2007 Silicon Valley Regional

[rachal]

SVR is personally my favorite regional, but we registered too late this year to make it

Some of us are dropping in on Saturday anyways, just to see the action.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by yodameister

If you want to go to SF, I would take the team down Lombard street, go to the Golden gate bridge, and go to the Exploratorium (this is a great hands-on activity science center). I took my team there last year and it was a big success.

We have to rely on public transportation while we are there and it seems like those things are all reasonably spread apart, so we didn't expect to see all of them. I want to see the trolley museum and Fisherman's Wharf; maybe Ghirardelli Square, too. A lot of the kids on the team want to go to Chinatown, so we'll probably spend some great amount of time there, too.

[yodameister]

Originally Posted by M. Krass

We have to rely on public transportation while we are there and it seems like those things are all reasonably spread apart, so we didn't expect to see all of them. I want to see the trolley museum and Fisherman's Wharf; maybe Ghirardelli Square, too. A lot of the kids on the team want to go to Chinatown, so we'll probably spend some great amount of time there, too.

If you are relying on public transportation, try the BART system. It will take you from (at least Fremont, its been a while since I've taken BART, it may go further south than that now) to downtown SF. It is similar to the MARTA system in Atlanta.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by yodameister

If you are relying on public transportation, try the BART system. It will take you from (at least Fremont, its been a while since I've taken BART, it may go further south than that now) to downtown SF. It is similar to the MARTA system in Atlanta.

BART doesn't go as far south as San Jose, so we're planning on taking CalTrans up to the city, but we'll be reliant on public transit for getting around there as well. We're all used to public transportation since most of us use it pretty regularly to get around up here in Seattle (I don't even have a car), but the city's a lot bigger and we're not as intimately familiar with it, so we're trying to find an area that has a lot to offer and sticking around there.

[Sean.Conway]

Team 987 is all ready to go!

[burkechrs1]

Well with SVR only 2ish days away I must say I'm pretty excited. This is by far our best robot yet and last year we did pretty well losing in the finals. I know there is already a thread about SVR but it contains some off topic posts.

So I want to know from teams that are going to be there, what do you guys expect to see? Also, lets make this the official SVR update thread. Good luck to everyone that's going. I will see you all thursday.


Chris
Team 668
Driver

[Michael Corsetto]

I'm predicting SVR to be one of the most ringer intensive regionals this season. I've been "spying" on a bunch of the websites of teams that are going and I see a LOT of arm bot, and not so many ramp bots, which makes me nervous. I think the "west coast" arm is going to be a consistent theme from what I've seen, even though our arm is nothing like it

It's going to be a fun regional, and I expect the action to pick up a lot from Thursday to Saturday, since to my knowledge only 7 of the 48 teams have had previous regional experience (114, 190, 192, 254, 488, 1070 and 1700)

Good luck every, I can't wait!

Mike C.

[Guy Davidson]

SVR will be a fun, scoring intensive regional. PALY Robotics is really looking forwards towards unleashing Thor for the first time, and see how our arm holds up with the rest.

Mike, what exactly is the "west coast" arm? I've heard of the West Coast Offense before, but not west coast arm.

-Guy

[Michael Corsetto]

Originally Posted by sumadin

Mike, what exactly is the "west coast" arm? I've heard of the West Coast Offense before, but not west coast arm.

-Guy

For west coast arm: see team 60/254 in 04 and 254/22 in 05, i believe 60 did it even earlier that 04 but I haven't personally seen it. I could link to 4 other teams who are making "west coast arms" this year, but I'll let you find those on your own

Only 2 days left!

Mike C.

[Bill Gold]

Originally Posted by sumadin

Mike, what exactly is the "west coast" arm? I've heard of the West Coast Offense before, but not west coast arm.

I don't mean to totally derail this thread, but here are some pictures of the evolution of the "west coast" arm.

2000:
http://www.firstrobotics.net/00galle.../060-1_jpg.htm

2001:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/12758
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/12759

2004:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/16914
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/19859
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/17228

2005:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/20479

It feels like only yesterday...

[Arille]

Coming from one of the regional's 5 rookie teams, team 2135 is diving into the competition head-first. Most of us do not really know what to expect at all, but we're game for whatever's to come! I, personally, am excited to meet all of the other teams competing

We have a few things left to correct on our 'bot (wire gauges, etc. etc.), so hopefully we will finish in time for inspection.

For those going to SVR, look around for our team! Team 2135 Presentation Invasion

[Lavapicker]

Team 2024 is coming over from Hilo Hawaii with a two-bot lifter. Very unique design...you just have to drive up four to six inches into a tray and we pull you up the rest of the way up like a tow-truck on either side of us. We then pull the whole side up and use kickstands to stop the backdrive. Worked well on some bots we used several years ago but we'll see when we get there how it works on you folks! We've missed FIRST the last three years so we're coming in as a rookie with distant memories of how it all goes!

Aloha,

[Fred Sayre]

Team 488 is looking forward to bettering our PNW performance



2 robots @ 12"

We have very large low profile ramps that are really easy to drive onto that lift independently and without the need for continuous power.

[Guy Davidson]

That looks pretty awesome. Hopefully we'll get a chance to test it for ourselves.

[115inventorsam]

Originally Posted by fsayre

Team 488 is looking forward to bettering our PNW performance

We have very large low profile ramps that are really easy to drive onto that lift independently and without the need for continuous power.

Among all the ramp bots I've seen, I say this one is definitely my favorite. I'm sure you can back up your performance at PNW pretty easily.

This will be my first ever regional, I won't be there on Thursday, but I'll be all pumped up for Friday and Saturday.

If you want to see 115's bot, it's on the MVRT website's frontpage(as a rookie, not sure if this is indeed what you call a west coast arm)