Team 2415: We Suck...

[Barry Bonzack]

Originally Posted by Ian G

Here are two pictures of our turbine. It is a Dirt Devil hand held vacuum modified to fit a Fisher-Price motor with a 1:2 gear ratio. This assembly is attached to a 20" diameter dome.

I must say, integrating a Fisher-Price to a Dirt Devil is very Creative! I was not expecting to see many robots that use suction to pick up the trackball. What is the quickest time your team has been able to drive up to the ball and pick it up? I counted about 7 seconds on the video, but I'm sure you've practiced more since.

Just a suggestion for your video: If you are planning on using it for promotional purposes (and I would highly encourage it), cut the video down to a 30 - 45 second highlight real. Feel free to PM me for suggestions.

[Andrew Y.]

We actually didnt get to drive recently becasue the programmers are selfish and want the robot for more than a day befo ship. I mean......c'mon!

but part of the "delay" was because the drivers where getting instructions. And there have been time when the ball was attached but the driver was waiting for instructions. Also, the impeller/turbine on the robot is not the actual one. Its actually about half the speed of the one we will be using. Hope fully we will be able to get that one on ASAP and have promo video within a few days.

[Ian G]

Originally Posted by Barry Bonzack

I must say, integrating a Fisher-Price to a Dirt Devil is very Creative! I was not expecting to see many robots that use suction to pick up the trackball. What is the quickest time your team has been able to drive up to the ball and pick it up? I counted about 7 seconds on the video, but I'm sure you've practiced more since.

Just a suggestion for your video: If you are planning on using it for promotional purposes (and I would highly encourage it), cut the video down to a 30 - 45 second highlight real. Feel free to PM me for suggestions.

Thanks for the advice on videos, we'll keep it in mind for next time.

Right now it is taking too long to harvest the ball. Part of the problem is the vacuum doesn't really give any good visual cues to when it is attached, (we are constructing a sensor system to deal with that). Once that is addressed, the ball postion sensor system is finished, the controls are finalized, and we get more practice, it should go significantly faster.

[santosh]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

I would have never thought at team could create enough suction to pick up a ball. Great job.

Thanks, we thought so too till one of the kids and his parent went out and tried it. The thing is that the compression of the foam allows it to partially fill in the ridges in the nylon helping us make it a lot easier to grab onto the ball.
Good luck to everyone!

[longrange]

We tried to suck, but gave up. You guys really do suck!!!!!

[RMS11]

Good job, but the music wasn't very good. Next time I would recommend something a little more intense. (like Enter Sandman)

[Andrew Y.]

Originally Posted by RMS11

Good job, but the music wasn't very good. Next time I would recommend something a little more intense. (like Enter Sandman)

THANK YOU! I said Sandman was the way to go.....but programmers are stupid...haha JK Ian

[aeasson]

Hey, are you guys really a rookie team? Another question, did some calculations and may be being dense here, but how did you get an arm long enough to reach the ball but also fit within the preliminary constraints?

Very impressive design though and good luck at regionals!

[RMS11]

Our arm is skinny enough to fit inside the two posts. It rotates inside, just above our drive train inside the size requirements. I will try to post a picture tomorrow.

[santosh]

Originally Posted by aeasson

Hey, are you guys really a rookie team? ...
Very impressive design though and good luck at regionals!

Thanks! And yes we are a rookie team. The team is comprised of a couple engineering mentors, a few school teachers and admin., and four college freshman that all participated in FIRST at one point in their high school career. The freshmen in college that are student mentors are from team 1002, 1415, and 2119. We all attend different schools and are from SPSU, Georgia Tech, and Emory.

The students of the team built over 80% of the robot with advising from the student mentors and engineers.

[neutrino15]

Originally Posted by sdcantrell56

We're also shooting the ball and our current prototype is getting about 6.5ft completely vertically and 12 ft when launched at a 45 degree angle

Wait, are you saying that your bot shoots the ball out of the vacuum funnel? Please explain!


And to team 2415, that bot is really cool. If you are having trouble picking it up, maybe build some arms that hold the ball in place? You could also just make it suck harder. Good luck to you all!

[sdcantrell56]

Yes that is what I'm saying. I will post up a video after this saturday of it working because we are still waiting on our finalized funnel. In testing we got over 12ft of horizontal distance.

[cgredalertcc]

We're using a vacuum as well. Is it a single or multiple stage, and how many inches of water can you pull? We have a two stage using the FP without the gear box we can pull almost 26 inches of water, which equates to a little over 1 psi. Based on the surface area of the ball inside our vacuum cup that is close to 100lbs of force on the ball. The ball is immovable when we have it in the cup, its pretty awesome. We'll be posting a video as soon as electrical gets done.... *sigh*

[Andrew Y.]

Originally Posted by santosh

Thanks! And yes we are a rookie team. The team is comprised of a couple engineering mentors, a few school teachers and admin., and four college freshman that all participated in FIRST at one point in their high school career. The freshmen in college that are student mentors are from team 1002, 1415, and 2119. We all attend different schools and are from SPSU, Georgia Tech, and Emory.

The students of the team built over 80% of the robot with advising from the student mentors and engineers.

to add to that we also have team 1311, kell robotics, and their mentor Mr. Barker, who has supported us from the beginning.

[santosh]

Originally Posted by cgredalertcc

We're using a vacuum as well. Is it a single or multiple stage, and how many inches of water can you pull?

Im not sure how many inches of water it can pull but the one in the video has about 100 lbs of force but we geared it on our actually one to have about 200 lbs of force. I myself haven't seen the 200 lb one in action but everyone else tells me that basically our arms have a better chance of giving than the ball does.