Day 25

More parts were order and the CAD was just about finished up, here's the progress of everything so far!

-D

Day 24

We have off today so we can get some much needed rest and catch up on school work!

-D

Day 23

Today we spent most of the meeting ordering parts and rummaging threw totes in the shop to try and find parts to use so we can save money. We found quite a bit of stuff we can use, and the robots are looking to cost about $3,000.00 for both the competition and practice robot. We owe A LOT to our sheet metal and Laser Cut sponsor for all of the donations they're helping us out with. They're saving us a lot of time and money!

-D

Day 22

Today we worked a little more with Art IV to do some CADding and design on the final robot, another idea, called the Awesome Bar, which is basically an arm, that is a bridge tipped, bump crosser, and pneumatic bridge balancer all in one, was designed. And we finished up building another ramp for our practice field at Southington! Here is a screenshot of the Awesome Bar!

-D

Day 21

Today we took the shooter down to the small gym for a couple of final tests. As soon as we arrived at the school, we locked on of the wheels on our two wheel shooter to make it a one wheel, and added another brace to what I like to call the, "Say hello to my little friend" prototype. As you can see in the picture we ate up a ball pretty bad with our lunacy robot, the shooter coated in rough top was like taking the ball to a belt sander, it wasn't such a good idea.

"Say hello to my little friend" prototype

After the tests today, it seems like we're defiantly going with a one wheeled shooter, and just moving a lexan faring at the top of the shooter to adjust the angle of the shooter. Maybe a 180 or 360 turret will be used, we're going to do a little tests with making brushes to use on the turret.

Also, something else I have been working on is getting stuff to sell on, "The GUS Store", which will be opening shortly after build season, we plan to sell some shirts, vinyl stickers, wristbands, and some other cool stuff online. Here are a couple pictures of some of the products we might be selling!

"Is it done yet?" -Mr.Dutra vinyl sticker

Fuego t-shirt

"I live my life 2 minutes and 15 seconds at a time!" t-shirt

GUS Wristbands!

Eat, Sleep, FRC shirt! Except it will say Robots! not FRC.

This is just a couple of the things we might be selling, I'll keep you updated as progress progresses!

-D

Day 20

Today we worked on figuring out the ball mover system, and it was CADed up! Here's a render!

Our programers also are working hard on fine tuning the tracking software for a turret, we believe we will  be using one, one more test tomorrow will tell us for sure.

-D

Day 19

Another much needed day off! But I contacted our powder coating sponsor and ordered the powder! We'll be using Metallic Orange, Metallic Black, and what I like to call, "Sexy Grey". Our sponsor is a local pair of guys that are a couple of the nicest guys in the world. If you're in the CT area, they are always willing to put some color to your parts for a reasonable price! Here's there website! Mrpowdercoat.com

-D

Day 18

Today we worked a little more on finishing up deciding on what the final robot will use for a shooter, a turret, single wheeled shooter, or double wheeled shooter. Here's a render of where the robot CAD stands right now.

We have another day off tomorrow, then Thursday we will work on deciding the final shooter and figuring out what will be used to move the basketball from the intake to the shooter.

-D

Day 17

Today we had a day off, need to rest up before the last half of the build season!

-D

Day 16

Today we tested the pneumatic bridge tipper design and it worked flawlessly! Here's a couple pictures and a video of the design! Notice we got three robots on the bridge again!

I've also been working on our robot release video! Here's what I've got so far! (Youtube fudged up the music, the pictures will match up to the music when the videos completed!)

-D

Day 15

Today, we finished some of the CADing on the final robot, and started making parts! I'm very glad we've made it to this stage in the game! Here's a picture of the no where near finished CAD.

The bridge tipper, balencer, bump crosser is expected to be changed! Possible with pneumatics! With one last test tomorrow we'll have the answer!

-D

Day 14

Well, we've accomplished what some people have said too be impossible, we drove, and balanced three robots on the bridge with a completely legal strategy. There was much debate on whether or not to release a video to the public, but alas the final decisions was to put it up. Here is the video.

Up next? How about four? ;)

-D

Day 13

Lots of progress was made today on our prototype, "z-plate". We completed the first iteration and put it to the test. The Z-plate is basically what it states, it is a plate we plan to be able to flip down, and latch onto our alliance partners robot, this will enable the end robot on the bridge to drive a little bit farther out. We're getting very close to getting three robots balanced on that ramp, my fingers are crossed we don't have a snow day tomorrow so we can get back into the shop. Here's a picture of the first, "Z-plate" prototype, and a little test to see how far we could get the robot out there, surprisingly, it gave us an extra 4-6 inches of room, I really really want to get those three robots up there, hopefully it will be worth the wait.

Another little update, I e-mailed our newest sponsor, a powder coating place a couple of towns over, and they're looking forward to do our parts. They even offered a tour, and let us spray our own parts. I'm pretty excited! Fingers crossed we have everything done with enough time to let them do it!

-D

Day 12

Our second day off of the build season, look for more stuff tomorrow!

-D

Day 11

Today we got a lot done, significant progress was made by the Chairman's team, our FRC design team finished up our two wheel shooter, and started a second, one wheel shooter. And our programming team finished up the automatic shifting code. Here's a picture of our two wheel shooter and a video of our robot shifting automatically.

We hooked the shooter CIMS up to some Victors, then to a PIC controller, to control the shooters speed. I'm pretty happy with the results, we learned a lot about how to ball reacts to being tossed so far. The wear on the ball affects the results a lot, if there is a lot of wear, the ball won't travel as far, and will drift like craaaaazy. 

-D

Day 10/Component Engineers Tour

Today we were privileged with the invitation to go visit one of our major sheet metal and CNC part sponsors shops. Touring that facility was like being 5 years old in a candy shop, nothings better in my mind then big machines that make robot parts! Pictures are below.

A warm welcome to the team.

A worker showing some prints for GUS parts that are being machined.

A working describing to the GUS team how WIRE EDM tooling works.

A completed part for this years robot!

One of my favorite machines, a 300 ton hydraulic press. 

Once we got back from the tour we continued work on our prototypes and practiced getting two robots on the bridge, it seems to be a lot easier than I first anticipated. Below is a picture of our two wheel shooter with two CIMs on it, I don't think we'll be using two CIMs, but remember, it's just a prototype.

And here's just a quick clip of us balancing two robots on the bridge.

-D

Day 9 1/2

Thanks to Facebook, E-mail, and Skype, the FRC design team is able to collaborate and continue designing even after the shop lights go out. After playing with the Lunacy robot, the design team has decided to design a short and wide, 6wd, 6 inch Colsons, 4 Cims, Two speeds(6ft/sec-16ft/sec), and drop center drivetrain. Here is a screenshot of the first designs.

-D

Day 9

Today some more progress was made with prototyping, and our programmer worked hard and wrote a code for automatic shifting. We also held a full team meeting to discus VEX championships and whether or not that would be possible, the answer is still unclear.

-D

Day 8 QCC VEX Comeptition

Today GUS took home the gold at the QCC VEX competition, it was quite a nail biter through the majority of the competition, but the motto, "Never give up" stayed strong until the very end, congrats to everyone on the team, awesome job today!

-D

Day 7

With QCC tomorrow, the tides quickly changed to VEX, we worked on the robot and got a little driver practice in. Good luck to everyone competing! Here's our finished robot as of tonight!

-D

Day 6

Today we finished making the bridge react like the bridges on the field, which took a lot longer than I excepted, and played with the idea about putting three robots on a bridge, we conducted 4 tests, and put the robots in every configuration. Going three robots all narrow will be difficult, but it can happen, maybe. My bet is we will be doing a wide and short robot this year, maybe 6 wheel drive, maybe 6 inch colsons. Nothing defiant though, still a lot of testing before we can finalize the drive-train. Here is a picture of three narrow/long robots on the bridge and a video of us having some fun with the Lunacy robot. My votes to just replicate the 09 bot and sleep for the next 5 weeks, you tell me.

-D

Day 5

Today the design team sat down for some more discussion on final robot design, after watching a lot of the prototypes, we've decided we need to scale up the two wheeled shooter to get a better idea of how it reacts opposed to the lunacy shooter. Here's a quick clip of the lunacy shooter and the scaled up two wheeled shooter.

We also finished our bridge, it needs a little modification to act like the bridges on the field, but the base is finished, we also finished the top basket, which is the one we'll be aiming at for the majority of the season.

 

-D

Day 4

Today we modified our 2009 competition robot to shoot the basketballs, it was as easy as adding VEX spacers to push the back lexan flap out to compress the balls a little more before shooting.

After seeing the results from the Lunacy shooter, we decided to try a two wheel shooter, so a few kids whipped up a 1/3 scale prototype made out of VEX material, if tests go as planned, we will scale it up.

We took a walk down to the gym to figure out some up the best angles to shoot the balls, and see how the ball reacted against the hoop.

-D

Day 3

Our first day off to get some sleep before this crazy week really gets going.

-D

Day 2

Today we sat down and discussed design ideas with the whole team, this year GUS is striving extremely hard to make sure every kid on the team has a say in the design, and a hand in building the robot. Our first game element was completed and work has started on the other.

From the programmers standpoint, they worked with the kitbot to start prototyping so ideas. They also brainstormed some coding ideas, such as an automatic shifter, a turret that would be able to track the retroreflective tape, and a sensor that would light up some LEDs when the bridge is balance within 5°. More work is to come.

Today was also our annual Kickoff Pasta Dinner Fundraiser! It was extremely successful and we even had a few big names come threw the doors to support the team. Thank you to everyone that helped out and made this possible, awesome job guys!

-D

Welcome to Manch-Vegas!

Today was quite a day, Rebound Rumble is this years game, and idea's are already flowing through everyones head.

We filmed and I edited our annual Field Interaction Video, which can be found here. It basically just gives a first hand tour of the field and elements. We will be meeting all of this week to discuss design ideas and start prototyping. I'll have more for you tomorrow.

-D

The Calm Before the Storm

Four day's to go and GUS is steadily working to get ready for this years FRC season. The shop is almost cleaned, the Bridgeports and lathes have been tuned and cleaned, and everyone is eagerly anticipating the new game.

This weekend I will travel to Manchester with a couple mentors and teammates to see the field for kick-off, i'm very excited. I will keep this updated through-out the season as much as I can, this should be an interesting experience. GUS will be competing at the CT Regional, WPI, and if we're lucky, St.Louis. Fingers are crossed that this is a good year, we're going in ready to win, because, like a wise mentor once told me, "Are you competing to make it to Einstein, or to go home?" That is my motivation.

-D