How do YOU start designing?

[KenWittlief]

I have to disagree with your statement - there IS a correct way to implement a design - engineers usually use a design cycle that may have 5 or 8 steps to it.

To analysis what your robot need to do, there is a technique called Data Driven Analysis. for the FIRST program its easy to implement, because the problem is already defined (winning the game within the requirements and limitations imposed by FIRST)

so all you need to do is analyize the scoring system. Up until now what happens during the game is of no concequence to your score (unless you are disqualified) - so the only thing that really matters is where your bot is at the end, and where the scoring objects are at the end.

Its not hard to put together a spreadsheet that will cover all the possible combinations of scoreing - best possible score and worst possible score - for example, last year - if you had all the bins on your side, and in the scoring zone you got one point for each - if you built a stack that was the mulitplier - and you can graph out all possible combinations, including the extra points for KOTH

and you could also graph out your qualifying points (your score plus twice your opponents if you win, your score if you loose...)

then there is nothing to decide or vote on - the DATA DRIVES your design - the DATA tells you what will give you the most bang for the buck, what the most important function is, the second most, the 3rd most...

for most teams if you focus on two primary functions you will do well (the top two). If you have a larger team and more resources you might try to implement three functions

for last year the data told us:

1. we had to get to the wall quickly and knock more than half the bins on our side - this is because the basis of the best possible score was having more than half the bins on your side of the playfield - this defined the two most important functions: A. we had to get to the wall quickly in auton mode and B. we had to have a way to push more than half the wall on our side of the field.

It turns out that being able to push half the wall over also allowed you to push bins around on the field during manual play - and having a quick bot also allowed you to smack bots off the top of the ramp at the end

but the data told us the 3rd most important thing would be to push bots off the top, or to ensure a place at the top for KOTH.

If we had followed this approach last year we would have done very well - We had the top two functions covered - but a couple people on the team also wanted to be able to build stacks, and we gave into them and let them design a simple stacker

the result of this is that the stacker never actually was able to stack any boxes in any matches (or maybe we built a stack of two in one match). but the frame of it made our bot a little top heavy and easy to push over

because of this we were tipped over several times during auton mode and didnt do as well as we could have if the stacker wasnt on the bot. but it was an integral part of the frame and we could not take it off.

Data Driven Analysis is what engineers use to figure out what the system must do to meet the requirements and be successful in the real world. I strongly recommend that you use it, and STICK to the direction it drives you to. :c)

[Gadget470]

Yes, I do know of the Engineering process, but what I meant by "No Right Way" was that the way for Team X won't always work for Team Y, sorry I didn't clarify. Also, using the established Engineering process won't always work.

then there is nothing to decide or vote on - the DATA DRIVES your design - the DATA tells you what will give you the most bang for the buck, what the most important function is, the second most, the 3rd most...

I do understand this concept, but it doesn't always work right. The most 'bang for your buck' relies on being able to do the 'big bang' effieciantly and effectivly. Have a huge stack and being able to reach KotH was the 1-2 Punch to a win. But was nearly impossible.

The step after compiling the data is to see what is feasible. Because you really can't get the Home Run bot (Master of all aspects), you do have to vote on which is easier to do effectively.