Rover Ruckus 2018/2019
This year we have decided to try something new, we are going to try putting up monthly updates from our team. These will include, general information about our team, challenges we have had, goals we achieve, any tournaments or competitions we attend, etc.
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We are happy to say t hat sis year has been our best year ever across the board, the team growth and sucees through competition as well as the relationship we have with sponsors have improved greatly this season.
April 2019
Between Alberta Championships and Houston Worlds we decided to focus mostly on autonomous and making small changes the intake wheels and size to work more consistently. We make thinner wheels with a wider diameter as well as making the bucket itself end sooner so it no longer catches on the field when extending out. Our autonomous programs were tweaked to be consistent and reliable ans new programs were written for the less successful pathways.
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At Worlds in Houston we did better than we ever did before we ended in the top 50% of teams being one penalty away from the top 16 teams!! Team members were able to visit FLL Jr, FLL, and FRC in addition to the other FTC teams. Our programmers and builders were able to talk to other teams and find out there solutions around various code and build issues. We were able to see who other teams were reaching through their outreach and new ideas on how to organize our engineering notebook. One student was a student ambassador and an sibling in FLL was able to experience FTC high level competition as well and see the unveiling of the 2020 FLL field.
March 2019
The team competed in the FTC Alberta Championship on march 9 & 10. We were able to reconnect with teams across the province and got to meet some more new teams. We won 4 out of 5 matches leaving us 2nd overall for alliance selection. We accepted team 5009 invitation and became part of an alliance with 5009 Helios and 30000 Datawolves. WE had several robots breakdown during the final matches but were able to place first. We left he competition with the Motivate award and a ticket to worlds upon getting Inspire 2nd place! We also were 3rd place control, 2nd place connect and had a dean's list finalist! We are happy to say that this has been by far, our most successful season not only in competition but with how we have grow with each other as a team.
February 2019
This is our last month before the Alberta Championship. We have one more tournament before then on February 23 in Calgary which we hope to have the final version of our robot done for.
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With only a month left will the Competition, we have several things on the agenda:
1. Our build sub team will get the drawer slides functioning and out intake working
2. Have out intake to outtake process running smoothly
3. putting the robot on diet so there is less stress on our lift mechanism.
3. Getting a full autonomous including sampling with either color sensor, Vuforia, or Tensorflow
4.Do at least 1 outreach event a week till the competition with the guides and scouts.
5. Get our dean's list submissions in
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January 2019
This month we finished our major rebuild we stated after red deer.
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We are now using drawer slides to reach onto the crater
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Our intake is a bucket like mechanism with elastics over two gears.
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Our outtake is a simple rotating arm that flips up and over placing the minerals into the lander.
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Our old lift design had trouble with the weight and we were stripping the slides so we kept the same idea but now have it so the hook is int he middle with the pinions on the two side pieces.
The majority of this work was done in the span of one week as we had low attendance during vacation and exams, but in the end we did finish the majority of the work by our February 2nd competition, in which we had an almost full autonomous, and everything in tele-op worked except for the drawer slides as we could not find good enough wires.
Congratulations to team 5009 Helios on getting first at round 2.
On January 26, we were able to see the FLL team SERVOS we were mentoring compete a the Edmonton Tournament where they finished in the middle of the pack.
December 2018
This month we had our first tournament of the season in Red Deer. We had a really consistent robot in terms of both hanging and auto. Our drivers found a way to collect blocks and balls to put in the depot by pushing them around the field. Congratulations to TWOSE team 12094 for getting first place!
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After the tournament we realized that our intake mechanism was not working out so we began a major redesign on that and also searched for ways to make our rack and pinion lift more sturdy. They decided to create an extending arm using drawer slides with an elastic intake on the end. The minerals will then be dropped into a bucket connected to a simple articulating arm that will place the minerals into the lander.
Until our new mechanism are finished, our code team has started to research Vuforia and color sensors for our autonomous program and our outreach team has planned 5-6 more event before our next competition.
November 2018
Throughout November we got a lot done. Our first tournaments is in Red Deer on December 1st so it was super important to finish as much as we could before then.
Our build team went through several designs for the lift mechanism before deciding on a dual rack and opinion system with a simple hook mounted on top. We had discovered upon trying a single rack and pinion system that the robot weighed to much and the guides as well as the rack were being destroyed. This caused the creation of a dual system which can lift up to 45 lbs. Our intake mechanism was going to fold our and reach inside the crater to gather minerals with an elastic band design. Unfortunately this was not light enough nor was it stable enough to be effective or reliable so we couldn't use it for the Red Deer tournament.
By December 1st our code team was able to compete everything we were able to do in auto including launching, claiming, and ending in the crater. Our tele-op was basic drive with the lift for hanging in endgame Overall it was pretty reliable.
