Free Build #2

Our free build is a bit iffy right now. We are on the idea of an arm that sucks up the tennis balls and puts them on a conveyor belt to the basket. The major problems we are crossing right now is getting a working arm to bring in the tennis balls. We plan to move the wheels further out for a farther range. Our budget is pretty good, around 110 shoebucks, even after the expensive conveyor belt links. Group Question: Our group is working together quite well. Not many fights are had, aside from the occasional crazy Cyrus rant. Jenny is very good for coming up with ideas. Cyrus is good for building structured frames. Andre is a good driver and screwing in the tiny bolts and screws.

Relay Build

This time limit challenge was stressful, but was a unique twist to a regular build. Sectioning the bot was an important thing to help us succeed and not waste time on picking up where another person left off. We probably would have sectioned it even more to maximize efficiency in our creation process. Working with a partner made the process incredibly faster. It allowed mistakes to be prevented and fixed faster. It also helped us win the awesome motor.

Free Build

We picked a direct drive train for our robot because we wanted to make it small. We also didn't need to go to fast through the course, so we focused on turning more than speed. The direct drive allowed us to have two, strong wheels. I don't believe there were any disadvantages to this drive train in the situation. If we were to put this bot into a race, we would have probably come in at last place due to no gearing. I think our bot was perfect as it was, other than the trouble we had with the faulty mini battery-packs.

Shoebucks?

Tumbler Vs. Protobot

Creating an inventory for the tumbler was stressful. I myself made a few mistakes, and had to redo the part I did. The protobot with its more lax inventory rules made it much easier. Since we have already gotten the hang of it, it was much better. When building the tumbler, we had a few problems with the placement of some of the screws and we ended up having to take it apart to move a couple things. When we got around to the protobot though, we made sure we were much more accurate. The tumbler had a very stable, easy to repair/tighten structure. For some reason on the protobot, the pieces kept falling off, even though we tightened them as much as we could. The build is also more complex so it takes a bit longer to find what is broken/loose and repair it. I don't think there is much we could have done differently to make the bot better.

Building the Tumbler: Day 2

If I could go back and change our inventory, there would be some changes I would make. I would make sure I got the motor extenders. We also took the wrong pieces. I'd also make sure to check all the pieces over again to see if I got the right ones.

Building theTumbler: Day 1

Today we finished collecting all of our parts for the build (Yet we still forgot/mistakenly grabbed around 4 pieces). After a few errors like this, things finally started rolling. Cyrus and I started the construction of the left half of the car, while Andre and Jenny worked on the right half. Some of the picture steps were at a confusing angle, but we still figured it out. The team is doing well. Tomorrow we hope to finish the robot.