FIRST Robotics 2026 - Week One Report

Pictures and video from our first week of build season:

Old robots being taken apart.  We need those parts, and new builders learn.  If you see how something comes apart you should understand how it went together.

An early build season task is always making accurate field elements.  We once torpedoed our entire season when a game piece delivery component was made with a ramp that was about 15 degrees from the spec.  Never again.

I never know how to illustrate what software does.  It's basically magic.  We thought this was going to be a weak spot on the team this year, but through a combination of alumni helping teach, a couple of smart 8th graders getting the call up to the Big Leagues, and another student with multiple talents helping out....looks promising.

OK, but where's Robot doing Robot things?

Intake prototype.  It has to be able to "touch it own it" for lots of game pieces.  We hope to have a capacity of 40.

And, once you have them, we need to be able to shoot them accurately on target.  Lots of 'em.  Fast.   In this one we got 8 balls airborne in 3 seconds.  Early "reliability" tests were hitting about 80% on target.  Not bad.

You may notice that we have adults holding this prototype down for testing.  It's not secured down, and it has a couple of flywheels that have a lot of stored energy.  There's a time to be a little extra cautious, and the end of a long Saturday session is one of them.

Of course consistency will be important, and it would be best to be launching them in pairs.  So a feed system is our biggest remaining challenge.   

Oh, and about flywheels.  We just happened to have a couple on hand.  They came off the fall Robot School machine which was designed and built with the sneaking suspicion that this would be a year to launch things.