Galileo 2009

[Ryan Dognaux]

Originally Posted by Kyle Love

Did any of you also notice this?

I'll echo Kyle's curiosity on this. Both 1646 & 461 had communication issues when we were in the Blue 1 player station spot. The robot would become unresponsive for about 10 seconds and then would become responsive again and act normally. This happened in our match against 25 and 179 at the start and end of the match seen here.

After checking the robot, everything was fine and we never had the problem again but I seemed to notice other times when it looked like the same thing was happening to other teams.

[Wayne C.]

Originally Posted by Ryan Dognaux

I'll echo Kyle's curiosity on this. Both 1646 & 461 had communication issues when we were in the Blue 1 player station spot. The robot would become unresponsive for about 10 seconds and then would become responsive again and act normally. This happened in our match against 25 and 179 at the start and end of the match seen here.

After checking the robot, everything was fine and we never had the problem again but I seemed to notice other times when it looked like the same thing was happening to other teams.

Looking at the video it almost looks like the contact jarred a connection somewhere. It eventually reset?

WC

[The Cyborg]

Congratulations to 111, 67, and 971 for being national champs. Your alliance was incredible to watch.

I also want to give my deepest thanks teams 71 and 987 for choosing us (65) as an alliance partner. Even though we didn't get very far, I felt that it was a high honor to work with the legendary Beast.

I did notice that there were lots of field issues on our division. I know of a couple of matches that had to be restarted, and there were sometimes long pauses between matches.

[rspurlin]

Originally Posted by Kyle Love

I have a couple thoughts.

A huge congrats to 111, 67 and 971, you guys performed great all competition long and were truly the best alliance there.

Second, maybe not so cheerful comment.
For teams who competed on Galileo, did you notice that the blue alliance station seemed to lose communication throughout the weekend? At first I thought "oh we must have something loose", but after hearing of it happening to team after team, I raised an eyebrow. Did any of you also notice this?

First let me echo the congrats, not only to our division champions, shortly thereafter world champions, but to all the teams that competed on Galileo. It was an honor to work this field for the week.

Your scorekeeper team kept records of the match turns as well as records of which robots had issues. We did not see a pattern that followed one alliance station or either alliance. We did see that certain teams consistently had trouble with their robots, regardless of which alliance or station position they were assigned. This normally indicates the problem is on the robot side instead of the field side. I was watching the status displays most of the time and often knew there was a problem before the team did. In such instances we alerted the FTA and FTAA to try to see if they could identify and correct the problem. Most often the radio links would drop at the same time as a robot suffered a collision. I did notice that the robots having the most trouble syncing with the field tended to have the radio buried inside the robot. Metal can interfere with radio reception, as can large motors and their magnetic fields. We also had chat open to the NI booth and would alert them to check out robots we thought might need an experienced eye to find a subtle or hidden issue.

In 101 qualification matches we aborted two matches during play, one because an E-stop was hit when it should not have been. One other was replayed when multiple teams showed simultaneous communication issues during the match, leading us to believe that there could have been a field fault. There were many times when I'd see robots stop moving, yet status indicators would show no problems. Sometimes we could see parts of the robot moving (like an intake roller) but no drive capability. Draw your own conclusion as to where the problem resides. Perhaps that seems to some as if there were massive field problems, but having weathered many seasons at FIRST, it seemed everything ran pretty smoothly to me. Overall, we cycled qualification matches every 6 minutes and 16 seconds.

If someone has some evidence of a problem I missed, I'd sure like to pass it back up the chain to improve future competitions.

[engunneer]

Originally Posted by Zyik

There's some pictures of Raptor on CD. They aren't the most up to date though, as we changed things up a little and gave it a hopper. This made it even more dangerous to get cornered by.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/33501
is one photo.

That photo doesn't show the damage to the right front vertical support that 973 sustained in elims. It was fun working with the raptor. We had a good shot at finals and didn't quite make it. Also thanks to 25 for rounding out alliance #2.

I haven't gone through them yet, but i may have some good photos of 973 and 25 to hand over. PM me an email address if you want Galileo elim pictures.

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by engunneer

That photo doesn't show the damage to the right front vertical support that 973 sustained in elims. It was fun working with the raptor. We had a good shot at finals and didn't quite make it. Also thanks to 25 for rounding out alliance #2.

I haven't gone through them yet, but i may have some good photos of 973 and 25 to hand over. PM me an email address if you want Galileo elim pictures.

It also shows our pre-champ configuration.

The upper conveyor belts were removed, resulting in never storing balls in conveyor runs, and a dumping roller that was geared ridiculously fast.

I'll PM you an email, thanks for the pics.

And about that support, we were debating not even putting it in (we were sooooo close on weight).... but later decided to just to take the hit. Well, I can say we're glad we did.

[fritzdejongh]

Originally Posted by rspurlin

If someone has some evidence of a problem I missed, I'd sure like to pass it back up the chain to improve future competitions.

Our rookie team had a blast in the Galileo division. It was great to have them compete against Wildstang in their first qual match, get beaten, and then watch Wildstang and their alliance win the whole thing.

One disappointment was also for us when the robot didn't move at all in a match, even though it had communication with the field. It only happened once the whole season, and we couldn't find any problem with our robot afterward. I talked with 1646 (I think) and it happened to them twice and they couldn't find any cause either.

One of our coaches was talking with a veteran team who apparently knew about a bug where if you turn on the robot before the DS had booted that there's a race condition that can occasionally result in this symptom. If true, it might be what happened to us. Normally we turn on the DS first, but there was time pressure to get the bots going for that match, and someone might have turned the bot on early. It fits better than any other theory I have. It could also explain why the problem occurred more for some teams: They might just be in the habit of turning their robot on early.

I can't find any info or posts about this though. Does anyone know about it? Is it really a problem? Is there a source of info us rookies should learn about?

I know this isn't really a field issue, and the fields did work amazingly well. It would have been nice to know that we have to be careful about this problem, and for the field managers to know as well (if true), so that they don't urge the kids to turn their bots on without being sure the DS is on.

In any case, we'll have a more strict turn-on procedure next year!

[Adam Freeman]

I just wanted to say it was great competing in Galileo this year. 67 was happy to represent the division, and we are glad that that we were able to help bring the Championship back to Galileo for a second season.

Thank you to all the teams that we alligned with throught the weekend.

It was great to meet all the new people I talked to. Especially talking with Shawn from 25, Andy Baker, Adam from 973, and Amir from 1717.

1717: I really admired your robot and your team. I was watching you guys work on autonomous modes on the practice field and the intensity and urgency that was displayed was incredible. For such a great robot, you guys were hustling around like crazy. It put a smile on my face to see how hard you were working to continue to improve. It was great to discuss game strategy with you. I wish we had a chance to play with you in a match, just to see how it would have gone. Maybe next year......

To everyone on 111 thank you for picking us and allowing us to have some input on the alliance selection list and strategy. You guys have an amazing team. It was a pleasure to coach with Raul and work with one of the best in FIRST. Your robot is amazing and your game play strategy is incredible.

To 971, you have a great robot. It started out rough for you in your first match, but you kept competing and working hard and we definitely noticed. There was no way that I expected you to be there at the end of the draft. I also had you guys in my pre-championship top 5, and you proved that observation correct in the end. Great job!

I am not sure we have had as smooth of matches this season, as we did this weekend. That is a credit to the great teamwork that we experienced during all of our matches together.

Thank you all for a great weekend!

Adam

[Mike Soukup]

Originally Posted by Adam Freeman

To everyone on 111 thank you for picking us and allowing us to have some input on the alliance selection list and strategy. You guys have an amazing team. It was a pleasure to coach with Raul and work with one of the best in FIRST. Your robot is amazing and your game play strategy is incredible.

How could we not pick the most dominant team during the regional season? Your robot lived up to its expectations on Galileo, so it was an easy decision. I'm glad you and your scouting team gave us input on the alliance selection list, it helped a bunch to hear another team's opinions of who they thought was good and why. It was also a huge benefit to have to justify why we wanted team X over team Y, it really made us think. The give & take between the two teams to come up with the final list helped make it better.

[Thelilpluck461]

I'm glad that the world champs could come out of Galileo! Congrats to all teams it was a lot of fun.

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by Akash Rastogi

This just made me Lol. XD If we were that partner....I don't think that alliance would've made it past QFs lol.

anyone have close up pics of 973's Raptor, that thing was such a beast, I only got distanced fuzzy shots of it in action. Thanks.

Pat Fairbank took a whole bunch of pics, and here's a decent one as we were configured at champs.

http://picasaweb.google.com/patfair/...34360290482482

[waialua359]

I agree with some of the last few posts that:
Something was up with driver station blue 1. Our robot kept losing communication on practice day both times we were in that position on the field, and then occasional resets.

And I was most impressed by 1717. Personally, I thought they had the best robot. Its ability to score was very consistent.
67 and/or 111 would have done equally well had 1717 been their alliance partner instead throughout the weekend. As a team started in 2006? they are a seasoned veteran presence.

[delsaner]

Originally Posted by smurfgirl

Do you have a suggestion as to which team it might be?

I'm kinda biased, but I'd really like to see 236 win... so I'm rooting for Curie.

Excellent Prediction.

[Nica F.]

Originally Posted by waialua359

As a team started in 2006? they are a seasoned veteran presence.

Just confirmed with the FIRST site, and they were started in 2006. I agree with you completely with them having that presence. Every year I was able to see their robot at the Los Angeles Regional I was never less than impressed.

In addition, it was really great to see so many teams from California perform so well. Usually many can only name 330, 254, 968 when asked to name "great" teams from CA when there is so much potential elsewhere as well. 971, 1717, 973, & 207 all put up a tough fight in eliminations, hats off to you.

[smurfgirl]

Originally Posted by delsaner

Excellent Prediction.

It was coming one of these days. (: I'm really happy for them!