2012-2013 FTC Team Kick-off Event

Team & Parents,

When: Saturday July 14th from 10am – 1pm
Where: Coach's house

We will be having our first FTC Team gathering on Saturday July 14th from 10am – 1pm. I know this doesn’t work for everyone, and I apologize. If you cannot attend, I’ll make sure to send any information needed before our next team practice the following weekend (July 21st).

We will be planning the FTC season, reviewing the team policies, and calendar. We probably won’t have a lot of time with the robot this day. But there will also be food and some team building games to help mix the new members with the old team.

If you can bring a side dish, desert, or drinks please email and let me know.

Parents are always invited to attend any practice
 - but if possible I’d ask that at least 1 parent attend from 12:30-1:00pm to review the team calendar and expectations.

If you have any questions or concerns do not hesitate to contact me.

Thanks,
Terry

October 24, 2011 Practice

Today Jaret refined his four-wheel-drive joystick program. We can now control the robot with the joystick and have it turn 360 degrees while staying in the same place. While Ian was making the four-wheel drive system one of the gears actually was touching the ground. At first we thought we would have to find a way to avoid this but after a few tests we realized the gear actually helped the robot grip the ground and improved stability. Today Ian mounted "wheelie wheels" so that the robot will not flip backward while going up the ramp. Jared finished the arm but has not yet mounted it. Tyler worked on making a program that will test the arm and its motors without them stalling like they have in the past.

Jared Ruehr

Name: Jared Ruehr

Age: 12

School and Grade: Harmon Middle School, 7th grade

Jared is one of J2IT's builders and is the vice team captain and is also a mentor for the younger team members. His job aspirations are to be some kind of engineer. Some of his other hobbies are sketching, sports, camping, and playing on the computer. Jared also participated in the FLL two years ago and participated in the FTC last year on J2IT . He enjoys having participated in the FTC and wishes to participate next year.

Jaret's Bio

Name: Jaret Skonieczny
Grade: 7
Team Job: Remote Control Programmer/Arm Controller/ Tester
Bio: The job of programming the remote controls goes to Jaret. He makes sure with the help of Ian, that the programs are running smoothly. He also designed and made all of the programs relating to the joysticks. Jaret is 13 and is 100% ohion. He was on FLL for 1 year and this is his first year doing FTC. Jaret likes reading, writing, and math and does well in school. He is currently in Boy Scouts and likes to camp.

Team Profile: Ian Doemling

Name: Ian Doemling

Grade: 7

Team Job: Builder and Progam Tester

Biography:

Ian Doemling is one of J2IT's builders. Ian also tests many of the programs, ecspecially the driver controlled programs. Ian is 13 years old and grew up in the wonderful city of Pittsburgh, Pensylvania. At the age of 7 he moved to Aurora, Ohio. He loves math and science and excels in school. He was on an FLL Team for 1 year then moved to an FTC Team this year. Ian loves to problem solve and build. He is in boy scouts and loves the outdoors. Although Ian lives in the Cleveland area he loves Pittsburgh and THE PITTSBURGH STEELERS.

Team Profile: Tyler Thieding

Name: Tyler Thieding

Grade: 8

Team Job: Primary Autonomous Programmer

Biography:

Tyler Thieding is the team's autonomous programmer who is skilled with various forms of programming and computer networking. He loves math and science and he succeeds in his schoolwork and is a straight-A student. His career aspirations are a theoretical physicist.

January 28, 2011 Meeting

Today we finished our rennovation of the arm by changing the design to fix it due to a motor burning out again. This included a new gripping system, with two servos. Pictures of the new
design are coming soon.

Feburary 3rd meeting

At this meeting we worked on a few things. Ian and Jared worked on the making the ball grasping mechanism. They also fixed a few issues with gears and such. Ian and I worked on making the plastic hoop ring to get the bowling bowl. I fixed some bugs in the joystick program. Tyler worked on fixing the auto program a bit.

January 23, 2012 Practice

On this practice we began to remodel the arm for the second competition. This included redoing the grip system and the whole arm position. We also worked out smaller issues, like moving the Samantha Module. And finally I confirmed that the autonomous programs work with our new design.

January 21, 2011 Meeting

Today, only I was present to work on the robot to prepare for the second competition we are attending. I worked on moving the arm controls downward in the robot, as well as beginning to remodel the hand. This will allow a more controlled lifting of balls and crates to the lift, improving accuracy and score.

I also worked on adding a system that will help guide the bowling ball to the robot, instead of involuntary releasing the ball. This will help us score more during the autonomous stage of the code. The position required for the internal side of the board was finally found, which was in the middle of the internal side with the robot shifted right at a 45 degree angle.

This was a productive construction day, which will help our entire team score better and hopefully make it to the state competition.

J2IT Competing in the FTC Regional Qualifiers.

J2IT completing code review with judge prior to the competition.




J2IT First and best run of the day.


- Terry Phillips

aka. HUM4N

Location:Tri-C FTC regional qualifiers

Team registration and robot inspection on Jan 13, 2012

J2IT regional qualifying event at Tri-C tomorrow.

Passed inspection with flying colors.

J2IT

Robot Inspection

Lifting the basket

-










Good job guys!

 Terry Phillips (Coach)

Location:Tri-C

Computer Model

This is a Google Sketchup represenentation of our robot.

J2IT Autonomous Code

J2IT Autonomous Code

The following program is one of four for each position, in this case this is the blue team, exterior side.

task main()
{
  initializeRobot();

  waitForStart(); // Wait for the beginning of autonomous phase.

  ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
  ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
  ////                                                   ////
  ////    Add your robot specific autonomous code here.  ////
  ////                                                   ////
  ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
  ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

  motor[W_Left] = universal_speed - 10;
  motor[W_Right] = universal_speed;
  wait1Msec(3500);
  if (red == true)
  {
    if (exterior == true)
    {
      left_turn(1000);
    }
    else
    {
      left_turn(1500);
    }
  }
  else
  {
    if (exterior == true)
    {
      right_turn(1000);
    }
    else
    {
      right_turn(1500);
    }
  }
  straight(2000);
  if (exterior == true)
  {
    if (red == true)
    {
      //Turn Left
      left_turn(850);
    }
    else
    {
      //Turn Right
      right_turn(850);
    }
  }
  straight(6500);
  motor[W_Right] = 0;
  motor[W_Left] = 0;
}

1/7/2012 Meeting

Today we ran a lot of test runs. Also I made the 4th motor move up the scissor lift. Tyler finaly went up and drove and operated the arm. Ian is working on making the top of the scissor lift flat. He also put non-slip pads on the top. Jared removed the plow which was getting balls stuck in body of the robot.








The new screw rod for popping the scissor lift.

December 29, 2011 Meeting

Today it was just Ian and Jared at the meeting. We decided to have the builders meet and then the programmers meet. Jared made a plow for the robot to try to prevent balls from finding their way into the center of our robot. Ian cut a piece of plastic that we will melt for the top of the robot. This will prevent the basket from falling off the sides. We also have ideas of adding non-stick padding to the plastic. We added finger like strips of plastic on the hand to help grip the basket. The tips of the "fingers" will be able to go into the holes in the basket. We also did a rewview of the hardware on the robot.

December 31st meeting

Today I made refined our joystick control system. I made the tank drive a lot better by adding a refined equation (JoyValue / 127 * 100 = Motor Value) that scales the joystick value of -127 to 127 into -100 to 100. I used the D-pad to make the elbow work a lot better, so i can refine it degree by degree. Tyler worked on the auto program to make it work better. It can now get the bowling ball but he is still working on getting the bowling captured.

12/19/11 Meeting

At our meeting we did many things. I did refined the joystick program to make expectational output. The equation is

MotorOutout = ( joystickValue ^ 2 / max joystickValue ^ 2)

Scrimmage Results

Congratulations Team on a great scrimmage.  8 FTC teams participated and all were high school except J2IT.  We scored 2nd place overall and had the single highest scoring game of the day.  We learned some great strategy and also some got some great ideas from the other teams to help finish our robot for the January competition. Thanks Hudson for hosting this great event.

Pre-Scrimage Meeting

Today our team was preparing for the scrimage at Hudson High School. I feel that we are well prepared even though our scisor lift has to be operated by the arm and not an independant motor. Today Jaret and Tyler worked on the programs revising and preparing them for the compotition. Ian and I both worked on tightening screws and packing materials for the compotion. I think that we will do well against the other high school teams, but I do not think we will come in forst for this scrimage compotion.