My hints and guess on the Game in 2004!

[danielkitchener]

Originally Posted by Rich Wong

I over heard a really good idea today in one of out robotics workshop:

Student1: I know how to get big sponsor money for the FIRST Championship in GA- design a game with 2 liter Coke bottles!

Coca-cola is headquartered in Atlanta and they would love to see all those Coca-Cola bottles flying around and become the "official drink of FIRST."

Student2: yet and think of all that free cola we can drink in the pits!


HINT, HINT, FIRST and Coca-Cola.

I think you're onto something
On the site, in the link that Dave gave us, there are inflatable soda cans...perhaps.
Oh, and also. I'm sure I've mentioned this to several of you, but what about conveyer belts??? They add a degree of difficulty to the field if they go opposite the direction you want to go, and havent been used before. I.e.
_______________________________
| END ZONE |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| | B | | B | |
| | E | | E | |
| | L | | L | |
| | T | | T | |
| | | | | |
|____| |________| |_________| and thats half the field. Belt moves towards the top of this post.

[miketwalker]

Originally Posted by Joe

All that because the C programming and it´s float points... ah.. I don´t know... calculating PI to measure distance between things, making exact calculations... there´s some point in that for sure...

I disagree. To have high accuracy, you need to have highly accurate motors and sensors as well. For most cases, your right... the new robot controller is nearly (afraid to say this word for reprucussions) infinite for the typical needs of a team. However, designing systems will always limit you. For example, look at WildStang's StangPS and I believe some other teams had similar systems.. they had a system to automatically drive their robots to specific "checkpoints" during autonomous and know where they were. Yes, they used a microchip controller on top of the stamp controller, but this year... we all have the controller... it just depends on how long you'll spend in the design of systems to create input to the robot controller to be worked with. This year's controller is VERY powerful, but I don't think FIRST is going to force all teams to have to design pretty complicated systems such as the StangPS, at least not this year... I think they will give us at least this year to get settled in with the new language, and any curves they might throw into autonomous if the rumors of autonomous being at the end or middle are true, those already will encourage more designing. Anymore would be too much for this year. Just my thoughts, anyone be glad to pop in and tell me I'm wrong on something though lol.

[gsensel]

Originally Posted by danielkitchener

I think you're onto something
On the site, in the link that Dave gave us, there are inflatable soda cans...perhaps.
Oh, and also. I'm sure I've mentioned this to several of you, but what about conveyer belts??? They add a degree of difficulty to the field if they go opposite the direction you want to go, and havent been used before.

Also perhaps the conveyor belts are only on for part of the match.

[maxgebhardt]

just glancing at the suppliers for this year, and something caught my eye, NYPRO is a sponser, they make custom molded plastic junk. maybe first designed its own object this year. also BEI which makes gyroscopes. they're a gold supplier this year, so maybe we'll get better gyros. this would make some sense if we were reaching into barrels where the operators cant see.
what I'm confused about is EBM sponsering on the platnum level, they make fans. why are they sponsoring...

[RogerR]

Originally Posted by maxgebhardt

just glancing at the suppliers for this year, and something caught my eye, NYPRO is a sponser, they make custom molded plastic junk. maybe first designed its own object this year.

such as custom made plastic bearing blocks, and drill motor mounts, like last year?

[maxgebhardt]

maybe, but that would hardly seem enough to become a platinum supplier. they might be making custom plastic oil bins, maybe shorter than normal.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by maxgebhardt

maybe, but that would hardly seem enough to become a platinum supplier. they might be making custom plastic oil bins, maybe shorter than normal.

Making molds and casting about a dozen parts for each of more than 900 teams isn't that cheap, and since I'm sure it's all donated, I'd bet that qualifies.

[Kevin Watson]

Originally Posted by maxgebhardt

what I'm confused about is EBM sponsering on the platnum level, they make fans. why are they sponsoring...

HMMmmm... Sliding friction coefficient of dry ice and fans... Where have I seen this odd combination before... Yeah, I remember! It was four or five months ago when I was in this really long, boring MER meeting when I noticed that Dave Lavery (ever the clown) had built a hovercraft using a toy fan, two AA batteries, paper clips, and a Krispy Kreme donut. It looked like Dave was trying to deliver it to Pete Theisinger ("the goal"), across the conference table (I remember thinking that if I was Pete, I wouldn't want to eat that donut after having all of those skanky paper clips inserted into it). Well, it looked to me like there wasn't enough lift 'cause the Krispy Kreme only made it half way across the table before the Krispy Kremes maple-flavored goo stuck it to the conference table. I then distinctly remember Dave mumbling something about maple-flavored goo not sticking to dry ice. Well, I didn't think too much of it at the time (Dave is always doing stuff like this in meetings), but now I'm not too sure that Dave was just experimenting with the latest fad in mobility platforms for Mars exploration...

-Kevin

[Chris Fultz]

We will have to climb stairs and then balance on a 55 gallon drum that is on its' side. Bonus points if you are on top of drum when time runs out.
And there are only 2 drums in a 3 robot competition game.

Roll your drum to your scoring are for an additional bonus point.

[D@ve]

I've been wanting to climb stairs for 4 years now and i'm still waiting ...Maybe this will be the year we all CLIMB to new hights!!!!!

[dez250]

Originally Posted by Kevin Watson

HMMmmm... Sliding friction coefficient of dry ice and fans... Where have I seen this odd combination before... Yeah, I remember! It was four or five months ago when I was in this really long, boring MER meeting when I noticed that Dave Lavery (ever the clown) had built a hovercraft using a toy fan, two AA batteries, paper clips, and a Krispy Kreme donut. It looked like Dave was trying to deliver it to Pete Theisinger ("the goal"), across the conference table (I remember thinking that if I was Pete, I wouldn't want to eat that donut after having all of those skanky paper clips inserted into it). Well, it looked to me like there wasn't enough lift 'cause the Krispy Kreme only made it half way across the table before the Krispy Kremes maple-flavored goo stuck it to the conference table. I then distinctly remember Dave mumbling something about maple-flavored goo not sticking to dry ice. Well, I didn't think too much of it at the time (Dave is always doing stuff like this in meetings), but now I'm not too sure that Dave was just experimenting with the latest fad in mobility platforms for Mars exploration...

-Kevin

Kevin, dont forget that the true reason Dave [Lavery] likes Krispy Kreme's is cause in space his devices wouldn't feel the drag from them while delivering to the I.S.S. or Mars!
~Mike

[aziandorkess]

umm.. i think the suppliers listed on their website were from 2003... i don't think they released the list of suppliers for 2004 yet. btw, coca-cola is sponsoring the georgia dome... pepsi's not listed.
foam would be very interesting... i was thinking about easter eggs but there are a lot of reasons why they wouldn't use it... i think stairs are probable... as long as it doesn't act like the ramp last year. gah. anyways... hope it's really interesting. like the clown idea. =P

[pauluffel]

The autonomous definately needs to be more difficult to challenge the experienced teams out here, but if there is just more time spent in autonomous or it is at the end, it would be even more damaging to teams that are having trouble making the physical parts of their robot work properly, not to mention any complex programming. I'm thinking that the autonomous period will come at the end, but will affect scoring, such as any points scored during the autonomous period at the end will be be given a multiplier of 2 (like double salary for overtime, get it, overtime?....). This way it the autonomous would be very helpful for teams that could get it done, but it wouldn't hurt you too badly if you couldn't get your root to do anything productive by itself.

Should have thought of this back when we could propose game ideas, anyhow, I think there will be some sort of different weighting to the autonomous period, rather than just having it as a head start (though this would probably be a nightmare for refs).

[maxgebhardt]

If they do put auto mode at the end I think it is very well possible that all you need to do is get the robot into a team zone, then a small human period is allowed to ensure the robot is oriented correctly. this could solve issues caused by the robot not being correctly alligned at the end.

[greencelery115]

"Vmax = 10 ft/sec

Yes, there are two paths you can go by
But in the long run
There's still time to change the road you're on." (official clue from first blast email)

velocity maximum? * perhaps something to do with the field setup?

With the clue words "two paths, long run, and time to change the road" I think something funny is going to happen to the timing system...maybe a modification of the field to provide two pathways (perhaps one short and not able to modify itself, or one long...or elevated fields...). I wonder why they mentioned "long run". This is really bothering me.