Tips to make your robot look good.

[fordchrist675]

Also a designed layout for electronics condensing and organizing helps make it look professional and efficient. It may be tedious but its well worth it.

[Vermeulen]

Added bonus to having a nice and tidy electrical board: it takes way less time to pull the electrical stuff, or to fix a problem. It once took me 10 minutes to pull our electrical board while testing, with two people helping me look for wires. Also, try to go away from the "box on wheels" design that many teams are guilty of (mine included). It doesn't even need to be a fancy cnc-milled one-piece aluminum shell. For example, the top section of 2194's robot this year was made out of die-cut cardboard with a design printed on one side.

[artdutra04]

It's all about the small details.

[VanMan]

I prefer the robots that look like they were made with hardly any time or funding. If the robot doesn't look good, people don't expect much and when it does well, people will be more impressed. With powder coated and nice looking robots, people mentally expect them to do better and if they don't preform well, people will be surprised. That's just my opinion. And I don't have any advice on how to make a robot look nice. All of the robots that I've built with my team in the past have looked only half decent although most preformed above average.

[BJC]

I think that you will find that teams that consistanty have a good looking robot also have a good brand image. For instance many teams have unique colors that they use on their robot every year. These team's robots are often able to be recognized from a long way off because of their uniqueness.

For example, if you were to put my own team 33's robot is a gigantic line along side of every other team in the world. Most people who knew our name, the killer bees, would be able to walk down that line and clearly distinguish our robot from all the others because our robot is covered in yellow honeycomb every year.

Just food for thought

[Andy L]

Originally Posted by =Martin=Taylor=

Carefully design your robot in CAD.

Then: poorly machine the parts (make sure to drill a lot of unnecessary holes). Do a terrible job welding (the key here is to make sure nothing comes out 90*, while maximizing burnthrough and blobbyness). Duct Tape. Use it wherever possible. When wiring, make sure to use as much wire as possible and tie it in great nots all over the bot.

...Then cover everything in plastic panels so no one notices


What? You think I'm joking?

I laughed for a good three minutes, because it's completely true

[VanMan]

Originally Posted by BJC

I think that you will find that teams that consistanty have a good looking robot also have a good brand image. For instance many teams have unique colors that they use on their robot every year. These team's robots are often able to be recognized from a long way off because of their uniqueness.

For example, if you were to put my own team 33's robot is a gigantic line along side of every other team in the world. Most people who knew our name, the killer bees, would be able to walk down that line and clearly distinguish our robot from all the others because our robot is covered in yellow honeycomb every year.

Just food for thought

I agree with this. The alliance colored bumpers really changed that this year though. If a team has a specific color scheme and it doesn't really go well with red or blue, then it changes robot appearance a bit.