The Wheels On The Robot Go Round And Round

The team met again after a long weekend away from each other. There was quite a bit of progress made on our practice bot (nicknamed Beckham because it will play soccer) and gearing up for Regionals. The big developments were with the drive train, the flag, the banner, and transportation.

The post is titled this way because of our major developments on the drive trains of both our practice robot and our real robot. The biggest news is that we bought all new wheels for our robot. We bought 4 plaction wheels and 2 omni wheels. The omni wheels have small spinners where a normal wheels has treads. These make it really easy to spin on the wheels. The plaction wheels have really a really grippy, rubber surface which should make going over the bridge much easier. Putting all new tires on at the competition is kind of crazy but we want to give our team the best possible chance to win and these wheels will do that. We also received our new cRio in the mail. It is smaller and more powerful. Can't wait to see it on the robot.

On the practice robot, we made progress by getting together all of the materials we need to put Mecanum wheels on. We changed our mind and want to put Mecanums on instead of raising the chassis up and having normal wheels. The Mecanums are cool because they allow for strafing. Plus, they sound a little meaner which is more exciting. Getting them on is a challenge though. We have to rebuild all 4 of our old gear boxes and totally re-make the frame (drill holes). It's kind of a lot of work but the whole idea of the practice robot is to get more practice with these kind of problems. Ryan also worked a lot on getting an idea for the kicker piston and how to mount it. As usual, great work and great thinking by him.

We had some more progress with Regional related manners. We finally got a banner we all really like. It is going to look SWEET in our pit. Rachel worked a lot this weekend on the flag and it is starting to come together. Can't wait to wave it around! Jesse and Kacy kept working on putting the coat of fiberglass on the mascot. Rachel and some others starting working on Statistics for Regionals as well. Bryce and Jordan worked on starting the Battery Cart as well. This will let us have an organized, cool looking place to charge our battery at the Regional.

More of our Community Outreach came together today as well. Bydlon reserved a Sprinter Van for our trip to Parker's Prairie Elementary School next week and our scouting trip to the Duluth Regional. 

Great work by the team today. Hopefully the snow storm tomorrow and Wednesday doesn't slow down our momentum.