Archive for category Competition

Success and Failure at the 2009 Battle o’ Baltimore

Aug 26

Posted by Eric in Competition

With the internal controversy surrounding 449’s attendance at the Battle o’ Baltimore, I’m glad to say that we did in fact attend. Summer events are always hard, with most people on vacation or simply not motivated enough to make the 45 minute drive from DC to Baltimore.

The goal of this offseason event was to give the younger members of our team—the rising juniors and sophomores—a jump start into running the robot without us old farts. The power’s been in our hands too long, and we’ve gotten too comfortable being in control.  The drive chain is loose? Not my problem. Here, have a wrench. It might not be the right size. Engineers have got to fend for themselves in the wild world of robotics.

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Battle o’ Balitmore vs Robotic Arm

Jul 27

Posted by Ben in Competition

So to go to the Battle o’ Baltimore this year, we’re going to strip the top of our robot and replace the catapult (which worked intermittently at best) with a new dumper design that we’ll spend the next few weeks building.

We also need, statistically speaking, about .5 more people to be interested in going to Battle o’ Baltimore to go (take the chance of a person going as the number of people; two people who are 50-50 for going or not count as 1 person going together. It works.) The reason for needing more people is simple; drivers shouldn’t have to work in the pit full time and vice versa (”That was a tough match, time to take a break… oh wait, I can’t because I have to fix the robot.”)

The other thing we need is a new coach. I’ve coached at competitions the last two years, but I’ll be out of the state at the time of the competition. I apparently have an uncommon idea of what coaching should be (compared to other coaches, not compared to the people I coach): the coach shouldn’t ever yell, except to be heard. The players will do a good enough job punishing themselves for mistakes, and don’t need you to rub it in. Whoever replaces me as coach will have to show him/her self to be calm in general (or at least whenever I’m watching).

I’ve noticed that Bo’B always seems to be rather time consuming; prepping everything, designing, building, programming (plus, I’m not too sure about the new NI stuff… last time we tried to download it took several hours before our laptop would talk with the cRio). Granted, Battle o’ Baltimore is pretty fun, but it always means less time for other things.

This year, I wanted to have a robotic arm built, one of those 5 axis contraptions that every robotics team should have. Scott mentioned this arm in the previous post (about our first summer meeting). Designing it would be an exercise in spatial thinking, CAD, and working with different motors for our younger members, building it would take precise machining that most of us could use some practice with. But the best part would be using it to train brand new electronics and programming members every year. And wouldn’t it be great if some programmer were bored and, say, taught it how to bring us sodas? Oh… and did I mention how awesome it would be?

Anyway, we should end up designing and building something like that regardless of whether we go to Bo’B (it just might run longer into the start of school), but this brings me to what I really, really want to build: a motorized joint that is in a feedback loop with a joint on a human (knee would be most useful), such that it enhances motions of the joint. Systems of powered joints like this exist already, and allow people (read: “soldiers”) to carry people on their back. Without noticing any weight. We probably couldn’t get that sophisticated, but you have to admit it would be cool to try. Maybe next summer…

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Last Minute Progress

Mar 18

Posted by Scott in Competition, Programming

The Chesapeake regional is coming up in about 12 hours, so here’s a quick summary of the team’s progress:

  • We built and programmed two scoring devices in one-third the time it took us to build one (and we rebuilt most of the robot, too)
  • The scouting network was finished. (Once again, the developer disagrees, and claims that it’s nowhere near. But since the binary is ready for publication, I consider it “finished.”)
  • I made some progress on the website, despite being instructed not to use sshd on the server because the system load was too high

The third bullet kind of annoys me.

In two weeks, we managed to build both a dumper and a shooter (an improved version of our old catapult). The stats are uninteresting, the point is that both performed well, unlike the old system, which didn’t work. I mean, didn’t “live up to our expectations.” It couldn’t predict motions, it broke a lot, and it wasn’t accurate. But both of the new systems worked. The dumper dumped (no, it couldn’t predict the motions of moving targets), and the shooter/catapult was accurate. We can predict motions, throw the ball, and the ball actually goes into the shooter (instead of from the harvester onto the floor) every time, thanks to an “unbreakable, but don’t try to break it” extension of the shooter’s orbit ball holder.

The team voted on which system was best, and the shooter won out. This lends itself to the strategy of focusing on collecting empty cells and passing them to the payload specialist. Our payload specialist is abnormally decent (hence the fact that we placed 23 out of ~60 at D.C. with a robot that could barely score), so if the robot can manage to get him some orbit balls, that should help.

The developer of our scouting software, “Scout 449″, has released version 4 of the software, which he says is ready for release. The source code (according to him) should be available soon. The funny part: he’s not willing to give me the source code at any point in the visible future, but he’s going to have it ready for the website, where anyone can download it, “soon.” He doesn’t see any incongruity.

The website will be redesigned (general interface and content) after Chesapeake.

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D.C. Regionals

Mar 8

Posted by Scott in Competition

The Blair Robot Project’s robot staged an above-average performance compared to the other sixty-odd robots in this year’s game, Lunacy. Unfortunately, the throwing and dumping systems did not work as well as the team had hoped. We made up for this by having an excellent payload specialist, and the team still managed to land in the top twenty-four, which gave team 449 and reasonable chance of being picked in the finals.

One of the team’s biggest successes was the completion (from the perspective of everybody but the software developer, who is still working) of a slick scouting system, which enables data to be rapidly collected and compiled. This data includes photographs, notes on the details of the robots, and qualitative ratings as well as records of past performance. Almost everybody not in pit crew was busy gathering data for the scouting network. Although the team did not win the award for the best scouting network, the network was quite effective. A bit less effective was the team’s ability to advertise itself: hundreds of buttons were made, but nobody got around to handing them out.

The end result was that Team 449 never ended up in the finals, even though twenty-four teams were picked and we were number twenty-three (and twenty-two and twenty-four were picked). Plans are being made for better ways for the team to advertise its own presence. In addition, the scouting network is being improved, and may be released sometime around Chesapeake for other teams to use.

Because of the extensive scouting done at D.C. on many teams that will also attend Chesapeake, we expect to have a significant advantage over many other teams, which will not have had the opportunity to study their rivals first-hand.

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Week Four: 1/22/09-1/30/09

Feb 3

Posted by Margaret in Competition, Mechanics, Programming, Robot Code

Once again, team meetings were delayed due to days off, this time the result of two snow days. With the school closed, students could not get back into the building to retrieve robot parts, but progress continued to be made by team members CADing parts of our virtual robot. For the remaining days, hours increased and we managed to continue to stay on schedule for completion.

This week, the programming subteam tested and modified the acceleration code and wrote the three-wheeled robot code for cRIO. Other team members redesigned the alternate shooter and continued to perfect the four-wheeled prototype’s frame and the harvester system, which can now load and dump orbitz balls. The backerman prototype was also tested and proved itself useful. The scouting subteam worked on designing the team’s t-shirts for this year and writing up information for several FIRST awards.

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Week Two: 1/11/09-1/16/09

Jan 22

Posted by Margaret in Competition, Mechanics

Subteams busied themselves with working on their projects and ordered crucial parts necessary to complete the robot. The prototype for six-wheel drive was switched for four-wheel drive, tested, and proved its worth. The ackerman design evolved into a three-wheel design incorporating a motorized castor wheel. The harvester, roller and catapult continue to progress, and while the shooter was considered a viable option for some time, it was eventually abandoned. Also, a full-size model of the trailer for the game was completed and our designs for power-bumpers were tested.

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Week One: 1/4/09-1/9/09

Jan 14

Posted by Margaret in Competition, Mechanics

Following kickoff, we spent Saturday and Sunday brainstorming concepts for robot construction.  By the end of Sunday, we settled on designs to flesh out and prototype. On Monday, members gathered together and those who had been unable to attend the kickoff were informed of this year’s game rules and our team’s strategy. Throughout the rest of the week, the mechanics sub-team worked on completing the two prototype frames and several types of ball manipulator, including a harvester, a spring-loaded launcher, and a catapult. One of the prototype frames was completed enough to test, and it worked fine. The other one was still under construction.

Meanwhile, the electronics sub-team created several versions of the electronics board to test out with the prototypes and helped the mechanics sub-team with their various devices. In the programming room, the PR sub-team assigned various responsibilities and planned out their activities for the coming season. The programming sub-team itself were able to successfully track colors using the camera and began developing code for the prototypes’ drive systems. So far, attendance and moral have been high as we eagerly look forward to another excellent season.

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Kickoff: 1/3/09

Jan 9

Posted by Margaret in Competition

At 9:30 AM on Saturday morning, around seventy students and parents assembled in a large conference room at Vecna Technologies’ offices. Our team’s president and vice-president gave a PowerPoint introduction on what to expect from the FIRST telecast and the coming six-week build season. Specific policy changes, such as the new practice of yellow-carding unsafe members, were announced and the commitment expected from students and parents was described.

Then at 10:00am, the telecast began. Several speeches were given by such illustrious personages as FIRST founders Dean Kamen and Woodie Flowers, along with a New Hampshire congressman. Then the exciting part began: the explanation of this year’s game, Lunacy. The telecast ended with a quiz show designed to acclimate teams to important rules and game specifications.

After the telecast, we ate lunch and split into five groups to brainstorm ideas for this year’s robot. Though initially daunted by the game’s challenging conditions, especially the low-friction playing field, our members enthusiastically contributed ideas for possible methods of movement, ball manipulation, and interaction with other robots. The new parents split into a separate group where they had a discussion about their role on the team. Later, the groups came back together to show their ideas and discuss them as a group. Although no single consensus was reached, we planned to meet the following day to continue debating ideas and eventually prototype several of them.

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FIRST Chesapeake Regionals

Mar 18

Posted by Ben in Competition

Saturday (rest of qualifying matches and elimination tournament)
Today we won our only match, thanks in part to our superb ramp, which lifted up the robot on us even though almost all their weight was still on the ramp and not the top of our robot. Then we cleaned up and crated up the robot. Just about everyone stayed to watch the elimination rounds, though we skipped the awards ceremony as more than one of us were coming down with something. If you didn’t come today, you have no idea how much fun you missed! (Picture the mixture of loud music, dancing judges, dancing people in the stands, loud cheering, outrageous outfits, excitement, and—best of all—robots.)

Friday (1st day of qualifying matches)
Today we finished passing inspections, thanks to the help Team 75 gave us with getting the proper version of the firmware for the operator interface. Despite our best efforts, we lost 5 of our 6 matches today, due to a seemingly-endless stream of bad luck (listed in no particular order). In one match, turning too fast ripped the manipulator out of the 80-20 due to the torq. In another match, one of our alliance mates got stuck in opposing alliance’s home zone, costing us the match due to the penalties. In a third match, we lost all power to our robot because we had neglected to re-tighten the terminal blocks. Then there was the match when one of our alliance members did not show up because Ryan and Katherine were not done fixing their safety issues (lack of a pressure switch in the code, no electrical tape insulating their electronics, and relays not affixed in any fashion besides the wires they were connected to).
The only match we won we missed because the robot controller suddenly refused to talk to our computer while we were downloading code, leaving us with no valid code on the RC (ouch!). We have no clue what was wrong, and only managed to get code on there by using Team 75’s computer and cables. Needless to say, we didn’t try to download new code after that!

Thursday (Practice matches)
Today we un-crated the robot and transferred everything to the lighter frame. As this took nearly forever, we made none of our practice matches (though other teams were impressed because it looked like we built our robot in 8 hours—which we nearly did). We also had some “fun” with the plates in the drive gearboxes. (The ones originally shipped by banebots had been discovered by FIRST to be too weak towards the end of the build season. We got the stronger plates at regionals, installed them, and then were told by another team that the pins in the new plates were too short, sometimes causing the gears to fall off. After a bit of reading of ChifDelphi, we ended up replacing the new pins with the old pins on one plate, using the loctite of another team. We may replace the rest once we have our robot back, but we ran out of time at regionals.)
We passed part of inspections today, though we had to lose the extension to the ramps to pass weight and size. (Final weight: 119.6, 0.4 lbs. under the limit!) This was complicated by a brief period of time around 7:45 when the lights went out.

Sorry I did not post this earlier, but regionals is a bit too tiring for me to write blog posts the day of.

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Welcome to the Blair Robot Project Blog!

Jan 9

Posted by Ben in Competition

This blog will detail the status of the Blair Robot Project as the build season draws to a close.  Additionally, the blog will have information as to Blair’s progress in the Chesapeake Regional FIRST competition.

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