Select a subgroup to view their Weekly Report.

This week, we assembled a mock robot so we could work on the manipulators while the electrical team used the real robot for programming. We constructed a prototype ball manipulator, which consisted of a roller bar, a stopper bar which prevents the ball from going underneath the robot, and a FisherPrice motor which was geared up (to spin 16000 rpm) by a 16:1 transmission box. We tried out a wheel roller bar first by fitting small broached rubber wheels onto a hex shaft. The decision to try those wheels was made last week. To our dismay, the wheels were terrible. The materials the wheels were made of had too much grip and were too hard causing the soccer ball to hop up and down when being fed into the roller bar. It did not improve even when we increased the speed. We heard that many teams have tried pool noodles and liked them. As a result, we moved onto constructing what we called the pool noodle bar. We tried it in two ways. One was putting a rod through the pool noodle and taping the ends to two wheels; the other was wrapping the rod with foam strips cut from the pool noodle. The bar grabbed the balls better, but the material wore out quickly.

Mr. Ing did not like neither the wheel nor the pool-noodle bars and could not help saying "none of this junk works". Seeing no progress, still, on Tuesday, we plummeted into deep frustration. Something must have struck Mr.Ing that night because the next day, which we vividly remember to be Wednesday, he took off the beater bar from last year's robot. Our faces brightened with hope as we saw the flaps of the beater bar struck the ball with steady smoothness and control. "The solution was right in front of our eyes all this time!" we cried.

Having discovered a better direction, we continued down the path by making the desired modifications to the beater bar. We tried spraying the flaps with a four-hour rubber coating but it went astray as the coating came off quickly. Afterwards, we decided to implant a material that would give the bar more grip. We experimented with different materials - rubber of conveyor belt (thin), pool liner (thick), and antistatic electrical mat (medium thickness polyethylene rubber). In addition, we used different lengths, combinations, and speeds. We were even working on the attempt to try a double-FisherPrice transmission which exerts ten times the speed of the motor we were using. Since Wednesday, all of us were busy with taking out strips of rubber, putting on new materials, and calibrating the position of the beater bar. We were so fortunate to have Dr. Ing, Mr. Ing's dad, come and help us through the endless number of trials.

In the end, we found that the beater bar, consisting of four strips of polyethylene rubber, gave us the best results. The beater bar can now grab an approaching ball, advance to collect balls, and manipulate the balls with respectable effectiveness.

This week was a crucial week for the electrical team. A lot of progress was made on the robot control system. Most of the problems associated with the crab drive were fixed. During the beginning of Week Four, the veterans discovered a problem concerning an incomplete formula which dealt with reversing the crab drive. Mr. Tui corrected the formula and we can now identify the closest angle it takes to get to the desired angle and reverse the motor when the difference is greater than 90 degrees. Meanwhile, the newer members learned how to solder wires and were assigned to understand the crab drive program (so we could insert it into the autonomous mode).

On Sunday, the veterans again encountered a problem with switching between the robot modes (2 separate car modes and arcade mode). This was fixed by changing the setpoint dependent on the y-axis of the joystick. The newer members were being acquainted with the Cypress I/O board. Jessica, Ying, and Jonathan learned how to connect switches (which will be used to switch between the different autonomous programs of the robot). It was revealed to us that resistors were needed for the switch; we could not confirm whether the current going through the I/O board was enough).

The veterans worked on seperating the different car modes of the robot (right, left, and 90 degrees) on Monday. Their goal was to make the modes run parallel (switching from one mode to another using one button). To fix this, Ms. Owens and Ms. Kim suggested to take out the Flag.vi from the crab drive mode. Ironically, the newer members were learning how to program a flag (which allows you to press a button and maintain a constant state until pressed again like when gear shifting).

The next day, a gyro was mounted on the robot to test how accurate it was when the robot went over the bump. The newer members worked on soldering the switches while the veteran members worked on using the enum function to switch between the car modes. Both tasks took relatively long to complete - two days. After these tasks were completed, the team switched from Jaguar to Victor 884 speed controllers to see whether there would be a difference in driving and programming the robot. It was concluded that the Victors made the motors stall at their current output range. Due to the number of crimps wasted over the season, Ms. Owens implemented a rule which would charge a member 25 cents for deforming a crimp or PWM housing.

Friday turned out to be a very important day in Week Four. A "late" strategy meeting was held. During the meeting, the strategies in different zones were determined, the robot priorities during the game was discussed, and different ideas for the manipulator were shared. More work was done on the robot control system. Sam wanted the Jaguars to be remounted on the robot (so that the motor wires would reach both Victors and Jaguars). It turned out to be very tedious; Victors needed to be repositioned and wires needed to be rewired. But, one-and-a-half hours later, this task was completed. Once this was completed, the robot was driven by three different people in order to compare the Jaguar and the Victor. It was concluded that the Jaguar resulted in a smoother driving experience. Another test was done to test the gyro and the test proved to be inconclusive. Further testing remains to be done.

This was our second to the last week to complete the animation. Our internal deadline is the same day as Valentine’s Day as well as Chinese New Year (the real deadline is the day after). It encourages us to work harder because as soon as we submit our work, we will be showered with chocolate kisses and red envelopes. Michelle started compiling the scene; two different materials were flipped to the inside of a sphere to simulate the sky and ocean. She imported the island with the palm trees, chair, table, and the umbrella. Michelle had to reapply materials because the objects lose their properties once they are being exported. Even though Sean applied materials to the train on his computer, Michelle has to reapply them again once it gets to her computer. Yueshi has been wondering if there is any way to preserve the materials when they are exported and is going to do research on that soon.

Yueshi learned how to use part of the particle system to create a blown away effect of the word “Credits”, and it took around three hours to render. In contrast, Michelle experimented with the fairy dust effect using the particle system. The product started with the word “Animators” and then each of our names rolled by individually.

One of our concerns was that our laptops will not be able to handle when everything is imported. With just the sky/ocean, the resort center and the props listed above, the laptop began slowing down a lot and froze once. Therefore, we decided to split the scene in two when animating. When we show the track/train, the whole resort-center-island will not be part of the scene. In fact, it will be deleted. That way, the computer will have an easier time animating. The island will only be shown in the end when it is needed. We thought that by doing this it would be more efficient and time saving as a result. As a result, we think it will be more efficient and time saving. We intend to start on the animation soon to assure that we will have enough time to render the whole 30 second animation.

This week was very eventful. We worked on the subtitle contraption, dealing with all the kinks and issues along the way. The scripts were finalized and the attire for all the actors was chosen. Then we "rented" a room to test out the set up for the Chairman's Video. Everyone gathered on Wednesday, ready for a test and/or final filming. Unfortunately, the aforementioned subtitle contraption issues and other technical problems prevented us from actually filming anything. We had a problem with the contraption because the PVC pipe in the back was too short for the width of the banner paper. The PowerPoint background thingy also did not work well because it was either too bright or too dark. If we turned off half the lights, there was a glare. So to fix these problems, we taped another shorter pipe to the PVC pipe and changed the distances and set-up of the video. Apologies were given out to all the parties involved, and the next film date has been set to next Wednesday. Everything should be ready (again) by then.

The Woodie Flowers essay (version two) was finally edited. And then edited again. And then again. We still need to show Ms. Uyesugi the second version of the Woodie Flowers essay which is completely different from the original. We hope she will like it.

We also made some stencils for the robot bumpers, using our standard font that Mr. Tui sent us. We shall test them out next week.

Also, and perhaps most importantly, we attended a team strategy meeting to discuss robot design and gameplay ideas. Each team member present had to give input on how the robot should possess and kick the ball and what drivers should do if they happened to be in a certain zone. The team captain wrote all the brainstormed ideas on the white board to be documented and considered throughout the build process.

Next week, we will continue on with the video drama. We will also perfect the essays to the best of our abilities. The bumper numbers will also be designed. Testimonials shall also be collected and summarized for inclusion for our team presentation. There is also the upcoming school assembly demonstration to deal with which makes us all nervous. Oh, and there are the "Pokemon cards" that John suggested. We shall design those, too. Next week shall be fun and action-packed!

Time is money! We can't believe that Week Four of the build season is finished! This week we worked on the Week Three gallery, the FAQ (frequently asked questions) and the Sitemap. The pictures for the Week Three gallery were resized and the thumbnails were made. We were able to finish it within 2-3 hours because we have enough experience now to increase our speed when working on the weekly galleries. Next, we worked on the Sitemap, which although it is easy to make, there are still some mistakes. For example, some of the links linked to the wrong page so they had to be re-linked. The FAQ web page gives more information about what we are doing and informs parents and teacher what FIRST is. Later, we hope to add information about VEX as well.

This week, we also were able to take more mentor pictures and use it as their profile icon. That's pretty much what the website team did this week.