FIRST Robotics - Right Up Close

The team really does not need my dubious help these days so I'm just hanging around.  I occasionally take pictures of things that amuse me.

This is obviously deep inside the innards of our robot.  Nobody could remember the gear reduction of that winch motor!  So what to do?  There were markings - of course on the under side - and just barely enough clearance to slip a phone under and snap a pic!  Note that we've also put a heat sink on the motor....it has overheated under high stress conditions in the past.

You have to be able to quickly change your bumper color from red to blue and back again.  Our solution are these handy detent pins that clip through a piece of aluminum bolted to the frame.  The bit of elastic is a hair band.  It keeps the pin from working loose.  It is handy to have girls on the team.  Oh and one or two of our guys also have rather long hair.

Just wrong.  I was told this was just a way to keep track of the allen key set, they were not actually going to fire up the impact driver and use it.

Just a few days until our next and presumably last tournament.  So we invited two other teams to come and practice.  Real world vibes.  Many good things happened and were met with applause.  A few things broke and were fixed by contributions from many.

Here's a picture with several silly things going on.  It's fine to practice with the three robots on your side just running back and forth, but without any "traffic" much less defense it is not realistic.  So we had a trash can on wheels and a tote on a dolly.  We'd push them out into the path of the robots and make them evade.....or nudge out of the way.  In the distance is the student at the game piece drop off station.  The wooden structure in front of him rather looks like a pulpit and the arm gestures that signal a successful grab look much like a benediction!  Ave Robotum!