robot, we likely would not be attending the championship this year.

[nlknauss]

I'm glad this thread popped up. Recent performance and discussion with my team has led us to think about getting a second robot together starting next year for many of the reason discussed in this thread. We've never built more than robot in the past, but have discussed it.

Can anyone comment on the build and design process involved with two robots?

[Russell2144]

Originally Posted by nlknauss

I'm glad this thread popped up. Recent performance and discussion with my team has led us to think about getting a second robot together starting next year for many of the reason discussed in this thread. We've never built more than robot in the past, but have discussed it.

Can anyone comment on the build and design process involved with two robots?

The way we do it is we have a core group of experienced builders working on the main comp bot so it is at its best possible condition, and the second robot is built by mostly less experienced members so they get a feel for tools, building, cutting etc. And if the second group runs into a problem they can ask for help and we will guide them but not do it for them.