Team 3113 Wins the 2011 South Central PA Qualifier

details to come....

Bot Specs (York)

Matt setting up the next test.
Thanks to the Reidy's for buying food to feed the beasts
Holden tweaking the program.
Bot going up the bridge.
Bot scoring in rolling goal.
Holden double checking the program.
Bot testing.
Matt fixing the bot.
The "little guys" working on the bull-nose.
Bot testing.
Our baton dispensing system located at the front of the bot.
Samantha, located at the top of our bot.
Our conveyor to dispense batons.
Our battery pack located below the conveyor.
Our baton collecting spinners.
Baton dispensing setup.
Drive system.
Secondary bridge dropper at the front of the bot.
Our main bridge dropper located at the back of our bot.
Bull-nose rolling goal collecting system use to score in rolling goal.

1/28/2011

Logan, Connor, Sean, Matt, James, Holden, Mr.Pontius, Andrew,Jarid, Mr.Lanterman, Brad

Today is our last day till our competition, everyone except Jarid and Mr.Laterman are staying over to get a good night rest till tommorow.
A VERY UNLUCKY THING HAPPENED, MY BROTHER AND OUR MAIN DRIVER, SCOTT HAS FALLEN ILL. SO OUR MAIN DRIVER IS ANDREW AND OUR SECONDARY IS SEAN. Despite
our problems we hope to have the same result as the MD competition.
Today we are testing like CRAZY and our new drivers are practicing.

1/27'/2011

Sean, Holden, Jared, James, Mr.Pontious, Andrew, Scott, Connor, Matt, Logan, Brad, Mr. Lanterman.

Today we are testing our robot Autonomous and testing driving up the ramp.
We are also testing putting batons in the rolling goal.

Things done in previous meetings

• V system to catch rolling goal was changed into a bull-nose.
• A servo to put bridge down from front.
• The use of many servo's.
• Re-wiring the new bot systems.
• We got rid of the lower baton collector because we do not plan on collecting from the lower baton dispenser.
• Rotation sensors attached for more accurate autonomous movement.
• Fixed the servo wire on the bull-nose.
• Programming the new servo's.
  

January 16, 2011

Brad, Connor, Scott, Sean, Holden, James, Mr.Lanterman, Jared, Mr.Pontius, Andrew, Matt
Scott, Matt, and Andrew are wiring the new bot because of our changes.
The programming team are setting up the new controller layout.
The servo was twitching uncontrollably because only the negatave wire was working.
We are innovating our bull-nose.
The middle gear is hitting the mountain while we are traveling over it.
During testing we found these problems....

• Wheels and conveyor where backwards
• The bridge servo did not have enough power to put the bridge down
• Bull-nose needs to go higher
  

January 1, 2011 Happy new year!

People present-Jared, Brad, Connor, Scott, Sean, Holden, Mr. Pontious, Andrew, Mr. Lanterman
Now since we have won our competition we are going to York for a qualifier now all we are doing is innovating.
In building we are tweaking our arm's mounting devise.
In software we are programing a motor encoder.
We are also brainstorming a new way to center the rolling goal.
We have found many ways to collect the goal and we are testing them.
We have finished building and programming the encoders.+

Team 3113 Wins the 2010 MD FTC Championship!

We headed out for the MD FTC Robotic championship at 5:30am on Saturday morning a bit bleary eyed and with high hopes.  I think all of the scouts had high hopes but none of us expected do do as well as we did - we won!

We placed 4th overall in the Qualifying rounds which gave us an automatic placement in the championship round as an "Alliance captain".  It was pretty cool to see the Boys as one of the selecting teams rather than hoping to be selected as in previous years.

There is a good bit of strategy in selecting partners and the #1 ranked qualifying team (Team 2843, Under the Son) asked us to join them in an alliance and we did so.  The third and final member of our alliance was team # 7, Tactical Sheep.  The second picture shows all the teams of the winning alliance, from left to right Tactical Sheep, Under the Son and Team 3113, The Craftsmen.

The championship round is played tournament style, with the four alliances playing in a seeded format, best 2 out of 3 matches.  Our alliance won it's semi - final match 2 games to zero.  The finals were very close (we split the first two rounds) and the last match had to be re-run due to a technical issue with the field.  The fourth match was a thing of beauty as all for robots (Under the Son and our robot vs G-Force and their partner) performed very well.  The last picture shows the end of the match with all four robots balancing on the bridge (extra Points).  Still we managed to eek out a win at 52 - 50!

The tournament itself was very well run - hats of the Professor Jeff Tjiputra, the College of Southern Maryland and all the volunteers how really made this event both work like a Swiss clock and be really a lot of fun.

Now we need to see if we get invited to the National tournament in St Louis.....

dECEMBER 10, 2010

Holden, andrew, Scott, Jared, Mr.Lanterman, Connor, Sean, Matt, Logan, Grant, Brad

Sean- Is moving Samantha and NXT to protect them from damage

Scott, Andrew, and Logan are re-gearing the drive system

Holden is replacing the Autonomous Program to allow for the new devices

Grant is redoing the presentation because we lost the original one.

Now all of us are testing our robot autonimous, Since we re geared the bot we need to retest the distance to time ratio.
WE have a working autonomous that drops the bridge and balances it WELL DONE GUYS!!!
Andrew taught us how to tighten a bolt

The Last Build Session before the MD Competition

Well here we are - the last build session before the competition

We have a good bit to do tonight, but I think we can get it done and done well.  There is one hitch - I have an appointment in DC this afternoon and likely will not be back to the house until a little after 5:00

Here's a list of items I'd like the boys to focus on

(1) Re-Gear the Drive system - last night the team determined that the stress issues we're having with the robot can be greatly reduce if we re-gear the drive system to have smaller gears driving larger ones (our current one works in the opposite direction.  There is an example set up next to the robot and the main thing is it doesn't require a lot of rebuilding.  I would like Scott, Andrew, David and Logan to focus on this first thing

(2) We need to move both Samantha and the NXT module to safe locations (on top of the robot).  Both need to easily accessible per the rules.  Sean this change is your first task.

(3) We need to re-calibrate the autonomous programs to take into account the gearing change.  The program logic does not need to be altered just the power and run time parameters.  Holden, please take the lead.

(4) We need to finish the Engineering notebook - including a description of tonight's activities.  We also need to finish the Robot Spec sheet and presentation.  Conner / Grant / Jared please work together to get this done.

(5) we need to formalize our game strategy and pit crew assignments - Matt please take the lead

Given the early start on Saturday (the boys need to be here at 5:00am!, mary Beth and I are more than happy to have any or all of the boys sleep over.  While the accommodations may not be regal, I can guarantee a nice pancake breakfast in the AM

ALL boys and parents need to bring safety glasses / goggles to the competition saturday.  This rule is strictly enforced and you will not be able to participate if you forget.!