dsalincoln's+Reflections+on+FTC+2009

> Obviously this was not my first year at the FTC, so I knew somewhat what to expect, but given the nature of the game and the changing robot designs it's hardly identical each year. This year there were fewer competitors, which actually made for more space in the pit, and that makes a big difference. We got practice time on the practice field, had more meaningful interactions with the other teams, and had 5 qualifier matches instead of the 4 we had last year. What I wasn't expecting was the generosity of the other teams - even though "gracious professionalism" was very obviously present last year, this year it was even more so. Teams gave out informational packets and autonomous code samples on CD, lots of people were coming around asking if the team needed help, and one team even donated a new motor controller to us! > The game this year was, I think, much more challenging than last year, and the complexity of many bots reflected this. Hurling balls into high up or faraway goals requires substantially more energy than just dumping pucks into a receptacle like FTC 2008. Our bot, simple though it was, was not even integration tested until we put it in the practice field on Saturday morning, mere minutes before our first qualifier. Many teams had technical glitches with their shooters especially - even Rhode Rage, team 121, came to their first match as our ally with a malfunctioning shooter, something that clearly wounded their pride quite a bit. On the whole, though, there were many more teams that came ready to play and with autonomous routines - the number of bots that didn't move at all in the qualifiers was much less than last year. > Overall, the experience for me was incredible - better than I ever expected. We left Friday evening despondent, with a bot that didn't really work and hadn't even been fully tested as a complete unit. We'd never driven up to a whiffle ball, picked it up, and shot it all in one smooth sequence - it was hard to imagine how all those functions would come together. We didn't even have a fixed platform height for our shooter, and our feeder mechanism was acting bizarrely. To top it off, by the end of the evening on Friday none of our batteries would power our motor controllers. Turns out all of these were easy fixes - the batteries needed new fuses, there were a few lines of bad code in the intake section of RobotC, and we quickly established a proper height for the shooter platform and had it drilled and screwed in 30 minutes after arriving in the pit. Those three fixes worked a magical transformation, both on the bot and the team members - the smiles that lit up while we watched our bot eat balls and fire them into the high goal on the practice field were really genuine, and very satisfying to me. > > At least two friends came - Sarah Young and Mark Plympton. Sarah has come the past two years, and I think it really meant something to the girls to have a faculty member in the crowd. She is a techie like me, so she understood the work that goes into a creation like the team's bot, and I know she was very proud of the girls for having made such a successful device! Mark Plympton, on the other hand, was more than just proud - he definitely got a little misty as he watched the girls score a point in the high goal during a qualifying match. For having been involved only a few days, his investment in the bot and its success was substantial, and I think he really got caught up in seeing the project complete and working. He, like the rest of us, did not have high hopes going into Friday evening, so to see that shooter working and the girls driving the bot so manically around the field picking up balls was a really powerful moment for him, and by extension for me. I also think the girls really got to know Mark over the course of a few days, and respected his skills and contributions - it was extremely nice of him to show up and support them. > > It's funny, because there were several "problems" with the bot that if you'd asked me going into Saturday AM I would have said they were going to bring us down completely. The front-to-back wobble of the entire chassis, the iffy shooter-feeder mechanism, the wiring - all were questionable. And yet they were complete non-issues during competition. Arguably the shooter could have had a better feed method - balls were bouncing off the tops of the flywheels and dribbling out erratically much of the time (as one of the other teams helpfully pointed out). One major design change I might have wanted would have been to make the entire hopper area bigger - as compact as our bot is, it doesn't leave a ton of space for holding balls, and being able to hold 15-20 balls would have been a nice feature. The shooter's erratic nature could be corrected with a shield over the flywheels themselves, but that again would have stolen space from the hopper area (such as it is). Clearly we also needed an autonomous program - even a simple one would have scored us more points in each match - but it's difficult to write one when you don't even test drive the bot until the day of the competition. The irony of it is that the element the girls created in the least amount of time - the ball intake mechanism - was the one that had the least problems. As Sydney so aptly put it, "It picks up balls like it's its job!" Indeed. > > Oh, I can come up with a lot more than five! > For the FTC itself: > For the class:
 * 1) **Was the FIRST Tech Challenge what you expected? Why or why not? Tell about how the experience was for you.**
 * 1) **What did your friends/relatives think? How did you feel having them watch your creation in action?**
 * 1) **Engineering perspective: what performed well on our bot? What needed improvement? Be specific.**
 * 1) **Come up with at least 5 quality tips for next year, to next year's team. These would be things you wish you knew (about designing, building, or programming) wish you had done sooner, wish you had learned better, wish you had understood prior to Saturday, etc.**
 * Purchase and bring spare parts for everything, //especially// electronic components. Not having spare battery fuses was inexcusable.
 * Bring snacks for the morning - bagels, fruit, drinks, whatever. Lunch comes too late.
 * Bring a long extension cord and a power strip.
 * Show the videos to the class prior to the event, and have quizzes and other time set aside for event prep.
 * Give detailed directions to the venue the week before. Talk about how to get there on multiple days.
 * Order t-shirts weeks in advance to avoid rush charges. :)
 * Focus more on programming lessons - pre-build chassis's for the girls so they can concentrate on programming them to drive, move autonomously, and use sensors to detect environmental changes.
 * Begin designing the bot as early as possible, experiment with different elements throughout October, November, and December.
 * Have lessons specifically focused on how to attach and properly use kit components