pic: T3 Controlls (team 68 truck town thunder)

[Alexander McGee]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

The tether cable powers the OI. If you're tethered to a live robot, you're powered.

Yes, however, for robot demonstrations, you require an ac adaptor to run the robot without a thether. We no longer need to have the controlls plugged in while doing demos. This means that we can drive the bot at parades much easier.

[Karthik]

Originally Posted by jacob_dilles

i betcha the catalac engeneers had fun with that one. maybe you should let the kids do some work, eh?

I'm far too tired to deal with an issue that has been discussed on these forums far too many times. Let me briefly sum things up.

1. Please don't make assumptions about the student to engineer contribution ratio on a given team. Unless you're on the team or closely associated with them, you can't possibly know.

2. FIRST allows teams to set their own guidelines on how much engineer contribution takes place. Just because your team may be more student driven doesn't mean that every team should be that way. By all means take pride in your own team's setup, but don't knock other teams because they aren't like yours.

3. The 'I' in FIRST stands for inspiration. That control box is definitely inspirational, no matter who it was built by.

4. Finally, there is no 't' in Cadillac.

Every year I'm impressed by Truck Town (and a little afraid). Keep up the amazing work.

[Gadget470]

The debate has been said many times. The conclusion is:

Engineers shouldn't touch robots
Students shouldn't touch robots
Engineers should help out students
Students should help out the engineers

All are the True. But who's truth's is the question.

This thread doesn't need to start this debate again.

[The Lucas]

As someone who has made their share of OI panels, I would like to congratulate you on your fine workmanship. A couple questions:

Is it made out of Chrome and Diamond Plate?
How wide is it? (looks wider than any I've ever seen but that may be an optical illusion)
What are you using to power the blue LEDs?

[Alexander McGee]

Originally Posted by The Lucas

Is it made out of Chrome and Diamond Plate?
How wide is it? (looks wider than any I've ever seen but that may be an optical illusion)
What are you using to power the blue LEDs?

And allow me to clear a few things up. Thanks for the support all, this was built by students. Three of us, to be exact. Our Job, chassis, is done, so we decided to do a little something extra.

As for the Cadillac emblems, yes they are readily available. Brendan, Mike, and I went our and shaved a couple of escalades. GM rips these (and many many others) trucks apart, re-designs, and throws most of it away. So, we can basically take whatever we need to make the robot look really cool. If it is in the scrap bins.

As for the specifics on the board, the dimensions are as follows: 48”x9”x2.5”. It is made out of two plates of 1/8” aluminum, and supports of 1” stock T6 square tubing. The side panels are, in fact, diamond-plate aluminum. The grill is round aluminum stock. There’s no chrome.

As for the blue neons and LED bars, they are powered by a bosch battery pack (a drill housing).

I thank everyone, once again, for their comments and support. Can’t wait to see what everyone has come up with!

[Adam Krajewski]

Originally Posted by jacob_dilles

i betcha the catalac engeneers had fun with that one. maybe you should let the kids do some work, eh?

Our team has two electrical/controls/programming mentors. I was the one that helped with the controls board. I told the students not to make it too heavy and not to make it too complex. As you can see, they listened to my recommendations.
Other than that, I didn't touch it. Please remember that what you say is not only a reflection of yourself, but also your team.

[J Flex 188]

beauty job.

im sure the students has as much fun building it as everyone else has had at looking at and drooling over it =D

[KenWittlief]

wow, you are the 1st team I have seen that could use their control system to chock their wheels, or to ramp their Segway up onto their truck :c)