Currently, the host robot is 90% complete. Our build team is working on improvements to the current body. We are adding guards to the jaguars and wiring to prevent dust from getting inside them causing problems like what happened to us last year. There was too much vibration on the camera which was hindering the vision on screen, so the crew is collaborating with each other to insert a different kind of foam to absorb the vibration. At the moment, the programmers are steaming ahead on improving elemental programming for autonomous to make the best outcome consistently. The minibot gang is working on 3 different designs to test which one is the most consistent in speed, power, and if it reaches the top. Overall, our team and robot have made great progress and are working the last minute kinks to ship the robot complete and in style.

Sorry for the lack of updates recently, we were too busy working on the robot to type one up. Over the past few days we have made huge amounts of progress on the robot. The main mechanical structure is almost fully completed, and we have a working deployer and arm/claw attached to the frame. Our new mecanum wheels still have not arrived, so we have the old ones on the robot for now. Programming has been having a little bit of trouble with autonomous. The robot also doesn’t stop after you release the joystick… Only a slight problem. The minibot has gone through several upheavals and radical design changes, none of them have worked quite as well as hoped. Luckily, a new design is currently being worked on. Cross your fingers, it might just work. We have transferred all of our electronics to a newly silver painted wooden board, it looks pretty cool. Here’s to a good rest of the week, and more frequent updates.

We modified the claw prototype to allow it to come totally flush up to the ladder and put on some surgical tubing to keep it open when picking up the tubes. We also cut out the circuit board and painted it. We mapped out the cable chain and need to order about another foot of it. Over all we made some essential improvements and got one step closer to the final goal.

Hello many worldly followers!

Today we have accomplished our goal of building a nearly working pole climbing robot and attaching the mecanum wheels. We are currently on track to finishing out robot.

~Henry

In honor of our incredible intellect and intelligence, I have written a haiku:

Team 2-9-2-8
Reversed the polarity
And made a robot.

Today, the electrical team wired new victors found a way to attach the encoder onto the window motors! The mechanical team reshaped a part on the ladder and put safety rubber on the edges of the ladder, spending a long time filing down rough edges. They also repositioned brackets around rear sprockets. The coders worked with the line following code and tested the sensors. And of course, the minibot has been reworked again.

FINALS WEEK IS OVER! With the long and grueling week of finals finally coming to a close, we took a great big sigh of relief. Sadly, that does not mean that we get the day off, production was low, though progress was made on the robot by the programming and mechanical teams. We were able to get the camera to follow the peg with a bit of difficulty. Sorry for the brevity, the meeting is closing rapidly and I have to help clean up.

Today we got all sorts of work done. As usual we split into groups to be more efficient. Some people worked on the arm, some people worked on the minibot, and others worked on programming. The programmers made great progress programming the camera to follow shiny circles. A few people spent the day replacing the wheels on the robot with mecanums, although when they put them on they found they didn't fit and spent the whole day making them fit but were successful in the end. Others worked on building the electronics board in the workshop. We got the minibot running but we are still tinkering with it to make it run better. A few problems arose towards the end with electronics. We started prototypeing a new claw design too. Hopefully we can finish the electronics board tomorrow, and we should be able finish the camera tracking program by the end of tomorrows meeting.

This week has been full of exciting achievements. The arm design is coming along nicely, and we’ve designed a new attachment to lower our claw to the floor. The minibot is being modified and we are slowly getting closer to having it ascend the 10 foot pole. Everyone is hard at work solving problems as they arise. The programmers are currently faced with the task of getting the camera to recognize the end of the peg when it’s at a far distance. As for the electrical team, they are working on the layout of all the necessary hardware. The mechanical team have constructed the base of the robot and attached the arm assembly. Right now they are focusing on fitting the minibot deployment and appendage in such a way that both function the way they’re supposed to. Difficult as things may be right now, everyone is still having lots of fun working together. Props to the mentors who have been staying after all the students leave and getting lots done on the robot!

Build season has officially begun! The new game is called LogoMotion and it introduces many interesting challenges for our design team. Our main focus over the last few days has been designing and prototyping possible designs for our robot's main appendage, which has the role of picking up the inflatable game pieces and placing them on the scoring pegs. As of this writing no best design has been selected but we are getting close; by Monday we should have the basic design of our robot completed so we can begin building actual hardware.