I am surprised no one has made a thread for this regional yet (correct me if i am wrong), seeing that it is a first week regional. This will be the first year that 610 has traveled to the New Hampshire regional, and it looks like our Canadian counterparts and 2006 Champions team 296 will be joining us as the two international teams. I remember that there was some controversy last year with the general first week regional blues, hopefully it will be smoother this year. What’s the regional like? How is the venue? Who are the teams to look out for?
First off, we’re glad to see that you’ll be attending the BAE Systems Granite State Regional – welcome!
We’ve enjoyed the fact that multiple Canadian teams have attended in recent years!
There’s always some leve of controversy about rules in the first week regionals, as the referees and teams are seeing how the rules actually play out for the first time. The only significant controversy I recall from last year concerned disqualification of teams that penetrated the restricted space in the low goals when opposing robots pushed them there. However, any controversy is usually handled quickly and fairly since the referee crew at the BAE GSR tends to be amongst the best anywhere, with some very experienced refs.
We think you’re likely to have an awesome time at this regional event. From our perspective, the volunteers at the BAE GSR have always been very friendly, helpful, and eager to ensure that all teams are treated well and fairly. The venue itself features close seating for spectating team members, excellent access between the pits and the field, top-notch professionals in an on-site machine shop that can fabricate almost anything a team might need to repair their robot, a half-court practice area for robots, and a very friendly atmosphere. The announcers are awesome, and the multimedia A/V equipment is second-to-none for FIRST events. The level of excitement and intensity is fantastic!
About the only troubles are that parking near the Verizon Wireless arena can be a bit of a hassle on the weekdays (but even that isn’t a problem if you don’t mind walking a couple blocks) and that the morning waiting area to get in is outside, where it can be bitter cold! (Then again, you might find New Hampshire in March to be downright balmy compared to the weather back home… 
)
As far as the level of competition goes, there are dozens of teams capable of fielding top-notch robots. With over 24 teams at the regional being veterans of 5+ years, 18 teams that have been to the championships two or more times, 15 teams that have been past regional champions, 6 different teams that have earned regional Chairman’s Awards and 2 Championship Chairman’s Award winners, it’s unlikely that any team will have more than one match that doesn’t include one or more powerhouse teams on the opposing alliance! The competition at BAE’s GSR features many teams that have a lot of battle-hardened experience – this isn’t the regional to attend if you are looking for an easy path to bring home a trophy! There’s almost too many powerhouse teams to list but teams that have been regional champions multiple times within the last few years include teams 126, 131, 133, 134, 175, 501, and 549. (Please forgive me if I’ve left anybody out!) Add to that list the 8 other teams that have won regional championships in recent years, and you can count on some very steep competition!
We look forward to meeting you in March, and hope that your team is at their best for the regional!
*(http://www.usfirst.org/frc/map/index.lasso?page=event_teamlist&event=NH)
Is it just me or is rather unusual to have so few rookie teams? But I guess judging by the number of teams at other regionals, they all went to Boston, with a few heading to UTC.*
[quote=“iCurtis”]
*(http://www.usfirst.org/frc/map/index.lasso?page=event_teamlist&event=NH)
Is it just me or is rather unusual to have so few rookie teams?..
*
I agree that it seems very unusual to have so few rookies. However, given the density of teams in Southern New Hampshire, it’s not surprising that there aren’t many local rookies.
I am hoping that there will be still more rookies signing up for the event – even though the tournament is full, space is reserved for rookie teams to attend. Team 2218 only signed up within the past week or so. I think many rookie teams don’t establish their funding sources until December, so it is possible that more rookies might attend that just haven’t yet registered.
However, if more rookies don’t attend the BAE Granite State Regional, it should make it easy for the judges to select the Rookie All Star winner! ;)[/quote]
yo
we sooo would have won that regional last year… we were DQd in the semi’s for a stupid reason, one of our alliance partners [1547 <3] was rammed and their ramp was pushed into a lower goal…
im pretty sure it states in the rules that that is not cause for a DQ
hopefully theyl get their rules figured out this year.
hehe
Team 95 is going to Manchester, like we’ve gone for virtually every year since we started (I think we missed one year). We need to go back, our experience last year at BAE was awful (not any fault of BAE, it was that darn 8.2V bug), and we need to purge the demons.
BTW, we’re probably going to bring a 30 degree plywood ramp so that we (and other robots) can practice ramp climbing.
Who’s gearing up for New England’s first regional of the season? I’ll be coaching for 1276.
Did anyone take a camera to BAE’s robot revealing deal? Or are those teams trying to keep their robots a secret? Last year BAE hosted pictures of it on their site, but this year there is no such gallery. 
On the subject of those doing scouting before the regional, if you’re interested…
1276
4 ft
120 lbs
6wd (all of which are tread covered)
3 speeds (4fps, 10fps, 15fps)
Tube scoring on all levels
Spoiler removal on all levels
Pickup from the floor only
Capable of climbing steep ramps, providing you don’t have have high guide rails on the inside edge
EG
We can climb a ramp like this |_____ |
But not like this || |____| (unless the inside rails are shorter than 1.5")
Ramps and Autonomous: Ask me Friday morning.
I’m assuming you’re talking about Unveiling.
I don’t know about pictures from BAE, but we have a mentor who takes pictures non-stop so I’ll post some of the team’s pictures here. I don’t see a reason to keep robots a secret. If anyone has any serious problems, then just PM me or something and I can get rid of the picture.
I’m assuming this is 134.
1519 (there’s another ramp that was deployed earlier)
That’s what I’ve got. Sorry about the lack of chassis pictures, but our photographer was sitting close to the stage.
I will be there on Friday and Saturday getting footage for The Blue Alliance. Can’t wait!
Chickenman from 229 is coming friday and possiblt saturday, I cant wait, it was my rookie year competition so it should be cool to return to the venue again as my last year on 229
I’d like to take the time to welcome all those that will be traveling to New Hampshire this coming weekend, and to wish you all the best of luck (except against us ) at the BAE GSR.
The BAE GSR has one of the best venues in FIRST (IMHO). Theres not a bad seat in the house. Seating is very close, excellent access to the pits, close to many resturants (if you dont want to pay the consession prices) and close to the hotels. Parking is close by (but a bit expensive). There is a full machine shop available and the machinists there are very good. There is a 1/2 size practice field (sign up early!!!) and a practice driving area.
You will find few regionals with a higher level of play. Most of the powerhouse teams of the northeast will be here (as well as a number of them from around the country), this is a bit offset by the fact that it’s an early regional, so many teams have not been able to work out all the bugs yet.
The weather is generally cold outside (10-20 F) and the wind can blow quite hard (Thursday morning standing in front of the Verizon Wireless Arena gets rather chilly).
Again, Good luck to all.
I will be attending BAE GSR as a spectator, and if all goes according to my timeline we should have some students from our rookie team we’re launching. BAE is always a fantastic competition with top-notch teams and edge of your seat matches. I look forward to enjoying the show!
I’ve got an announcement for the Granite State Regional… Team 166 will be running a scouting database that is open to all teams for both contributions and usage. In other words, we are trying to start a universal scouting database for everybody to use.
Last year, we found that there were wireless networks at GSR, so we made our team’s scouting data available to everybody. This year, we’re trying to take is a step further and make one database for all teams to add scouting data to.
As the scouting lead for Team 166, I came to the conclusion that the data that could be obtained by cooperation among teams offered much greater upside than the benefits of traditional, cuthroat secretive scouting. Mass cooperation will help insure that every match is scouted, and duplicate accounts of the same match will help to cross-check the accounts.
I have attached a copy of the scouting sheet that our team has based the database on. We placed an emphasis on making as many items on the sheet “circle all that applies” responses as possible rather than “fill in the blank” responses. We went through about 5 or 6 iterations before we finally agreed on the current scouting sheet.
On Thursday of the competition, two people from Team 166, Rob (myself), and Zach (the team member who is responsible for programming the database), will come around the pits with paper copies of the scouting sheet and copies of a document on how to use it. We need other teams to help in order to make this experiment into a success. If we can achieve any level of mass cooperation, we can make traditional, every-team-for-itself scouting a thing of the past.
Scouting Sheet Final.doc (39.5 KB)
Scouting Sheet Final.doc (39.5 KB)
Me and the X-Cats drives team are comming down for Saturday to get a feel of what the competition will look like.
This is almost exactly Team 95’s robot (except that two of the six wheels are treaded, the four corner wheels are omni wheels so we can pivot).
We have concepts for making our ramp interferences less of a problem.
is BAE being webcasted? if so where is the link?
I don’t believe it is being web-casted… but I am recording the regional and will be uploading it all to the SOAP archives early next week. I may be wrong, but I don’t remember it being on the webcast schedule.
My team, team 610, will be traveling down to BAE for the first time, joining 296 as the Canadian contingent down there. I think you’ll be seeing alot of the Canadian flag this weekend :p. Here are some specs on our robot:
- 6 wheel drive
- 2 speed AndyMark Gearbox’s
- Turreted arm
- Two joints on the arm, main joint and manipulator joint
- The upper portion of the arm also extends out
- here is a pic:
http://img47.imageshack.us/my.php?image=img0035ch6.jpg
So after a day of watching this game, here are a couple of observations:
With defense, it becomes very difficult to score, and if a robot of the opposing alliance is between you and the end zone, you aren’t getting home. While today seemed promising that high scores would happen (there were several instances of a row of 8), I don’t see that happening tommorow.
Also, there needs to be a ramp graveyard. Several teams removed them. Also, although ramps are few and far between, they are a match swinger, assuming you get robots up them.
No Bumpers?!?! In our row of the pits, which is about 1/3 of the 46 teams at the regional, there are about 3 robots with full bumpers.
Just plain double ramp bots will be at a premium.
This game is all about teamwork. You must work with your alliance partners, and follow your strategy to the end. We scored much better in our practice matches when we had a plan then when all just tried to score as much as possible.
Yeah I was surprised with the number of teams not using bumpers. Free protection, free weight, free stability. It’s also a very easy way of making sure you have numbers on your robot.
There are a couple of ramps, but none of them look really promising. We tried to get up one, but we ran out of time. Teams would seriously have to get back really early on in hopes of getting up a ramp. A forklift design might be different, but ramps definately provide some trouble.
The rack does really swing around. There were many many instances when a team would place a tube on the goal and try to back away without letting go of the tube. The rack proceded to shake violently and I actually did see a couple teams miss putting rings on while the goal while it was swinging.
Not many human players scored on the rack. One of our mentors (who is actually a field resetter for this event) said she counted four tubes scored by human players. One of those was scored by our human player. 
As far as I know, only one team (Buzz 175) was able to score in autonomous.
I saw a couple of very good scorers. I see most of the time between scoring tubes is taken up by actually picking up the tube. It takes some time to line up, actually grab it, and all that.
That’s my overview of just what happened during practice matches.
Any robot pictures taken today that you can upload?