This is only our second blog post, but the progress we have made since our first one is tremendous. With the scrimmage behind us and our first qualifier approaching, all three of our teams switched into high gear and worked extremely hard in order to build operating robots. We made lots of changes and advancements, but seeing the development of our robots and skills have made us all extremely proud.
Starting where we left off in our first update…
For Lovelace, 9981, October 17th started the beginning of the reformation of our attachment. Half of the team began to plan more for the construction of the claw while the other half realized the wheel intake wouldn’t be able to move the foundation and began brainstorming ideas that would allow us to easily perform that task.
Hypatia, 9820, finalized chassis design and added different configuration of our wheels. They created an attachment for their robot, started designs for mechanisms, attached the brain skeleton that only has one of the expansion hubs, and attached the wheels and motors to our chassis. “I designed and started making some of the measurements for the mechanisms and measuring the lengths, widths, and height for all the attachments,” said Elise.
Hopper, 9821, brainstormed a LOT and figured out components of the claw mechanism such as the wheel type, bar length, as well as the functioning mechanism itself.
The first thing that Lovelace tackled during the October 22nd meeting was trying to attach the expansion hub. We weren’t completely sure of the position where the hub should be placed, so we went for a bar near the back end of the robot. We figured it was the most reasonable place with our current design and it would be an easy enough place to move the expansion hub if needed to. After attaching the hub, we further discussed linear slides and how it would function with the robot and attachment.
Hypatia worked on other designs for their mechanisms and worked on improving them. They also worked on adjusting the outside of the chassis, motor placemats, and bar alignment.
Hopper talked about unexpected difficulties that had to do with their chassis design, such as weight requirements (must be below 18 inches, but be below 14 inches to go under the skybridge), the exact workings of the chain that will let the linear slide extend. They also planned out the claw and created a visual model, which will be used to cut the claw out on polycarbonate plastic.
During the October 24th meeting, Lovelace had to discuss the rake mechanism, how it would move, how it will reach the foundation to set the block on, how will it grab the block and foundation, if we should we change the chassis design, and how it will work overall. We wanted to develop, design, and build RIC as soon as possible in order to work on code and be scrimmage ready. Using a whiteboard, we talked about the attachment and how it would work. We planned out the direction the claw would move and what sort of movements and joints it would need in order to function the way that we want it to. Although we didn’t have time to plan out any of the measurements of the claw, we did draw out all of the needed measurements and detailed blueprints of RIC.
Hypatia finished attaching mecanum wheels. “We are using sprockets and gears to work the mechanism,” said Elise. They finished our mechanisms and decided to use the gear and sprockets in order to rotate the chains, and then designed measurements and attachments.
During this meeting, Hopper proceeded with the final steps to attach their linear slide on the robot. This included adding a bar to support the linear slide(though we would later replace this bar for two sturdier ones) and replacing any t-screws we accidentally added. As for the claw, we went to the field robotics center to cut out the polycarbonate plastic we needed to cut to build our claw.
Lovelace had an exciting meeting on October 29th since the mecanum wheels finally came in! We were able to attach them to our chassis leading to us having a robot that could finally move. Using the diagrams that we drew from the previous meeting, we were able to come up with measurements that would most efficiently use robots space and stack the most bricks.
Hypatia finalized linear slide measurements using the measurements that Grace had planned and thought about earlier. Later they worked on attaching mecanum wheels onto the chassis. This was the most challenging part of the meeting because they had to thoroughly think about how the robot will look like, meaning where everything will go.
On the 29th, Hopper got a new member, Aria! During this meeting, they did mathematical calculations relating to the linear slide and its support bars. Hopper also thought about attaching the claw to the linear slide. This includes the motor that will keep the claw level to the ground and also the servo that will allow the robot to pick up the skystones. They also organized (until then) a very messy bin.
On November 5th, Lovelace was able to move onto the construction of the mechanism since they finished all of the needed measurements. After catching up all of our team members up to date, we collected extrusion bars and marked where we needed them to be cut. We worked on figuring out how the mechanism would work as a whole, and learned about sprockets and the movement of chains. They also modified the RIC prototype we had originally made to make it more reasonable and usable.
During this meeting, Hopper changed the single support system for the linear slide to a double-bar support. The new supports use two smaller supports rather than one big support, this distributes the weight of the motor, claw, and linear slide a lot better and keeps the robot balanced. Hopper also found material to use as grip support for the claw and added a backend passive bar. The passive bar will allow the servo-moving polycarbonate material with the added grip support to have something to keep the skystones still.
Hypatia rearranged the direction of the wheels, because if the wheels were not the right way the robot would not go in the right directions. It was a little tedious with a lot of trial and error occurring to see if everything works.
During some all hands meetings, we have fun team bonding activities with our big sisters.
During the November 7th meeting, Lovelace divided into small groups in order to get a number of things completed. Ashley worked on getting our engineering notebook up to date and started to learn some basics of how to write code for driver-controlled period. Bess, Maddy, and Claire worked on putting the robot back together with the newly cut extrusion bars and constructed the triangle base for the mechanism. Sydney and Kameron continued to work on RIC. Learning about how sprockets and chains work, they were able to further improve the hand and with the help of a model that Austin built with an operating sprocket mechanism began constructing one that would operate on our robot.
Hopper added a gear system to support the linear slide and actually allow it to turn our linear slide upward. The gear system involves two axles, one on the top and one on the bottom. The bottom one has the motor and smaller gear (72 teeth), while the top one has the bigger gear (125 teeth) and attachment to the linear slide. We also rebuilt the claw. Members of our team continued to tweak the ideas used for the claw because the idea that they thought would work in theory did not in real life.
Hypatia finished tightening the chains and connecting them. They had to add the sprockets to the inside of the chains because they were loose and had to tighten them. They also attached the motor to the mechanism.
Some of us attended the FIRST Ladies Movie Night event on Friday, November 8th. We watched a short film called “Sitara” as well as “CodeGirl.”
Lovelace focused on rebuilding the chassis on November 10th. They hadn’t finished reassembling the robot from last meeting so they prioritized fixing that. A major problem was that the two of the wheels weren’t put in tightly enough so a lot of time was spent going back and trying to re adjust everything on the axel and tighten the bushings. By the end of the meeting they had rebuilt the robot and attached the triangle brace.
Hopper added the linear slide to the gear systems. They also added a stopper of sorts to prevent the linear slide from continuously falling and being an annoyance. Hopper also attached the claw to the linear slide because without it GRAHAM would just be a pushbot and completed the irritatingly tedious task of making sure the the two linear slide support bars were parallel. With much trial and error, we were able to do it and ensure that everything was in alignment.
On November 12th, Hopper scavenged an old linear slide from one of the old Lovelace robots because their linear slide wasn’t as smooth as they would have liked. They added a phone to the chassis frame, which was just the first of a myriad of things needed to make their robot competition-ready. They also added the claw onto the new linear slide, making sure that it was on the right way.
Lovelace spent the November 14th meeting trying to finish the construction of RIC and trying to fix some unevenness in the robot. Some girls realized that some of the exterior of the robot weren’t parallel. The two side bars got further apart the closer you got to the front of the robot. Other girls focused on adding rubber to the top of RIC that grabs the top of the bricks to had more grip. We also continued trying to add the sprocket mechanism to the robot.
Hopper added an expansion to their robot the first of two. We also made sure that the claw was on right (It wasn’t. Harshi fixed it.) and tested it with a servo controller. This helped Hopper to gauge any human error in the scrimmage and compensate in case it does happen. In total, without the linear slide extending Hopper was able to stack six blocks. The claw was able to effectively do its job and seemed to work fine.
Much of the November 17th meeting Lovelace spent finishing the tasks started on the previous Thursday. We managed to complete the construction of both the chassis and the attachment. The biggest task was positioning the two axles so that the two gears that allowed the attachment to go up and down to touch. But after several attempts, we were able to find a suitable place. We also put on a chain on both of the sprockets so that the hand stays parallel to the floor.
During this meeting, we added a switch and the second expansion hub to the chassis, finishing what Hopper had to add to our chassis frame. We also reattached the claw that we detached it cut axles. Hopper also finished their linear slide for the scrimmage on the 23rd
During the November 19th meeting, Hopper learned how to code! Some members of the team spent an hour analyzing the java code to understand it as none of Hopper had really seen FTC machine-based java code before. Hopper also planned out and partly designed a s’mores capstone to earn more points at the scrimmage the next Saturday, November 23rd.
With a finished robot, most of the Lovelace team moved onto learning coding. Michelle introduced the Andrew Studios where coding for all programming happens, and then taught about the FTC package and functions. It was an extremely useful day!
During this meeting, November 21st, Hopper started to (faultily) code by copying and pasting existing code in their own team code. However, they failed and put the code in the wrong class type, so it was extremely buggy and wouldn’t run. On a more positive note, Hopper’s capstone was fully designed including a small nub on the top which would make it similar to a sky stone and able to be picked up by a robot.
Our mentor, Austin, helped Lovelace write code for the driver controlled period. They experienced some difficulty due to the fact that with mecanum wheels there is an added complexity when it comes to driving. They also learned about SohCahToa and how that determined how code is written. They drew several diagrams to picture which directions the wheels needed to move in order for the robot to move a certain direction, finished writing the code and finally did a test drive of their robot.
Here are our robots!
November 23,2019: Scrimmage!
Lovelace had a successful first scrimmage, finishing in 6th place. Despite not having a functional arm, we made the best of ourselves as a pushbot, supporting the other robot on our alliance. We were able to practice communicating to teams and practiced coaching and driving. One team that we admired was one that used two servos attached to two small finger mechanisms that could open and close in order to grab onto the foundation during autonomous and endgame to move it. We came out of the scrimmage with a new strategy of polishing our robot to fit more of a support bot. We figure since we don’t have the advantage of experience and as much time as the other teams, were more likely to get further into the game as a bot that is designed to help support.
Hypatia passed inspections with flying colors. We ended up using a push bot. Our arm was fully built, but was hitting a wire, so we couldn’t use it. We coded at the scrimmage, and had a working push bot. We got 8th place, and our goal is to get a working arm. It Was also interesting to see other teams takes on the robot and the competition.
During the scrimmage, Hopper found out how an actual competition works. It was a great experience and all got familiar with what will happen during the first qualifier on December 7th. However, unfortunately, the scrimmage did not go exactly how they would’ve liked – we placed 15th . For example, they found many new unanticipated problems, such as connection issues between the expansion hubs, incomplete code (But thanks to Michelle, were at least able to move!), and weak gears that will have to be replaced. They will also have to focus on becoming new drivers since there was a very unexpected second controller that was added, as well as coming up with a good strategy for the qualifier on December 7th.