267’s robot for the 2001 game is one of the most innovative robots I’ve seen!
Ok, I’ll bite. How did this thing trigger its flopping down? Are the back wheels (treads?) touching when it was in starting config?
What powered the arm? The 2 pneumatic cylinders?
How much did the goals weigh?
This is so cool - I was about to upload some 2001 Epcot match videos to YouTube. One of them is a match where 48 and 111 scored 488+ points in a match with this very robot. 
It’s been a while; 2001 was my first season, so take my info with a grain of salt…
The robot had a small weighted tail (final version is visible in the upper-right picture) that was used to tip the bridge so they could go over, and if I remember correctly, it also was used to tip the robot forward at the beginning of the match. I believe that you’re correct about the pneumatic cylinders powering the arm. The goals weighed ~75 pounds or so.
This was one of at least three robots that lifted goals. the other two that lifted goals were team 86, and team 282, though I don’t think that 282 was capable of lifting them onto the bridge. Ironically, all three of these teams are from Florida (must’ve been something in the water).
While they always made high caliber machines, this sticks in my mind as one of the most beautiful machines I’ve seen in all of my years of FIRST. Losing Demolition Squad (267 merged with 710 in 2005, who then themselves folded in 2007) was a huge loss to the culture of Florida FIRST.
Thank you.
Why is it I just find these older robots so well designed and engineered? What were those arms made of? Looks like 2x1.
Sorry for all the questions but this is a very slick looking robot and it looks like something I can learn a lot from.
Looking at some other picture (there are a few more on here if you search through CD-Media), it looks like 2x1.
As for why the older bots look so well put together, I can’t really speak too much to that; while there were a few box bots that I recall from my early years, there doesn’t seem to be as many as in recent times. I’m sure there were a variety of factors that could contribute; maybe the lack of autonomous allowed for more time and energy to be focused on hardware. The lack of a kit chassis could also have forced teams to approach the robot design with a bit more planning and forethought. Maybe it comes back to the “quantity vs. quality” debate that seems to spring up ever summer. Heavy mentor involvement didn’t seem to be as frowned upon as it is now, so there may have been more professional involvement. The list could go on…
I love looking at the older machines from time to time; many of the current crop of FIRSTers weren’t around pre-2005, and so haven’t seen some of the mind-blowing creations that blossomed without the presence of the in-match volume constraints and bumper rules.
a big reason was one of their engineers donald tarca… another huge reason was there was no autonomous so you didn’t have to split time and build two robots to be competitive
It was 2X1 alum (unlike the steel frame they made in 2000). Roger’s post was pretty on the money other than the fall. 267 relied on their track system that was still in contact with the ground while vertical. Their driver just drove it to initiate the fall (pre-autonomous) and when they fell over in the beginning of the match I believe there was a pneumatic cylinder on the bottom (not visible in these photos) that absorbed the energy from the fall.
The tail primarily acted as a counter balance for the weight of the goal. I cannot remember exactly but it was less than 100lbs. Without any balls in the goal it was pretty light from what I remember, but with the balls it became much heavier. I never saw them use it to reset the bridge, but I’ll take Roger at his word.
One of the most interesting things to their design was if they were assisted by another robot they could place both goals on the bridge while going back for their end zone bonus (something few could do, and even fewer could do consistently which is what made 71 so dominant)
oh and the pneumatics powered the goals up and down, but if you look carefully you’ll also see a gas shock in support
I’ve a question, could somebody who was around back in 2001 explain the rules of the game? I have been trying to find them for a while but with no real success. Thanks
http://www.teamkrunch.com/Team_Media/Manuals/2001.pdf courtesy of Krunch.
http://www.teamkrunch.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=82&Itemid=127 May be of interest.
Incomplete synopsis (oh, the horrid site design :)):
http://web.archive.org/web/20010125054200/www.delphielite.com/ELITE_2001/competition.htm
Edit - Per the rules, there were 40 black balls, not 30.
The only team-centric scoring mechanic about this 4v0 game was the ability to cap the goal with the big ball that was the same color as your rotating light cover. This earned your team a 10% score bonus.
Please link us to the videos you will be uploading. I would love to see some matches from 2001.
It’ll happen tonight.
In the meantime - here’s one of the most interesting matches from that season:
As well as a much better game synopsis than I posted earlier:
We have some videos on our site. One of them is a higher quality version of the youtube video that Travis linked to.
About a year ago I was reorganizing our team hard drive, and I found a presentation on object manipulation in FIRST Robotics. The presentation happened to have a picture of this robot, and I liked the design so much, that I had the picture as my desktop background for a while. It’s nice to finally get some more details about the robot and its functions. How did the bot perform at competition?
7th seed and Archimedes finalst per Jim Zondag’s wonderful data collection posted here:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/papers/2383
Interesting how so there are so few videos of 2001.
Here’s the only one I’ve found with bees in it:
http://jmen.us/Bees/orlando.mpg
It’s from our old website. Our new website is very behind on creating pages for old robots, so they haven’t linked to it yet.
That’s a match on einstein, I dont know if it was semis or finals.
Its fun looking back at past robots and seeing just how simple yet effective they were. This one had four drive motors, 2 FP and 2 drill, two claws (yellow side and purple side), and a small arm to lower the ramp.
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=451A5331A7D37056
Q117 is the video with 267 in action with 48, along with WildStang’s Rampbot.
Gradually, I’ll be adding some match videos from 2002-2005 to this playlist.
Outside of the details already mentioned, the robot also had a 4 or 5 position CAM system for positioning the stinger. They had put the CAMs on the stinger shaft and then put limit switches under them so they could tell the position of the stinger. I can’t remember the reasoning as to why they didn’t use a pot for the sensing, but their system worked well. The purpose of the tail was to adjust for the varying weight of the goal, which also served them so they could place the goal down onto the ramp.