Meet me in the pit- Tent and Shields

By Austin, Lin, Tycho, Omar, Darshan, Jayesh, and Max

Tent Building

Since we had the general idea of the shape and size of the actual pit tent, we set out to either build or find a tent that we felt best fit the theme we selected. We chose to start off by trying to build a structure via PVC pipe and a tarp like substance that we could drape over the pipe, we handed off the idea and models to Mr. Virani to have him figure out what PVC requirements we would have to fulfill and the cost to build. While he crunched the numbers a group left the house to see if we could find a suitable material to drape over the structure; Tycho, Mrs. Lux, and I went to a local army surplus store in hopes of finding a parachute like material that we could use, however the only cloth available was a very heavy and expensive canvas that we decided would end up crushing the frame, (we didn’t leave empty handed though since the store had lots of fun items). After returning to the house we had another council with Mr. Virani and decided to consider other options since the PVC and tarp idea required to much effort and too much American currency. Various hardware and surplus store websites later we found a rather unconventional shaped tent used to cover cars that was built in two sections each measuring 8’X9’ at their base, we concluded to buy the tent and use the parts to only build one of the sections, and since the pit measures 9’X9’, use the remaining foot of space in the front for table with room for a TV to play various team promoting videos meant to catch a passerby’s eye.

Shields

In terms of the shield, the basic form is completed and ready to be upgraded via LED’s and insignias which will hopefully be mounted before competition. Due to the use of recycled parts the shields are cheap, sturdy, easy to build, and most importantly relatively accurate looking. Expanding on how they were made, the core is old floor tiles from a competition field that have be locked together on one face and had the remaining teeth cut off. To provide structural integrity, old black metal broom handles were attached via zip-ties length wise to the back face of the shield bridging the gap between the two halves. Next more zip-ties were used to create a basic handle design to carry the light shield around. We chose a weathered red duct tape to cover the front face of the shield since it had the appearance of old weathered wood and saved us the pain of having to paint the shield, following the red duct tape the outside edges of the shield were gilded with a nice golden duct tape. To finish off the shield I used a drill press to mount some spare tetrix pieces to the inside of an ikea bowl and pushed the extruding tetrix remnants through the shield and zip-tied them together to keep them from coming out. Oddly enough most of the parts I used were sourced from our robotics “warehouse” and are easy to find or cheap to buy, so building one of these shields on your own would be easy. Not only is the shield light, cheap, and recycled it’s also pretty sturdy, once we had one built we were eager to play with it and made this little video for you to enjoy below.