12-02-2005 12:56

Koko Ed

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

Was the space donated to you or did you have to rent the space? Was it at full price or at a discount?

12-02-2005 13:00

tkwetzel

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

The picture description seems to indicate that it was donated to them. That is a nice display area with a lot of exposure.

12-02-2005 13:16

Greg Perkins

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

Has anyone watched the show "overhauled" on TLC? this is kinda an idea i had that just came into my mind....they built a mustang in front of a live audience..

soooo, what if some team was able to accquire a mall lot, and be able to design, build, and test their robot in front of a live audience! have video's running during the first part of the build season while designs are developing and during the construction phase audiences will be able to see what goes on in makine FIRST such a challenging program.

I know this is just a rough idea, but what do you all think?

12-02-2005 13:28

tkwetzel

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

That sounds like an excellent idea. A couple more questions about the display:
Is your display always open when the mall is open and if so, is there always someone there to look over it and answer questions? Do you need to have someone there while it is open and what hours is it open if so?

12-02-2005 13:34

Greg Perkins

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

Mall's are open what, from like 7-10?

so your team has a display until the classes get out during the week, then go to the mall, and start their work.

this would be generally be a big weekend ordeal, having build run almost all day...

of course if anybody decided to try this, much more planning would be involved!
good luck folks

12-02-2005 18:52

Cyberguy34000

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

The mall donated a really nice back room for us to use as this year's build site. When the store front in front of us moved out they let us use it as advertising space for our team and FIRST robotics. We meet 6-9 Mon- Fri, and 10-6 on Sat. Whenever we're here the display is open to the public. We usually have 2-3 people working the display at a time, helping answer people's questions, and making sure no one walks off with our bot .

The display has only been open for a few days but thanks to the amazing exposer that we're getting but it's been an incredible success so far. We've already had 6 students who really want to join next year, 4 people who were very interested in mentoring, several people who wanted to start Lego leagues at their schools, and even a few people wanted to sponsor us. Overall people have really enjoyed coming through our booth and many have come multiple times. Sometimes we let them look at the build site in the back room which usually gets them pretty excited. Many of the people that come by want to go to the local regional competition in Denver.

It's been a very successful, and in a week or two we might have a demo in the main section of the mall. That'll be fun Anyways, I'll be posting some more pictures soon, so until then, any more questions/comments?

13-02-2005 10:27

dlavery

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

Excellent idea! If there are several teams in an area, I would imagine that it would be even more fun - and a more attractive idea to the mall management - if three or four teams were all building their robots in the display area at the same time. The teams could "compete" to get the builds completed (which would add to the appeal for the "audience" of shoppers that would watch from the mall). But at the same time they could help each other during the build. In the past, there are several instances when teams worked together to form "meta-teams" that would share basic knowledge, techniques, fabrication abilities and strategies while still working on competing final designs (and no, I am not just talking about 254 and 60 last year - there were many others that did this in earlier years). This would be a great opportunity to form a meta-team and have them work together.

-dave

18-04-2005 12:12

the_short1

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

.. yea kinda like at the toronto regional. .. . 1680.. . 1620.. 1114 i believe it was. .(not 100% shure on team numbers anymore.. but their were these 3 robotics they all had pertty much identical drive systems .. and they all shared the same programming code.. and they only lived like 20minutes away from each other so they would help each other fabricate parts..

it was really cool how they shared each others resources and still managed to build 3 unique.. yet similiar robots. . .it was REALLY cool. .

18-04-2005 12:22

dez250

Re: pic: Team 662 Mall Display

That would be FRC Teams 1114, 1503 and 1680 Who consist the group NiagaraFirst.org