Did FIRST underestimate us?

[Rod]

Originally Posted by MikeWasHere05

Not sure what your saying here... you build your robot in 150 hours?

Why not put it in the 2006 kit? If you know how to use it, all the better to you. If not, they'll probably put an alternative in (banner sensors, IR, etc.)

Six weeks of build time. We work 3 hours per day M-F. 8 hours on Sat. That is 23 hours per week. Times six weeks is 138 hours of build time.

[Mike]

Originally Posted by Rod

Six weeks of build time. We work 3 hours per day M-F. 8 hours on Sat. That is 23 hours per week. Times six weeks is 138 hours of build time.

138 * amount of students

Lets say you have 2 programmers, that gives you 272 hours to program. More than a sufficient amount if put to the right use.

[jgannon]

Originally Posted by Wayne C.

Since we have few to nobody using the cameras and stacking vision tetras I think the opposite is probably the case.....

I've been giving it some thought, and I think that FIRST may very well have known what they were getting us into by including the camera with the kit. The animation and the human simulation at kickoff both indicated that vision was going to be a simple task; both showed two teams on one alliance pursuing vision tetras, and the animation even showed a robot using vision during driver control to find the loading station. No one familiar with the technology could honestly believe it to be as simple of a task as it was portrayed, but that wasn't the point. Line tracking is a pretty simple task; many teams achieved it last year, and once it was done, the vast majority of us programmers got to sit around and watch the rest of our team slave away on mechanical issues. By giving a monumental, practically unattainable task, FIRST continued to strive for their stated goals; they don't care if our code works, but rather that we've been inspired. I personally spent dozens of hours trying to make the camera work, and all the time between ship date and competition was spent pondering how I could pull it off in only three more days of work. By the end of our regional, our team ended up hacking our camera box off the side of our robot, because I couldn't make it work. Did I succeed in capping a vision tetra? No. Did FIRST inspire me, and lead me to ponder programming tasks that I'd never even dreamed of? Absolutely, and I'm thrilled about it. It's fantastic that a very small group of teams have mastered the technology, but I wouldn't say that the teams that at least made an attempt (probably a sizable number... anybody remember the thread complaining about how easy programming was going to be this year?) have failed.

[Collin Fultz]

FIRST always talks about grandmothers and making them proud.

My grandmother was at BMR this weekend and said that this is her favorite game by far. She's sen three year's worth of games.

So FIRST---you made my grandmother proud.

If I could have made a suggestion (which i couldn't) I would have made the home zone worth more points. But, whatever.

Personally (on a side note) I liked last year's game best.

[the_short1]

we had the camera and we had it to stop when it got x cm from vision tetra.. also to track it around the room and follow (me running around with it in hand). .. the thing taht stoped us ? we had 119.95 weight wihtout stickers . . . yea.. so we had to cut some stuff out and we managed to get it to 119.0 for competition <so we had a little extra.. but not enought for the CAMERA and MOUNT.. . so we had to scrap it . .

we have 2 robots. .. but u see the second robot (practice) has an olderversion robot controller.. and little we knew till too late.. hey its PBASIC! .. we managed to get it running for pratice driving and boom etc.. but no autom.. yea..

[mathking]

Did I succeed in capping a vision tetra? No. Did FIRST inspire me, and lead me to ponder programming tasks that I'd never even dreamed of? Absolutely, and I'm thrilled about it. It's fantastic that a very small group of teams have mastered the technology, but I wouldn't say that the teams that at least made an attempt (probably a sizable number... anybody remember the thread complaining about how easy programming was going to be this year?) have failed.

This is exactly the attitude I hope for in my students and what FIRST strives to promote. Bravo. (And CMU should be happy to be getting you next year.)

[Rick TYler]

Twenty-three posts and not a single person has suggested that FIRST should have included a water element to make Triple Play more challenging.

I'm disappointed, people.

[JohnnyB]

Originally Posted by Rick TYler

Twenty-three posts and not a single person has suggested that FIRST should have included a water element to make Triple Play more challenging.

I'm disappointed, people.

Danger, Will Robinson! Danger!

[DarMagi]

Originally Posted by zc923

I it just me, or does it seem as though the stacking tetra thing was not fully thaught out. It became apparent at the NJ regional that the robots could stack 8 tetras on a goal. The reason I bring this up is how the tetras begin to tip over and fall off the goals.

I have to say it was not an underestimation of our abilities. Maybe this even was overlooked by officials, but it was deffinately not an underestimation. As an individual, you stepped up to the proposed challenge, with that said you are to look at all aspects of the game and play accordingly. This was just an overlooked aspect by alot of people, I didn't even think of the tetras falling under their own weight, but that is just part of the game. We are never underestimated by the officials, but merely just put up to a challenge that seems hard, only to find out just how easy and fun it acctually was.