Sunday, January 17. 2010
Ok, so today I’m a slacker and made it to Robotics in the middle of the afternoon. So I have to give a “hats off” to those that were here first thing this morning. Mike H. and Mentor Mark were the first to arrive at 10, by the time Mentor Dave V. arrived with the donuts and bagels, a small contingent was present. What we ate for lunch! Alex C.’s family brought lunch: pulled chicken (and a vegetarian substitute) and rolls, carrots, chips and Doritos, and a delicious milky-way cake and really awesome chocolate chip cookies!
Mr. Weisbrod stopped in today for a while to check on us. We love to see our teacher advisors! Mrs. Latona was here on Thursday and I forgot to give her a mention!
Updates! The base construction on all of the bumps is done! Yesterday a tower was put together, but I missed it. It has been pulled apart for storage, but the next time they put it together, I’ll try to get a photo. The tridents have also been put together. For some reason they are only 5 feet long, so they might need to be redone.
The Mech1 has sketches on the smart board and is discussing of the amounts of compressed air needed to lift the robot and what would happen if another robot tried to hang on us. Mentor Tom K. is doing an amazing job of making physics come to life and there are free-body diagrams all over the place showing the impacts of friction and mass on the force needed to lift a robot.
The Mech2 team is tweaking their prototype. Every time I look at it, it is a little more complicated. It appears to be close to meeting all the requirements – the foot retracts in under 2 seconds, the distance and arc are good, the total height of the mechanism is within the prescribed envelope, and so on. The prototype robot spent some time kicking balls over the bumps in the cafeteria.
Mike H. on the electrical team spent some of the time drawing wires, and being frustrated about drawing wires. The team is starting to plan how the control system will fit into the drive-train. The controls team is continuing to model the components, picked out buttons and ordered toggle switches.
The programming team worked on the software to move the camera, pan and tilt, and has the joysticks enabled to move the camera. Andy is writing code to allow the robot to drive forward in a perfectly straight line, including the compensation needed to correct for the robots mechanical movements. Alex C. is working on the custom dashboard for the classmate PC.
Mentor Tom C. has spent the whole afternoon in the closet again. I think he is getting it put back in order but is really hoping that everyone will start to do their part to put things back where they belong.
Crystal is taking some time to work on the team e-mail before we all head home for a day off!
Happy Martin Luther King Day and I’ll be back on Tuesday!
Photo of the Day! Just because I’m making the rules, there are TWO photos!
