2009 Peachtree Regional

[RMS11]

Originally Posted by Tom Bishop

It seems pretty clear that the WiredCats problem was with the main breaker, and Flash's too. But to have so many go out at once seems unlikely; not impossible, but unlikely. We have had main breakers go out before, but on older robots that have retired from competition. Never had one go out during a competition that I can remember. But I plan on bringing a spare to Championships

I can't remember an elims round where so many robots didn't work at some point in a round. Our alliance had problems, #1 had problems, seems like others did as well. I wonder if there's an issue with this batch of main breakers? Or maybe just an issue with teams getting excited and forgetting the basics

Our breaker might have been from last years bot for some reason... I am about 90% sure it was.

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Let's move the breaker discussion over to electrical. See you there.

[joshsmithers]

I believe what I'm about to say should be relevant to Peachtree, but this may have occurred elsewhere as well.

In SF 1-2, our robot would drive. More specifically, our pick-up and dumping mechanisms functioned the entire match, but our drive motors never did. There is no way to know whether or not the Jaguars driving the two cims were getting a signal, but I doubt it. The jags were connected properly before and immediately after the match, when I checked. Back at the pit (after we lost), we immediately tethered and drove the robot. It operated flawlessly. Our team has mixed feelings about why this happened, but I believe it was a field issue. However, it was only the drive motors (which plug into to pwms 1 and 2, so maybe the signal for those weren't getting there?!?!).

Did any other teams have issues with their robot mysteriously work only partially? This has really been bugging me...

[PlatyPi Gunner]

we did actually in qf-2 i think as well as the 2nd match before eliminations. It only occurred when we were on the blue side, blue 3 to be more specific. Also, our shooters were the only thing that worked as well, me managed to score like 3 balls on a robot that got too close. They blamed our drivers station, and gave us a new one

[joshsmithers]

After discussing this a little more with the team, one mentor recalled 1319 not working in the finals, match 1; can anyone confirm or disprove this? I know for sure that 590 wasn't working in finals, match two.

Originally Posted by Zflash

EDIT: Also are alliance partner 590s robot stopped working in the last final match, we assumed it too was a bad 120A cb, however I am not sure if any of 590s members confirmed it.

Everytime this happened, it was on the blue side of the field. Coincidence?

DISCLAIMER: I'm not trying to blame the field or complain about the results of the matches, I am just trying to figure out what exactly went wrong.

PS- 2655, I heard your team is coming up to Hillsborough for THOR in June. Is this true? (I hope so.)

[Jimmy K]

Originally Posted by joshsmithers

After discussing this a little more with the team, one mentor recalled 1319 not working in the finals, match 1; can anyone confirm or disprove this?

Yes, I also saw Flash's robot not work. This has already been discussed. See posts #116, $119, and #121 in this thread, and the main circuit breaker thread in the Electrical Forum.

[cziggy343]

Originally Posted by joshsmithers

Everytime this happened, it was on the blue side of the field. Coincidence?

nope, b/c in the semi-finals when they didn't work, they were red

[joshsmithers]

Originally Posted by cziggy343

nope, b/c in the semi-finals when they didn't work, they were red

Yay, even worse.

[PlatyPi Gunner]

We were down a robot too in the first final, and part of our conveyor had snapped off by the second. kinda off topic, but it confused me to why 1746 didn't call a timeout when their bot was on the fritz

Originally Posted by joshsmithers

PS- 2655, I heard your team is coming up to Hillsborough for THOR in June. Is this true? (I hope so.)

as for that, I personally have no idea what it is, but I'll look into it and get back to you

[Zflash]

Originally Posted by PlatyPi Gunner

We were down a robot too in the first final, and part of our conveyor had snapped off by the second. kinda off topic, but it confused me to why 1746 didn't call a timeout when their bot was on the fritz



as for that, I personally have no idea what it is, but I'll look into it and get back to you

Since you brought it up I was confused as to why they did not shut your robot off when your conveyor belt was dragging on the floor and made you go outside the size constraints.

Anybody?

[rfolea]

Originally Posted by PlatyPi Gunner

.. it confused me to why 1746 didn't call a timeout when their bot was on the fritz

We didn't know we had a problem until it was too late....

For the record, the actual sequence of events was:

1. Broke a chain. Still not sure why.
One group thinks we simply lost a master link
The other group thinks our chains had a lot of slack
in them and a hit at just the right time got one cocked
wrong on a sprocket. That coupled with the fact that
it was really crappy chain -> bye-bye.

2. Threw a chain - The previous mishap really messed things
up so now the chain was loose enough to come off by itself
Quickly added a chain tensioner to take up slack

3. Loose wire. Probably knocked loose during previous repairs.
Broke free right at the start of the match. Ugh.

It's hard to overcome 3 catastrophic failures in a row ...

While we were "Undefeated" through the quals, we really can't
take credit for it. We had an unbelievable amount of good
fortune. Geez .. the first match our guys forgot to plug
the bridge ethernet cable in, but because they had the Team light
wired wrong, no one could tell ... Special thanks to 1533 and 1304
for winning that one - boy was that embarrassing!

The kids were crushed for loosing the finals for such crazy reasons,
not only for us, but also for 1771 who REALLY deserved to be there ...

We also want to thank 547 - they were awesome - did everything
we asked them to do and were very gracious about the whole thing.
If you ever need a partner, check these guys out - they are great!

We learned a lot at Peachtree, rest assured those lessons will be
addressed for Palmetto. We can't wait!

See you in a couple days!

[Andrew Y.]

Originally Posted by rfolea

We didn't know we had a problem until it was too late....

For the record, the actual sequence of events was:

1. Broke a chain. Still not sure why.
One group thinks we simply lost a master link
The other group thinks our chains had a lot of slack
in them and a hit at just the right time got one cocked
wrong on a sprocket. That coupled with the fact that
it was really crappy chain -> bye-bye.

2. Threw a chain - The previous mishap really messed things
up so now the chain was loose enough to come off by itself
Quickly added a chain tensioner to take up slack

3. Loose wire. Probably knocked loose during previous repairs.
Broke free right at the start of the match. Ugh.

It's hard to overcome 3 catastrophic failures in a row ...

While we were "Undefeated" through the quals, we really can't
take credit for it. We had an unbelievable amount of good
fortune. Geez .. the first match our guys forgot to plug
the bridge ethernet cable in, but because they had the Team light
wired wrong, no one could tell ... Special thanks to 1533 and 1304
for winning that one - boy was that embarrassing!

The kids were crushed for loosing the finals for such crazy reasons,
not only for us, but also for 1771 who REALLY deserved to be there ...

We also want to thank 547 - they were awesome - did everything
we asked them to do and were very gracious about the whole thing.
If you ever need a partner, check these guys out - they are great!

We learned a lot at Peachtree, rest assured those lessons will be
addressed for Palmetto. We can't wait!

See you in a couple days!

thats not too bad...few years ago santosh and i went on the field and was scratching our heads on why nothing worked...we forgot to reinstall the robot controller....now THATS EMBARRASSING

but...
fortunately for us we had all our problems during the qualifiers.

[PlatyPi Gunner]

we were undefeated the first day, but our whole 2nd day of qualifiers was a big disaster, first off our wiring on our compressor was loose, so we could pick up the moon rocks, but not shoot them. 2nd match, we apparently had a driver's station problem so we didn't work then. third match 1746, 1319 and co. just wrecked us. then the second elimination round we didn't work again, but we got a different thingamajig, which seemed to work. after that we didn't have any problems until one of our bands snapped in the finals.

ps. chains are the devil

[Doc Wu]

Does anyone know why the standings page on the usfirst.org page for the Peachtree Regional is empty? Does anyone have this information?

The other pages - match results, awards, etc. - are there. Only that is missing.

I want to parse this data for statistical use. This is the only page I'm missing.

[Jimmy K]

Originally Posted by PlatyPi Gunner

2nd match, we apparently had a driver's station problem so we didn't work then. third match 1746, 1319 and co. just wrecked us.

Actually, you have those switched. I remember as our alliance reaped the benefits of the malfunction, scored a supercell on ourselves, and still got the <G14> (but only for doubling not tripling). (http://www.thebluealliance.net/tbatv/team/2655)

Originally Posted by Doc Wu

Does anyone know why the standings page on the usfirst.org page for the Peachtree Regional is empty? Does anyone have this information?

The Blue Alliance has all of the match scores. If you click on a team, you can see their overall record as well as their record at Peachtree. This is really inefficient, but it is a method of retrieving those stats if you really want them.