ok so i have started the where do you build your bot thread, i am now starting the 2nd part to that thread, who builds your bot? Is it the students, the mentors, mixed, or do you send it out to be built?
~Mike
Ill start this one off also, our team members, the students do about 90% of the work, with the mentors doing some of the more advanced work that has the students helping with that also or watching on to learn.
~Mike
Our team is mixed, with students doing most of the work. The students design the about 90% of the robot as well as built the machine. The students also do all of the pit work. For those teams that were at UCF we were the team that was always in the pit fixing the transmission.
The design is 95% student done. We come up with the concepts and do the inventor drawings and the calculations. The students even look up parts to be ordered. The work is 98% student done. And when I say work I mean cutting, drilling, machining, assembling, maintainance, you name it. The only parts on our robot that were not student done were the 8 welds and 2 CNC parts.
Our bot is enirely student-built. And i mean every single aspect was done by students, we actually had no engineers.
In the past it was all the students. (When we won Nationals) But this year we had mostly freshman so only about five members were experienced so the mentors were basically teaching this year.
Our bot is mostly student built as well. The design is our own and so is the construction for the most part, although we had our welding done elsewhere. The girls who come down to the basement shop pretty much everyday until 6 (like me) take on projects of their own often times working with different bot components, and our mentors offer guidance with our projects and introduce us to the advanced work. Two of our mentors our engineers, two others are parents (although their kids arent on the team any more), and the third is a teacher.
build robots? who, where, when?
We are almost completely student built. We have adults that keep us doing things right, but arent as hands on. We do have one engineer who do get his hands in the mess tho.
Here is some more reading for you.
And to answer the question, ours is a mix. It completely depends on how much each student wants to build. I’d say maybe 2 or 3 “die hard” students did most of the work, while most others kinda sat around and talked and laughed and watched.
Stephen
**Team 341 (Miss Daisy) ** was 100% student designed, built, and programmed. (Autonomous Gyro Program)
We have about 12 students on our construction/pit crew and 5 teachers with technical backgrounds.
The teachers provide advice and machine training, then we ** get the heck out of the way!!! **
Best of luck to everyone in the off-season!
well thats a silly question, the Students of team 25, work hand in hand with the Tradesmen of Bristol Myers Squibb Facilities Maintenence Shop, and The Students of Team 1089 (the most awsomest Rookies ever) was 100% studnet built with the help of one of the Team memebers father who own a bike shop, and they built it with the tools inside there
Yeah. This year, there’s been a lot of engineer ‘input’ on the robot. 
Some of our engineers have been involved in FIRST for 7 years…they know what is going on too well. We also have a lack of motivation in the students it seems…but that may very well be because there’s not a whole lot for the kids to do. I’d really like to see some major changes in our team, but I don’t want to upset our engineers to the point that they leave.
Personally, I could point out 2 pieces I built on our robot. That’s it for this year. 
Our robot was, is, and always will be 100% student built. This includes design, construction, and programming. Engineers/mentors are there to make sure we don’t hurt ourselves and to answer any questions we may have. They do not impose themselves or their ideas upon us. What makes them great is that they realize that this is the students’ robot.
My team is sponsored by the University of Wisconsin-Platteville and since the shop is at the university, the college students help out with a good portion of the robot, but the the ideas are usually from the high schoolers and college students.
Design done 100% by students + 2 parents.
Built done 100% by students + 2 parents.
Driven 100% by a freshman.
No Bull.
We do it the way it was supposed to be.
Back in my day, our robot was somewhere at 40/60 built favoring the teacher. Maybe 30/70 design. I don’t see how a robot can be built entirely by students though. Well, if it was just a drive and a program maybe, but a full multifunction robot, in my opinion, has to have some engineering input. I’ve seen some stuff now in college that I can relate to the robots from high school that wasn’t near my level of understanding in high school, but maybe stuff that in depth isn’t really a necessity in FIRST. Are 90% student built robots any good?
we built the entire bot ourselves, and when the parents tried to help, we got all protective and they never even got close 
*Originally posted by Etbitmydog *
**Back in my day, our robot was somewhere at 40/60 built favoring the teacher. Maybe 30/70 design. I don’t see how a robot can be built entirely by students though. Well, if it was just a drive and a program maybe, but a full multifunction robot, in my opinion, has to have some engineering input. I’ve seen some stuff now in college that I can relate to the robots from high school that wasn’t near my level of understanding in high school, but maybe stuff that in depth isn’t really a necessity in FIRST. Are 90% student built robots any good? **
1089 not only had a good robot, it was amazing. I was there off and on during the first few weeks of build season. They managed to have a 90/10 student built robot, favoring the students. The 10 was an incredibly helpful and supportive parent who owned the bikeshop they worked in.
Of course I am biased towards their robot, so I’ll let the fact that they were the ONLY rookies in the JNJ regional semi-finals stick out for it.
Do not underestimate the power of a dedicated student.
This was our fourth year as a team, and when we started, no one really knew what was going, since our first meeting was just after the kickoff. Sooo, a lot of the work was done by the high school seniors while the college advisors did what they could to help. We have gotten to the point where the college students prompt ideas but only help when we are completely stumped, which is rare. OUr hich school students know how to do soo much-- from CNCing parts to programming and other important tasks. Our team isunique in that we don’t have any professional engineers. The students do an amazing amount of work to make us successful.
I think that almost every team has to have some mentor involvement. With our team I would have to say that the students have the biggest input. The students have to have the ideas and they need to make them a reality. I think that FIRST is preparing us for the rest of our lives. Like many people in the first organization have said, “Many Engineering Based Jobs Go Uu-filled Every Year”. With the menors help, we are on the front of technology. Most if not all of the members from our team go on to college, and many earn first year salaries just shy of 100k. Without the mentors I believe that none of this would be possible. I think that it is good for the students to run the show, but it helps when you have professionals teaching you how to do it correctly. The mentors often help the rookies the most, and usually by the time that they are on the 2nd or 3rd year of the program then they no longer need much help from the mentors. They open the door for us, we are the one that has to walk through it.
Good Luck to everyone at the invatationals this year. See you guys at IRI