Updates From The Build
Day 2 – The Competition is Riveting!
Mar 18th
You have got to be a part of this!
Out of Orbit is performing extremely well in the qualifying rounds. We have won five out of five matches, while scoring a great amount of points! Generally, we have scored highest on our alliance in most matches. That leaves us seated second – but scored equal with the first-seated team!!!!!
Our drivers have definitely loosened up! We now see Orion screaming down the field, when it’s open, and succeeding at a high percentage of attempts at scoring. Way to go drivers!
Our scouting and spirit teams are in high energy, to say the least! Go to our gallery and check out yesterday’s photos. Stay tuned for today’s!
Come on out to Hamilton High School. Matches end around 5:30 this evening. Then, tomorrow, opening ceremonies start at 9:00 with matches resuming immediately after.
Day ONE of Arizona FIRST Robotics Competition!
Mar 17th
This is it! The day has finally arrived!
Today is Thursday, the first of a three-day competition event. This day is dedicated to setting up and testing the robot, the pit, the drivers, the team. So far, we are passing with Out of Orbit colors.
Robert has done a great job with pre-match scouting. With good organization and training of eager scouts, the entire list was completed fairly early in the day. Now, we know what the teams believe their strong-points are. The practice matches will be telling.
Our drivers conquered their first practice match in style. They placed one piece on the highest peg and one on the lowest. And now, they have a feel for what the real playing field is like. We’re hoping that as the competition heats up, they become the ones to apply the pressure to the other teams.
Our pit crew has been working hard and has the space well-organized. Some decorating is still needed – after all, we want the world to know who we are!
Well, enough for now. I HAVE to get back to the team! Please stay tuned. We’ll update when we can, but no wifi on the site, so even this brief into came at the expense of a little break from the excitement.
Guestbook
Feb 25th
Do you have a comment or a question about our team or website? Well, you are in the right place to do it! This is where you can comment here. We would love to hear from you.
Weeks 4 and 5: Falling into Place
Feb 20th
Well, it has been a rush watching all the pieces fit together. We have until Tuesday the 22nd, so it is really coming down to the wire
To start with, there is some exciting website news. We submitted this site for the Website Award! We aren’t sure whether that means we can edit beyond the updating of the blog and photos, so once we know, we will update what we can. One major victory down!
As you can see, we have gone far on the robot since our past report. The arm has come together. The mast is assembled and installed with special thanks to Southwest Water Jet, who worked the awesome design into the mast in addition to cutting out other pieces for us. Our programmers have come through, making driving easy with only a few glitches. The electronics have been installed on the chassis and wiring is wrapping up as we speak. One nagging part of the progress has been construction of the bumpers. But we think we’ve designed our best bumpers ever. So, we will go into competition stronger than ever, with a bot that is less complex than any other year, and therefore beautiful in its simplicity.
Weeks 2 and 3: Rollin’ On
Feb 1st
Well, it’s week three already! A lot has happened, so let’s get to it.
To start, we have settled on a design. Essentially, we have a claw equipped with three rollers, which will give us the ability to “pitch” (turn) a game piece up and down. This is set on a single hinge mast, allowing us to retrieve pieces from the ground and feeder stations in a simple manner. We can also score. The other part to our strategy is the minibot, which connects o the pole by magnets and has two sets of wheels, activated by switch. While we don’t have a deployment system yet, you can see a demonstration of it on the robot page (and it’s even improved beyond that already!) Also, you will find full specs for our “roller,” for those who are curious.
Based on the idea, we have mounted the beginnings of the mast, and have developed a working prototype of the roller. Programming wise, we have made headway in our code, and is now using the camera. We have made models of the tower, and other game pieces. Even the website got some love with updates to the robot page, sponsor pages and pictures! It was a good week all round!
Speaking of sponsors, there is some exciting news! Mike Holmes and Bernie Clark, CEO and lead Engineer of Aero Design & Manufacturing are visiting us this Thursday to drive the robot and see how we are doing, with intent of sponsoring us! We’d like to thank them for their generous offer and hope they like what they see!
See you next week!
