pic: Team 704

[CD47-Bot]

loading photo ...

[uvabrad825]

80 pounds?!!??! how?!?! that's amazing...

[Joe Johnson]

Nice clean look!

I like the hinged locking arm -- reminds me of Beatty in 1997 -- National Champs for the first time that year, tough act to follow, but you can do it.

Who did all the nice milling to lighten your beam plates? Much nicer looking than nasty holes.

I see from your "slippery tape" on the front wheels that you must have had too much traction to turn well. Very common this year. It's a big club -- perhaps try 6 wheel drive next year. Hey if it is good enough for Team 47, it must have something going for it ;-)

Great effort. Great result. Hope you have a lot of great matches.

Joe J.

[Taylor_Ratliff]

Thanks for the compliments guys. Yes, we had a little trouble turning, but we had been working down to the last minute. Vought, one of our sponsors, milled out all of the plates for us.

The final version of our robot has hood that goes over all the electronics to protect them, and alot of our sponsors corporate logos on it. Unfortunately we dont have any pictures of the robot with those on it. I will post pictures though when we get to our regionals on April 1st and open our crate.

[Taylor_Ratliff]

Well our coaches finally decided who will be driving this year, we had tryouts with an older robot that handles the same. There were two people trying out, me ( A freshman) and Martine (A senior). Our coaches think I did better, so it looks like im driving . Im pretty nervous, our competition starts in one week! Ive never even been to a FIRST competition before, anyone have some pointers?

[jpsaul7usa]

Nice looking bot Noob question: is it alright to rest the battery on its side? My team though for the last two years that batteries had to be upright. I don't remember seeing any non-upright bats on the last two competitions though...

[jamapor]

Originally Posted by jpsaul7usa

Nice looking bot Noob question: is it alright to rest the battery on its side? My team though for the last two years that batteries had to be upright. I don't remember seeing any non-upright bats on the last two competitions though...

the battery doesn"t have to be upright. our battery in 2K3 wasnt upright, and it worked quite well for us.

[Jay H 237]

We have used our battery in different positions over the years in the different robots depending on space and center of gravity issues and never had any problems. Center of gravity is a big issue this year due to climbing the platform. I recall seeing several threads on battery position in these forums.

Back to original topic, as others have mentioned I also like the fact that you didn't completely mill out the pieces (swiss cheese). Just milling out recesses in your robot has given it a different character compared to others.