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Box me up, Scotty!

Oh. My. Gawd. WE MADE A BOX. The final frontier. These are the voyages of the Botbox C*R*U*S*H! It's mission: to boldy flush what no screw has ever flushed before. ^____^ That was fun. And people thought the mallet hits were gunshots xP.

But yeah, it was a party. George, James, Jar Ett, Tingley, and Paul all messed around (I'm not going to link because I'm lazy) :P

Anyway. I'm in a box! I'm in a box! ...

"...and the Practice Bot wins the race!"

So the practice bot was completed today - special thanks to James for helping me finish that out. At 8:00 PM, it was finished... and our ACTUAL robot was still technically in the works. D'oh! That's okay though, cause we were just piecing together scrap metals (although it is surprisingly close to the actual bot!) while they actually had to figure some more things out. I got the chance to help out today with the competition bot, and let me tell you, there was some definite thought and effort put into that bugger. Way to go Josh and Mr. Urquhart!

On a different note, the dinner tonight provided by Katie's mother was delicious ^_^ It also spurred an investigation that led us to the conclusion that the distinction between a taco and a burrito had nothing to do with folding. Rather, a burrito is made from a flour tortilla, whereas a taco comes from a corn or wheat one. Random, huh?

Anyway, tomorrow night is packing deadline, so expect another update. We should be driving TURDUCKEN (oh, did I mention we named the robot? xD) around! Hasta la vista!

T-NUTZ!?

This is MADNESS! THESE ARE T-NUTS!!! My gosh >_< Those things get to be so obnoxious. Chassis is almost completely done. Got to a point where we were trying to set up the motors/mount them, and we were there till 11, but we hit a good stopping point. Go Tingley + Kindy!


ROBOT -1.0a

In the final stretch, Tingley and I were put on assignment to modify this practice bot (last year's chassis) and rip it apart. At which point we would fix it. Of course >_< Haha, but we're going to mimic our actual chassis and hold back some key components in order to test them and train drive team (TOTALLY want to be on it this year - that arm would be mad sick to test). Right now, it's a hassle to outfit this bot, though. I mean... we're using scrap parts with some toughboxes and PIMP_OUR_RIDE-ing it. It's a tough job, surprisingly. But that's cool :P


Back to Basics

As mentioned in Tingley's post , we've pretty much found out (after much CADing) that the lead screw system is not possible given our motor constraints. Hm... so basically we're going to take our very, very original idea and make it better. Pulleys!


(Lead)Screwing the Arm

No more articulation! We're going for a lead screw telescoping system. We were kinda thinking about using a grappling hook launcher, but decided not to. Lo and behold, we later saw another team with a grappling hook. xP Should have expected that. Arm is really annoying me because we're rather rapidly shifting designs back and forth so I can't actually really go ahead and CAD anything (which I actually DID learn through a combination of methods a and b mentioned earlier).

We'll probably change it again, at which point I may throw up my hands in gracious disgust, but we'll make it through. Ciao for now (hey, that rhymed!) It's chow time! ^_^


In a Classroom, Far, Far, Away...

So... it's officially the beginning of the ARM PROJECT *gasp*.

School and all the random band activities, as well as some other extracurriculars, have been really crazy as of late. Math competitions are starting up - it's all insane O_O I should be able to handle it, if only the senioritis weren't making things very difficult.

We threw some ideas at each other, there were some injuries, but it was all good. I should warn you before I really get into these that I have a terrible habit of making horrible puns, so try not to get too hurt.

Anyways, articulating arm? It's an interesting idea, but I'm not sure how it's going to work out. We have some dimension issues that I'm concerned about. I haven't learned how to use Autodesk Inventor yet, either, but I'm sure I'll pick it up. CAD! James/Tingley will probably have to either a) throw me at it, or b) teach me. I'm not sure which will necessarily

I have a really good feeling about this year. Like the ideas, the team, and especially our new Coach, Mr. Urquhart. We all work together in a way that just complements the abilities of each other, even if it's a bit hectic/scary here and there... but that's what FIRST is about, right?

I've got to get to work on the arm! Until next time,
Matt!

Matt Kindy


Hey! I'm Matt, class of 2010, I'm 17, and I'm really enthused about going to college next year at MIT, Stanford, or Princeton (assuming I get into one of those three). This'll be my fourth year in FRC; I've been a programmer, a prograneer, and an engineer, now... so I've pretty much done a bunch with that. Here at Spruce Creek High I like to play clarinet in the band, debate international politics with Model UN, and of course fight maths wars in Mu Alpha Theta (in addition to my robotics commitment). Some random stuff you should know about me is that I love to use Asian smilies @_@, utilise British spellings, and sporadically burst into song with Tingley '10, too. I'll be blogging about my work on the specialised projects of Team 2152 this year, and I'll update you from time to time ^_^