2010 Build Season

We are halfway through build season!  Ack!!!
Yep, that pretty much sums it up.
Before I start on today, I have a leftover from yesterday. Peter published his white paper on the Chief Delphi Forums.  Here is the link: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/papers/2324

This paper explains how to use the ellipse detection software with the camera to determine the robot's position relative to the target.
Using the FRC Camera in conjunction with the NI Vision software, the robot’s position relative to a vision target can be determined. The Vision software can detect ellipses in the camera image and measure their major and minor diameters. The ellipse detection software can thus measure the apparent deformation of the target by the camera’s changing angle relative to the target, which can be used to determine the robot’s position.

Pretty cool, huh?!?

Food for today! Mentor Karen brought bagels and donuts this morning.

Lunch was brought Jason's family and was subs on wonderfully fresh rolls, served with chips, snicker-doodles and bar cookies.

Dinner had an oriental flair, which was my special request.  Crystal's family provided three dishes to choose from:  A Pad Thai styled noodle medley, rice noodles with shrimp and shitake mushrooms, and a fried rice with crab and lots of vegetables!  There were also vegetarian versions.  The dishes were served with crunchy noodles. Dessert was oranges and peanut butter stuffed pretzels.

Here and there updates:

Field team:  One goal is completely finished with the padding and chains.  The other three goals have been built (wood frames). 

The drive team spray painted frame pieces in the great colors of red and black.

The programming team is working on the kicker code and has Thunder Plucker back up and running with all plundered pieces returned.

The electrical team has finished drawing some nebulous part for the control box in Inventor.  Mike H. just kept calling it "the part," so I'm not actually sure what part it is. Maybe it is the mystery part for the control box. Hmmm.

Quentin brought in his Rolling Thunder Breakaway t-shirt logo design.  Mr. Weisbrod happened to be here and was able to provide some suggestions for some design modifications.  We will see the final versions on Tuesday.

The Mechanical team spent the day in the meat locker working on Inventor, trying to get the material lists made so we could order parts.  It sure seems like there aren't enough hours in the day to get all the design planning done!

Lots of students taking tests today, I sure missed parentor Sharon! 

It seems like it was a long weekend and I'm ready to have a night off!  See you Tuesday!
Photo's of the Day!

Caption Photo#1:  SHECCA!




Caption Photo#2:  I've been framed!

There is so much going on during the build times now.  I think that is the hardest thing to capture in the blog.  Students are familiar with the rooms and some of the tasks so that now in addition to the main sub-team groups, there are little pockets of students busy on tasks scattered everywhere.  Today was more challenging for me since I was trying to accomplish my own tasks with students as well as pay attention to the team as a whole.  I'm not a good multi-tasker.  That's actually an understatement.  I do not multitask. But I do like routines...

Here is our food for today!  Saturdays and Sundays are so much fun food-wise since we have all of our meals together.

Thanks to Mentors Larry and Leann for bringing in the Donuts and Bagels and a tote of Coffee.

Lunch was sub sandwiches care of Alex V.'s  and Mentor Dave V.'s family!  They were served with all the fixin's, a tossed salad, potato chips and cookies!

We had a mid-afternoon snack courtesy of Mentor Tom K's wife, who brought us up a collection of leftover baked goods from the PHS Fantastic Finds Bake Sale!

Dinner!  We had a birthday extravaganza meal!  To celebrate Shauna's 10010th birthday (That's in binary, for all you non-geeks reading this.  Get out your old base 2 memories and see if you can figure it out), her parants treated the team to Sticky Lips (Restaurant) Barbecue!  We had massive quantities of pulled pork with barbecue sauce, rolls for sandwiches, pasta salads and birthday cake!  For the vegetarians, there was barbecued tofu "steak," and a pasta salad with veggies mixed in.  Of course we sang Happy Birthday!
Saturdays include an Integration Meeting, so thanks to Supermom Val here are the notes:
Mechanical lift - There will now probably be 4 telescoping tubes (not 3). There are 3 possible hook designs. To do: make sure all pieces of the winch are in Inventor, assemble it all, and figure out the mounting point. Need to order stuff from MacMaster-Carr.
Mechanical kicker - Most stuff is in Inventor. Motors, beater bar, and ball stopper are in Inventor. Materials can be ordered today even before drawings are finalized.
Electrical - Went through old BoM and started modifying it. Added stuff to shopping list. Took off Victors and added spike relays instead for kicker (we probably don't need speed adjustment there). Need to correlate with Mechanical - sensors for kicker position, winch,etc.
Controls - Nailed down a rough idea of what the controls will be. Can do the inlay mechanical piece. Need to correlate with Programming to make sure all the controls are OK.
Programming - Reverted to base code and no CAN bus errors! The robot now drives using PWM. Base code for the upper mechanism was started on Thursday.Need to think about grouping sensors for driver feedback - all kicker sensors, all winch sensors, etc. - because there's not enough I/O for all the sensors.
Drive-train - Parts are in, robot drive-train will be built today! Weight estimate is about 50 lbs. for the drive-train.  Brackets need to go on the bumpers this year, because the allowed bumper weight has been increased to 20 lbs. That saves weight on the drive-train.
Speaking of Val and our other great parent-mentors.  Did I mention that we had a new term for them?  They are now "parentors"?  Our other possible word was just "pentors," with parent-mentors of returning students called re-pentors.  That one didn't make the cut. So parentors they are!

Time now for the seen and heard section:

I'm so glad for the input from all the students and mentors as I take my blogging notes each day.  I really enjoy hearing from Mentor Bear.  He always give me some unique insight to write about or at least takes the time to translate the activities of the programming sub-team into terms that I can understand. 

Bear's opening comment today, "We have tunes in the shop now."  The back story was that from the Fantastic Finds sale, Bear had purchased a cheap set of speakers.  So thanks to Bear, we had "tunes!"  I found myself at certain points of the day enjoying those tunes!

As far as the programmers go, they were able to complete enough programming to drive the base robot with the joysticks.  They have much to do, but always seem to be asking for more to be put on their to-do lists.  For pure entertainment in a very bewildering way, I will go into the alcove that we use for testing their code with the robot and listen to the talk of the programmers.  Mixed in with the whole new language is a steady banter and for the most part good-natured ribbing..."what do you call an X-box that doesn't play games?"  "Yours" came back the jab to a student who was inquiring about ways to fix his X-box. Ah, programming humor!

In the controls group, Rachel was working with Mentor Eric A. on using a schematic drawing program to do the detailed wiring diagram of our control box.  Eric had used the program as an afterthought lat year, but this year is trying to use it as a tool to assist in the control board wiring.

There are many new parts in the shop.  Matthieu was leading the electrical group in setting up relays for the new motors being used for the kicker.  Tresten was filing the rough bumps off of the encoders so they could be mounted on the drive-train, the transmissions were being mounted to the motors which in turn were being mounted to the motor mounts. A lot of drive-train fitting was going on, including rebuilding the drive wheels.

Computers were busy as Inventor designs and detailing was still progressing.  Bills of Materials (BoMs) were being prepared so the our lists of items to purchase could be finalized.  The Chairman's essay was being cut and stitched - its still very fat, but is gradually coming down to size!  Val was updating e-mail lists, parentor Lee was helping me tweak the formatting of the blog while giving a tour of the shop, and Team Leader Larry was working on Rally preparations (Feb 21 is the date for that!)

Team game and tool tests were being proctored by parentor Sharon.  The field crew bought the carpet and carpeted a bump for the drive-train sub-team to use.  The memory foam was cut with a hack-saw.  And oscilloscope was being used to scale and calibrate the encoders for the wheels.

Visitors today included Shauna's grandparents (to eat birthday cake) and Rob, a young mentor who always takes on the task of helping a rookie team each year. This year he is helping the rookie team from Pittsford.  He will also be back next week to help us cook bacon when we have breakfast for dinner!

A bonus today  -  here is the recipe from Matthieu's mom for the great vegetarian past dish we had earlier this week!

PASTA WITH CHICK-PEAS AND SPINACH

4 oz medium pasta shells
1 pkg (10 oz) fresh baby spinach, coarsely chopped
1 can (19 oz) chick-peas, drained and rinsed
1 clove garlic, chopped
½ cup vegetable or chicken stock
3 tbsp olive oil
¼ tsp salt and pepper
juice of 1 lemon and lemon rind
¼ cup Pecorino Romano cheese

In large pot of boiling water, cook pasta until tender but firm.Drain. Add chopped spinach. In food processor, purée the chick-peas with the rest of the ingredients, except cheese. Stir into drained pasta, mix in cheese and serve. Makes 3 servings.

Photo of the Day!  (note:  Today there were so many opportunities for great photos!  From Shauna's cake to Crystal's pink bunny and static hair, to the pattern on the oscilloscope, thanks for all of your ideas!)

Caption: Larry fueling up for the day!

Oh My!  It is snowing!  I am surprised with many students are here considering how bad it is!  We are very used to snow here, but this was different, this was white-out snow!  Since we have been in the school, the maintenance crew has been snow-blowing the entrances!

What we ate for Dinner!  Matthieu's family came and joined us for a delicious meal. They made a chicken stew with carrots and celery served with potatoes. There was a gourmet vegetarian selection with whole wheat pasta, a chickpea, spinach, lemon and pecorino romano.  We also had bread and butter, cookies and soda slushies.

There was an Integration meeting before dinner.

Team Leader Larry is expecting full designs completed by the end of the night Saturday.

For the Mechanical team, the beater bar works well when the helix is pointing toward the center.  They will need something more sticky to create more friction.  They tested the beater bar with the Fisher Price motor. Larry said it was time to stop prototyping the bar until the beater bar is put into Inventor. The main part of the kicker is moving along in Inventor, they are incorporating some of the work from last night and will be prepared to order parts by Saturday.  Hanging / lifting mechanism: the tubes are drawn with correct dimentsions the hook needs to be redrawn, maybe in several configurations so the it can go to Harris.  They are working on the mounting method and may want an arch for mounting the hanger.  Mech 2 is adding a bar on the back for stability, and may be able to work that into the mounting.  

Electrical had to some some wiring to use the PWM cables.  They are considering using jaguars where victors are currently used, but Larry needs them to start to get a good estimate of the weights.  Larry also reminded them that it was time to start the BoM.

The controls sub-team is working on sheet metal piece, which should be ready to send out tonight.  Buttons came in last night.

The Programming sub-team started converting to PWM, but still getting CAN bus errors.  They will revert to base code tonight and test to see if CAN bus errors go away.  They need code to make the robot drive and work the kicker.  There will be a sensor for the kicker position - may be able to start coding for that.

Field: The foam is in for the field! If they can't get to anything else, they will work on cutting the foam for the goals.  Need carpet for at least one bump, to test whether the robot can climb the bump - this is a priority!

Team meeting notes:

It's Thursday!  Safety Talk Day!  Tonight's topic is on the hazards of stored energy, including electrical, pneumatic, gravity and the most likely hazard for our robot, our kicker mechanism and the electromagnet release system with the stretchy bands.  It is time to start to carefully observe the Robot On / Robot Off protocol.

Larry will be starting to sit down with students to get them registered on the FIRST student database.  Parents will need to go online and register as well to approve the student registration. 

Larry discussed a concern that some students feel they are not being included in the design process.  He reminded the students that they also need to take the initiative to give input and make sure the mentors or other team members take the time to hear and listen. 

Crystal has set up a community service event at Intervol for Wednesday, February 10 from 4-6 pm.  Intervol is a place that collects surplus medical supplies and the team goes in and helps to sort them.  With the earthquake relief going on in Haiti, they have been receiving lots of donations to sort.

The tool test and team tests are available to be taken! I'm waiting to hear who gets the first perfect score.  Drive team and pit crew applications should be available on Saturday.  There was a lot of interest from the students in applying for these teams.

Seen and heard:  Taking the test was a very popular fill-in activity tonight.  There was some gloating going on over the test scores, but I won't give any names, Val.  The Inventor stations were full tonight so I'm sure much progress was made on the final design.  The control team was trying to figure out which button functions were needed and wanted, the field team was seen lying down on the job, as they helped break in the memory foam for the goals.  Loud noises were coming from the shop where parts were being cut, ground and filed.

The Pittsford team did not make it out in this weather!  I hope they can reschedule for Saturday or another day soon. 

Saturday will be a big day for us!  A finished design will be in the books!  Larry said to make it so!!

Penfield High School Reminder:  The Fantastic Finds sale will be held Saturday in the Cafeteria starting at 9 am.  This is the PTSA's largest fundraiser, a giant "garage" sale.  If you are in the area, come and shop and stop in and visit us!

Photo of the day!  So many good opportunities, but here is the one I've picked!  Caption: It's the Burger King!

What we ate for Dinner! Jacob K.'s family provided dinner and it was another great meal! We had pasta in two shapes, with two sauces: a tomato sauce and an Alfredo sauce. We had MEATBALLS! And warm garlic bread!  And a deluxe tossed salad with broccoli!  The dessert was cookies baked by Jacob himself!  Two varieties:  chocolate chip and molasses crinkles!

We had alumni visitors galore tonight!  Rika joined us for dinner and ended up staying and helping the Chairman's essay review and editing.  Annie came and spent some time with the controls sub-team.  And then Ted came for just a quick visit with his friend Tim!  It's great to see all the alumni, and especially fun to watch the reunions, sometimes boisterous, with the current students.  Back when she was a student, there was nothing quite as amazing as a full bore Rika hug-slam, and to see those reenacted tonight brought back memories!

Remember Team Leader Larry's mutterings from last night?  Something about nothing being done...well I think I need to explain just a little, because although I love Larry's pessimism,  I think progress can still be seen.  The drive-train is not finished, that's true.  But we have to wait for the Banebot transmissions and they are due in tomorrow or Friday.  So on Saturday, significant progress should be made on the drive-train.  And we don't have a final design for the robot yet, but we have a considerable amount of the design work done in Inventor, and have started the process of producing pieces that will validate the design and may even be able to be used on the actual robot.  For example, the kicker is going to be powered by two window-lift motors, and tonight they mounted the motors in the current design configuration which will allow them to verify the operation of the kicker and provided a chance to further refine the packaging of those components.  The electrical team is confident of their plans and other than modifying the board to fit in a final configuration, and make it much more neat and tidy, its pretty complete.  The control box is moving along, joystick are mounted and the rest of the plans are well under way.  And programming code is actively being written and tested each night.

But Larry is a bit in the doldrums.  He knows that compared to last year we are way behind.  And based on that experience, he is worried.  A little revealed team fact - we actually put an incomplete robot in the crate last year and finished building it on the first day of our first regional.  That process was agony and I'm sure Larry does not want the team to go through that again.  But as one of our safety questions on the team test suggests, the only thing that actually has to be brought by a team to competition is...wait, if I tell the answer, I'll be giving away a piece of the test!  But the reminder is that it's not just about the robot, I see engaged students, student who are learning and trying new things each night.  I hope they are inspired students. And Larry - I remember Kim going through what you are going through at some point each build season.  You have our admiration for filling in her footsteps and shouldering the momentous task of being our team leader.

Some interesting things going on tonight: 

Last night the back burner had two things place on it, tonight it got even more crowded back there.  The CAN bus is now a can't bus.  Even Calvin programming sideways couldn't solve the problem. Since the CAN bus problems were taking too long to fix, the programming team has determined that they need to switch gears and work on programming a PWM system.  Tonight, they did the first test of the PWM motor drive.

Students started taking the tool test and the game test a little more actively tonight.  So far the average number wrong on the tool test seems to be two.  I didn't get any feedback on the game test, but I had heard that it isn't nearly the stumper that it has been in past years. 

Pool noodles are out in the shop, but they are not being used for bumpers. They are being wound in Rolling Thunder red tubing in a helical fashion.  Ah!  They are beater bars in process!  I've volunteered to cover them with black spandex once they are finalized. 

In addition to supervising the team test takers, Supermom Sharon was seen in the shop on safety glass patrol.  Later she was found overlooking the online shopping for FLARE and award items that was being done by Alexis and Karen.  Hey Leann!  They found some stickers for Larry!

The Inventor design work was being done in the other computer room, where there were less distractions.  The base robot design now has some tentative mountings for the grappling hook mechanism.  The field team was here as well working on some calculations for field pieces.

Mentor Leann and I reviewed some ideas of things for the Leadership team including plans for celebrating Engineer Week in February and for updating the business plan executive review.  Superdad Lee will assist with updating some of the documentation in the business plan notebook.

Tomorrow we will have some visitors from the Rookie team from Pittsford!  That will be fun!

Photo of the Day!  Caption:  The Shopping Seniors!

You can always tell the it is midterms week by the students energy levels at the team meetings that week.  Most of the students have only intermittent tests and no classes this week. They seem to have a frenetic activity about them, like they have been caged at home all day and are anxious to be out and about. And it seemed like everyone was here for a while; the computer lab was packed!

What we ate for dinner!  Thanks to Mike H.'s family we had chicken stroganoff with a choice of white rice or egg noodles, with a vegetarian casserole option.  It was accompanied by a tossed salad, bread and butter, and cookies and oreo "truffles" in lovely shades of red and blue.

Team meeting notes:  Reminder for team members:  Travel forms are due by January 29th.  No form, no trip.
Significant news on the robot design:  We had been planning on using an electronic clutch to make kicker strength adjustments, but after a careful analysis of the rules have determined that this may not be allowed depending on interpretation.  Rather than risk the mechanism being disqualified, we are going to spend some time tonight reviewing the alternatives and make a decision on a revised design.

Tuesday evenings start with the integration meeting @ 5 pm.  Val has, to my relief, once again, taken the notes for the meeting. 
Drive-train - With the real wheels on the robot, it was tested in the cafeteria.  They are anxious to test it on real carpet, and to get the real components in for the frame so the wheel brackets won't bend during testing.  The parts were reported to have shipped on Friday. They need the programming team to fix the periodic stopping as a result of a CAN bus problem.
Mechanical 1 - As reported from Sunday, they are going with a winch and telescoping device. They have three 19 inch telescoping tubes drawn in Inventor, and with the hook the weight estimate is 2.5 lbs.  The righting mechanism is on the back burner for now.  (Blogger's note:  I hope it comes back to the front burner!  I love the idea that if the robot ever tipped that these little arms would shoot out and flip it back over!)
Mechanical 2 - The time was spent to put the electronic clutch on the kicking mechanism, and programming was ready to start to work on making the kicker adjustable.  But wait, the team learns that the clutch is not legal based on this year's Breakaway rules.  The design work on the kicker was about 50% done in Inventor, but fortunately didn't include the actuator.  The team will start the design of the front beater bar tonight.
Electrical  - They are still waiting to hear where the electrical controls are going to be located and how much space will be allocated on the chassis.
Field - A full goal is assembled.  They are cutting the pipes for the tower / ball return system (measure twice, cut once!).  They may try to obtain a small section of carpet that can be used for robot testing until the full field is available.
Controls - They are ready to finalize their plans, but need a "button count."  They will be working on Inventor tonight.
Programming - The CAN buses are spewing error messages, and the team needs to see why.  They have been working on upping the camera resolution, but no luck yet; they still can't see the target well from a distance.  More back-burnering!  The camera work is being paused to dedicate the time to robot code!

Dinner break actually goes here.

After dinner wanderings:  Several of the students seem to be working on test preparations, a few on physics.  It was a good thing that Mrs. Latona, who just happens to teach physics, was here for our meeting time tonight! 

Peter, with the guidance of Mentor Bear, was working on a mathematically technical document that discusses the methodology to determine the position of the robot relative to the target based on calculations of the size and shape of the camera image.  Bear is encouraging Peter to post this as a "white paper" on the Chief Delphi Forums. I hope that we can get enough resolution on our camera so that we can use the information to guide our robot's kicking skills.

The electrical sub-team is back investigating pneumatics in case they are needed on the robot to assist the kicking or hanging  (or self-righting) mechanism.

The programming team is working on identifying the source of the CAN bus errors.  They have the robot out of the shop, and when they drive it the wheels stop and start in a rather intermittent fashion. 

The mechanical teams are scattered, one group is working on some prototype pieces, and the rest is is working on Inventor.  The telescoping pole and hook are visible on one terminal, and the kicker is on another.  Alex W. can take the image of the kicker and animate it to show the motion.  I find that quite fascinating!

The controls sub-team has updated the dimensions for some of the controls in Inventor.  They are ready to cut the holes in the sheet metal so the control buttons can be mounted!

After spending some time planning and building, the field sub-team is preparing another shopping list, this time for ball return items.  Note for next year:  if you like to shop, be on the field sub-team.  Well, that's if you like to shop at Home Depot and Lowes, that is.

Mentor Leann has been spending some time updating the student achievements with new build season hours.  New totals:  1338.5 student hours, 1190.5 mentor hours, for a total, so far, of 2529 hours.  Team Leader Larry is overheard muttering, "That's a lot of hours for having nothing done."

Speaking of having nothing done... we needed to make a decision on a new kicker mechanism.  And we did.  The new choice is a electromagnetic release system.  More in the coming days on our newest feature, I'm sure.

Photo of the Day!  (I actually took some cool photos of the team working with the pneumatics and of the programming team with the proto-bot, but in the end it was the school lockers that won. They are sealed for mid-term week.) 

Caption: An interesting use of zip-ties!