A fundraiser concept for football towns.

[Billfred]

Alright, so I was thinking of a fundraiser that would be fairly simple, unique, and have some kind of teachable moment. Here is my solution.

• Take a box on wheels. Your old competition robot, a drivetrain you prototyped, anything. It just needs to be reliable, and preferably have pneumatic tires.
• Build a big hopper on top, probably incorporating a trash can.
• Over that, add a pneumatic piston with a plate, capable of flattening a soda can and, through gravity or a conveyor, dropping it into the hopper.
• Spice up the robot with flashing lights, team logos, and a big red button.
• Bring the robot (and some extra batteries) to the local tailgating area before a football game. (Make sure you have permission to do this, first.)
• Offer to take empty drink cans by letting them feed the cans into the robot. (You may have to design that piston to accept larger-than-soda-sized cans--there are bigger ones out there.) For bonus points, let them operate the aforementioned big red button.
• Talk more about the team if folks ask.
• Sell the cans at the local scrap dealer.

Bada-bing. You've got a primer on pneumatics, fundraising, talking to people, and OI wiring (hey, big red buttons don't come on the joysticks after all) all in one day. And you'll get a chance to try a different drivetrain, since a FIRST field is decidedly far gentler on a robot than the asphalt of the outside world. (Okay, so the FIRST field gets rougher on robots when you add in other robots.)

Does anyone have suggestions to change or expand on this?