Category: 2018 Season

The last two weeks of build season were incredibly busy. On the robot side, we were able to get our bellypan and elevator gussets (the pieces that hold the frame together) cut by a waterjet. Thankyou sponsors! The mechanical team took all of those parts and riveted them together resulting in a completed drivebase and an elevator. They then worked to build the intake and get that attached to the elevator.

The electrical team attached all of the electronics to the electronics board and got that attached to the robot. They updated the firmware on the motor controllers as well as the roboRIO to ensure compatibility.

Our team also hosted 2018 Testrun with the help of Isthmus Engineering. We brought all of our field elements over to Isthmus Engineering's warehouse and had the opportunity to test our robot along with other FRC teams. It was a really great event and we were really happy to work with the other teams.

Chairmans has finished the essays and submitted them. They have now started to practice for the presentation as well as brainstorm for the visual aid.

On 2/20/2018, we bagged up the competition robot. We won't be able to work on it until our first regional competition. We are now starting to work on the practice robot and hope to have it finished in the next two weeks.

Over the past week, we have finished the second set of gearboxes and continued to work on the CAD model of our robot. The programming team has begun to work on the autonomous code. Our main priority for autonomous mode is to place a cube on the switch and cross the auto line to get the ranking point.

We have also worked more on our cube intake and its integration with the rest of the robot. We plan to use pneumatic cylinders to drop our intake. It must start up so that it will be inside frame perimeter. 

The electrical team soldered CAN connectors onto all of our Talon SRX motor controllers. Those will all go onto our robots and run various motors ( drive train, elevator, etc.) With the large elevator on our robot, we don't have as much space for electronics on the bellypan. For this reason, we will be putting them on a separate platform somewhere else on the robot.

The whole team has been working on our chairmans and woodie flowers submissions. We have decided on a main theme and have been incorporating it into our essay and short answer responses. We plan to build a visual presentation element in the coming weeks to assist in the chairmans presentation.

This week, we have continued to work on our main drive train. Unfortunately, the gearboxes that we had hoped to use have gone out of stock so we are going to create our own. We cut spacers and have built one set of gearboxes. We also attached all of the hubs to our drive wheels so that they can be added to the drive train as soon as it's ready. The frame is nearing completion and is only missing bearing blocks and the gearboxes.

We have been working really hard to finish the CAD for our cube intake as this will be a very important part of the robot. The fourth revision is just about finished and we hope to finish it next week.

Another part of our robot this season is the climber. Currently, we are working on the hooks that will attach to the climbing bar. Our first model was cut out on the X-Carve and worked really well. For the second version, we are going to add latches to help prevent us from swinging on the bar.

Side ramps (for lifting other robots) are still being discussed but the team seems to be leaning towards not including them because of the added complexity. One of our big goals for this season was to be simple!

This week we have continued to make changes to our cube intake prototype and have decided on a somewhat final design. We made the design in SolidWorks (CAD) and then cut it out of MDF on our X-Carve. This design looks much more promising and is able to pick up the Power Cube from any orientation (the cube is 13" x 13" x 11".) We also switched the wheels on the intake from the 60A durometer 4" compliant wheels to the 35A (green) durometer 4" compliant wheels. These wheels can compress much further and allow us to hold the cube more securely.

We have finalized our drive train CAD and started working on the elevator and climber. The first climber hook designed by our team looks promising but does not include a latch. We have decided to create a second version which includes a locking latch which should help us be more stable on the bar. We will be cutting this design out on the X-Carve next week and testing it.

The field elements are almost finished. We have built the scale and exchange but are still working on the switch and its fence.

We also worked with the BadgerBOTS corporation to sort LEGO robotics kits for the local FIRST Lego League teams. This will ensure that all of the teams get the same parts and all get a chance to learn about robotics at a young age.

One of our students also testified in front of the Wisconsin Committee of Science and Technology to get more funding for robotics teams in Wisconsin. She was joined by FIRST Tech Challenge students as well as FIRST Robotics Competition students from other teams around Wisconsin. This was a great experience and yet another example of FIRST being more than just robotics!

This week, we received the brand new FRC game: FIRST Power Up (see 2018 kickoff post). We have started to prototype various cube holding mechanisms (see images below). At this point, we are focusing on quickly picking up cubes and being able to place them on the scale and switch accurately. We have also been working on the CAD (Computer Aided Design) for our drivetrain. It will use 6in wheels so that we can easily get up the platform at the end of each match.

In the coming weeks, we hope to finish our cube intake and attach it to a cascading elevator. Later in the season, we hope to be able to attach climbing hooks to our elevator to allow us to gain additional points at the end of the match.

On January 6th, FIRST Robotics Competition teams from all around the world were given the 2018 game challenge. This season, we will be stacking cubes onto tipping scales with the objective of making our alliance's side tip downwards. Please see the video below for more information on the 2018 FRC game: FIRST Power Up.