http://www.usfirst.org/uploadedImages/Community/FRC/Game_and_Season__Info/2010_Assets/1st%20Clue.jpg
This is real, not a prank from Greg. http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc/content.aspx?id=16075.
OK, now the fun starts…
http://usfirst.org/uploadedImages/Community/FRC/Game_and_Season__Info/2010_Assets/1st%20Clue.jpg
This is the first actual hint released today on Bill’s Blog and the usfirst.org website.
Field element? New trailer hitch? How am i going to build that out of pvc?
"Good Morning Teams,
I wish you a happy winter holiday of your choice. FIRST will be closed Friday, December25th returning Monday, December 28th
The FRC Season News and Email Blast page now has its own RSS feed.
A game hint should appear on the FRC landing page of the usfirst.org website today….
16 days until the 2010 Kickoff
See you there! "
The link was broke when I try, but I will assume the above pic is legit…
its a telescoping platform of sorts?.. at least its just telescoping…
http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc/content.aspx?id=16075
It looks like it’s only one of a series of these parts.
If multiples of these stack together maybe our robots have to do office filing or parts warehousing:ahh:
Maybe we stack little robot partners on these shelves…
The link is dead, but the game hint is viewable on the FRC landing page on http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc/
Hmmm…
The hint image is an original image, not found anywhere else on the internet based on a TinEye search.
It looks like a multipositioning step of some sorts. Possibly the field this year will have a wall that will vary in height randomly?
EDIT:
Also, since it is listed as “1st Clue.jpg” we might be in for some more clues closer to kickoff.
The design of the piece suggests that it wouldn’t be robust enough to be a field piece, in my opinion.
It’s a set of support parts that telescope.
And with the reflections it’s not on water its ON ICE!!
It’s an ICE ski support with the rest of the ski to be attached.
WE ARE ON THE ICE! Woo roboteers, start your skate machines!
It connects to something in the field as the Overpass did in Overdrive. if you look at the smoked lexan, you can see a reflection of a pole (not the two poles visible to us) But a pole with 2 visible pegs. Those could be connections for other pieces? A field element?
Its obviously a render of the field, or more than just this part, they just moved the background plane during the render.
I’ll throw stuff out there. I already said a field connection part. So something structural. It could also be an autoloader for some piece. A ball or something, Part, Box, Playing element, that the robots could get at and it would always be filled (by a volunteer!) from 2005.
Thoughts??
My first thought was that it looks like some sort of yoke, but that seems too similar to last years idea with the trailers. Unless, this year you attach and reattach trailers…
I don’t see how it would be adjustable. There are two pins on either sides that snap into other tubes, but those holes in the center are for attaching the plastic piece, not for sliding, right?
Docking mechanism?
Maybe that a futuristic hoop because FIRST is doing a techno update on Croquet.
More discussion over here:
It looks more to me like two parallel bars with stops at either end, then another set of tubes that slide over the parallel bars from one stop to the other (there is a small ledge on the pole beyond the center piece that suggests it is not really a telescoping piece)
The mechanism in the picture looks adjustable, kind of in the same way that a hurdle can be adjusted… Maybe the robots will have the task of changing the height of the mechanism?? Who knows…
Perhaps the piece that slides over it just isn’t pictured.
It might be a field piece, but it would have to be something attached to the robot side. Again, it just doesn’t seem substantial enough (thick enough) or has proper fasteners to be a stationary (permanent) field piece.
It’s shown in a horizontal position, maybe we should think of it as a vertical piece of some sort, say a tower? Maybe this is the game piece, you have to make a tower of this and use the Lexan part as some sort of shelf to hang something off of or put something on.
The center (outer) poles look like they slide over the longer inner poles and stop at the pins at either end. On the render, there is a little ledge on the poles that suggests that the inner pole extends the entire length of the image, and that the larger diameter pole is actually shorter than at first glance. I still don’t ahve a clue as to what it does, though.