Please help support our team! $40 buys a motor, $55 buys a new battery, $150 adds controllers and sensors, $500 pays tournament fees, $750 upgrades our chassis

Iron Reign

Welcome to Iron Reign at Dallas ISD's Science and Engineering Magnet

Super Regionals - The First Day

23 Mar 2017

Super Regionals - The First Day By Ethan, Evan, Tycho, Max, Jayesh, Janavi, Lin, Darshan, Omar, Charlotte, and Austin

Task: Go to super regionals, set up, and present

Way too early in the morning, on March 22nd, the Iron Reign team gathered in darkness. It was approximately 65 Farenheit and gusts around 12 mph were blowing in from the South. Under this cover of darkness, a bus pulled into our school. As the trees shivered in the wind and the stray dogs around our school howled, we boarded the bus.

Of course, we were boarding the bus to head down to Athens, GA, to go to the South Super Regional tournament, and we hoped, to advance to Worlds. On our way there, we stopped at Sunset HS to pick up RoboBison Amistad, the other team from our school district. Then, we two teams were on our way.

No road trip operated by DISD can ever be simple, and this one was no exception. Our coach was driving our chase vehicle AKA our robotics RV, but managed to beat us there by five hours. The team ended up being on the same bus for twenty total hours, stopping three times. Luckily, on our way down there, many of us got to see sights such as the Mississippi River for the first time.

Finally, we arrived in Athens at 1 in the morning. Some of the team split off to sleep, while others broke off to work on the robot. But, it was late, and we all went to bed soon.

The next, first real day of the tournament, we woke up bright and early. We were one of the first ones to have pit load-in, and we actually managed to do everything in a timely manner. Our tent that we designed was slightly bigger than we thought, but the teams neighboring us were fine with it, so everything worked out in the end. We did a little bit of preliminary scouting and talked to a few teams. We also got our robot through inspections.

Finally, we went into judging, and it was the best presentation that we've done this year. We had two new team members added to the presentation, and we pulled it off flawlessly. As well, we added a new visual gag, with Darshan jumping out at the judges from under the cart. We got asked some very good questions that I can't remember, but the judges were generally very impressed.

Reflections

See Postmortem.

South Superregionals Day Two

24 Mar 2017

South Superregionals Day Two By Max, Tycho, Omar, Jayesh, Darshan, Austin, Charlotte, Lin, Evan, Ethan, and Janavi

Task: Reminisce on our first six Superregionals matches

After a decent night's rest, we began Day Two at around 7 AM. A lot of our tools and materials were still on our RV, so we first moved them over to our pit. Our match schedule said that we'd have nine matches beginning with Match #1 (just our luck). After the...interesting Pokemon-themed opening ceremonies, we began the day with our first match.

Match 1: Our alliance partner was Thorn's Army, and we faced Greased Lightning and Guzzoline Robotics. We lost; we didn't earn as many points in autonomous or teleop. It was our first game anyway; just a warmup. No big deal.

Match 2: Our alliance partner was Saber Robotics, and we faced Aperture Science and The Prototypes. We lost; tied in teleop, but our autonomous didn't score as much as theirs. Warmup game #2, no big deal.

Match 3: Our alliance partner was 4-H Rohming Robotics, and we faced Team Duct Tape and Twisted Axles. We won; even though neither of us were able to cap, we nailed our autonomous and teleop periods.

Match 4: Our alliance partner was Static Void, and we faced East Cobb Robotics and Team CHAOS. We won; our autonomous didn't score as much (we missed a beacon and a ball), but our partner was able to cap and our combined teleop scored more.

Match 5: Our alliance partner was LASA MurPHy, and we faced Diatomic Dingos and Blue Crew, Too. We won; our autonomous worked great and scored well, which made up for our lackluster teleop period.

Match 6: Our alliance partner was Technical Difficulties, and we faced the Rockettes and LASA Ultra Violet. We won; once again, our autonomous worked great (we missed a ball though), we scored more particles in teleop, and our partner was able to cap. Four in a row!

We felt pretty good about this day, since we came off of a four win streak. However, we still worked as long as we could on improving the reliability of our autonomous. Once the pits were closed, we were directed to the team social, where there was Super Smash Bros. and DJ Mickey Nightrain. It seemed like a fun time (Tycho tried his best at professional Smash), but roboticists usually aren't the type to be out on a dance floor. Jayesh is an exception because he's weird.

As well, we were interviewed by a few groups of judges, and performed well in the interviews. We froze up a few times, but it worked out. Also, we invited some of the judges onto our RV.

Reflections

Even though we were able to do a lot of work this day, we're slightly disappointed in our tiredness. Even though the RoboBisons had brought an entire field with them, we didn't really think about asking them to let us use it to practice. We were very exhausted, and with a half-still-sick Mr. Virani, we think we just weren't enthused enough to stay up late and do some more work. If we had, we might've had the small bit of reliability we needed to win more matches with just our autonomous. ;-; Either way, we're proud of the work we did. Tycho did a great job driving for all the matches. Note for next year - we neeeeeeeed more than one driver. On to Day Three!

South Superregional - Day Three

25 Mar 2017

South Superregional - Day Three By Jayesh, Tycho, Omar, Max, Darshan, Austin, Charlotte, Lin, Evan, Ethan, and Janavi

Task: Reminisce on our last three Superregionals matches

Our final competition day began with the driver team rushing to the pits because of a warning given by the game officials for the first match's teams to reach the pits earlier than expected. We reached in time, in fact about an hour before the match actually began. This mild inconvenience did give us time to formulate a strategy against our opponents, the high-scoring mechromancers.

Match 1: Our alliance partner was Neutrinos, and we faced Mechromancers Redfish. We lost; The Neutrinos disconnected early and we had made a strategy of denying the scoring of the Mechromancers. We were relatively succesful, halving their usual scoring output, but without the expected scoring of the Neutrinos, we lost.

Match 2: Our alliance partner was Guzzoline Robotics, and we faced Mouse Spit and Browncoats. We won a very close game, where a blocking penalty by Mouspit helped us win our closest game of the tournament.

Match 3: Our alliance partner was KNO3, and we faced The League of Legendary Scientists and Tundrabots. We lost a 15 point game, where a miscue in our autonomous positioning proved fatal and cost us the winning points of the match.

The match schedule we had today would be our toughest sleight of games for the entire tournament. Despite the unfortunate circumstances of the Neutrinos disconnecting early into our first match, we played decently well and had close games against our toughest competition.

Reflections

Our last loss ended up proving worse than anyone could've expected. In the award ceremony we figured out we were one spot on the leaderboard from advancing. Due to our aquisition of the Judge's award and our position on the leaderboard, we were named first alternate for Worlds. Unfortunate for us, we hope to do better next year.

YouthSpark with Microsoft

15 Apr 2017

YouthSpark with Microsoft By Lin, Jayesh, Ethan, Evan, Charlotte, Omar, Max, Tycho, Austin, Darshan, and Janavi

Task: Mobile Tech XPerience's appearance at the Meyerson

The Meyerson Symphony Center hosted a Microsoft YouthSpark event this Saturday with activities from robotics to VR to 3D printing. We set up the sumo laptops up in the atrium and the 3D in the MXP outside, right next to the Perot tech van. The tech van had most of their setup outside with a smaller piece inside, and we worked pretty well in tandem. (I have it on high authority from a random girl that walked in that ours was cooler)

Reflections

The groups of kids coming by were spread out so we couldn't teach a group of 8 all at once like in previous experiences. Thankfully we had BigThought volunteers helping out. We couldn't have done it without the 5 of them. We ran through the presentation for them at the beginning, as we still thought that's what the plan was going to be, so they knew how to teach it after a few more pointers. Out of necessity it was basically one-on-one teaching, but that meant many of the kids got much more into it than they would have in a larger group. I had one mom comment that this was the most focused she had ever seen her daughter, and a couple of boys tweaked their program so much they ended up winning against everyone except each other. This event definitely got a lot of kids really excited about robotics, and we're hoping they'll look into a team or a club at their schools.

Keychain modeling went smoothly, and we ended up getting all the models printed or printing before leaving, and most given to a parent or kid at the event. We got addresses for the leftover few and are planning on sending them off within a day or two. A group of friends worked on a collaberative house, one doing the rooms, one the design, one the roof. It turned into a massive house when they had to leave, and we made sure to tell the kids and the parents where to find SketchUp if they looked interested. We had a huge number of kids throughout the day and it was a great event and great group of volunteers to teach with.

Discover Summer Resource Fair

29 Apr 2017

Discover Summer Resource Fair By Ethan, Evan, Max, Tycho, and Charlotte

Task: Present to kids at the Discover Summer Resource Fair

Today, we brought the MXP to the DISD Discover Summer Resource Fair. We talked to about 250 people, including the Mayor of Dallas. We helped about 50 people create and print keychains using Google Sketchup. In the front of the RV, we introduced about 200 people to Lego Robotics, and assisted them in creating sumo bots.

The goal of this event was to inspire kids to go into STEM programs, and I believe it was a success. Several kids came up to us and asked us questions about camps, as well as how to get into STEM activities. As well, we increased visibility of the Dallas City of Learning group.

Reflections

These events are very good for increasing FIRST and STEM exposure in local communities, and we will continue doing them in the future. As well, we need to work on accommodating more people in a limited space.

UIL Robotics 2017

19 May 2017

UIL Robotics 2017 By Ethan, Evan, Tycho, Charlotte, Austin, Omar, and Janavi

Task: Compete in the UIL Robotics 2017 State Tournament

The UIL Robotics State Tournament is a Texas-only invitational based upon a team's performance in Texas qualifiers and regionals. Since we preformed so well in the North Texas Regionals, winning the first place Inspire Award, we qualified for UIL as well as Super Regionals.

While the tournament is planned with FIRST's help, it differs from a regular FTC tournament. First, the only awards are for the robot game. This harms Iron Reign from the get-go since we work heavily on our journal.

We did well in the robot game, but not amazingly. We went about 4-2, but got carried in some matches. We got chosen for a alliance, but lost in the semi-final round. This year at UIL wasn't much to brag about, so the reflection is the most important part.

Reflections

We learned many lessons at UIL. First, this was our first senior-less competition, so we have to learn how to moderate ourselves without them. Secondly, we ought to put more emphasis on our robot and driving. While the journal is definitely important, we could've won an extra game or two by practicing driving and keeping our robot in working condition. Finally, we need to work on delegation of roles for the upcoming year, as there'll be a vacumn left by the outgoing seniors.

Turn Up! 2017 at Frontiers of Flight

24 Jun 2017

Turn Up! 2017 at Frontiers of Flight By Janavi, Jayesh, Lin, Tycho, Omar, Evan, Charlotte, Ethan, and Darshan

Task:

Each year the Frontiers of Flight Museum hosts the Turn Up!, an event that contains STEM exhibits and demonstration to teach kids about the wonders of Science and Math. We brought the Mobile XPerience (MXP) complete with laptops, 3D printers, and LEGO SumoBot to help teach. Outside the RV we had laptops set up where we taught kids how to code EV3 sumo bots and battle them , we also taught kids how to create their own key chains on SketchUp and 3-D print them. Inside the RV we had more SketchUp latops set up as well as the educational Minecraft servers where the kids could learn how to build structures. As well, we demonstrated our FTC competition robot and Argos by driving them around the museum we got younger kids excited about robotics by giving them balls and letting them "feed" the robot.

Reflections

Going to event like the Dallas Love Field turn up allows us to introduce kids to the wonders of STEM and robotics and help prepare them for their futures from an early age. Helping introduce our community to STEM career is a really integral part of this team and we hope to inspire many more youths through programs like this.

Darshan's Farewell

08 Jul 2017

Darshan's Farewell By Darshan

Task: Adios mis amigos

Well... this is somewhat of a bittersweet moment for me. All of us seniors are leaving for college in hopes of spreading our horizons and making something of ourselves, but we're leaving this team that has become almost a second family. It's been a good few years since I first joined this team and I never thought that I would even make it to this point. I've learned so much in my tenure with this team, from all the technical stuff that goes into the robot building process itself, to building my teamwork and communication skills, and that has actually been one of the things I've enjoyed most. Meting new people and teaching both kids and parents the importance of the STEM field has been great especiaclly, when you see their faces light up. I've made many friends through this team and I know I'll keep in touch with some for a long time. The experiences I've had here are some that will last a lifetime, from riding in the RV all the way to Arkansas to the time we finaly made it SuperRegionals. But we've had our fair share of dissaapointment as well as sucess, but as a team we always bounced back. Something I hope the future of this team continues to do, succeed and bounce back. Hopefully y'all make it to Worlds next year XD. And in the words of YFN Lucci: "EVERYDAY WE LIT!!!" p.s. lil yachty

Omar's Farewell

08 Jul 2017

Omar's Farewell By Omar

Task: Bye :'(

Hooray for graduation! Sort of. As we seniors write our farewell blog posts before we head to college, we have a lot of years to think about. In my case, I only have my 4 years of high school to pull from, but that's more than enough to express my gratitude for being on this team. I've learned so much in so many different areas, and not just scientific ones. I've learned about being on a team, about the logistics of managing said team, and about reaching out to my local community to spread STEM to the next generation of scientists and engineers. I've made a ton of awesome friends, as well as improved my personal and group communication skills (which were lacking before and are still lacking now, but they've still improved a ton). I hope I can apply some of my knowledge to my future, so that I may one day have a Lamborghini and drive around Beverly Hills. My best wishes to the team for the future! (You're going to worlds next year. -_-)

NSTA 2017

15 Jul 2017

NSTA 2017 By Ethan, Evan, Lin, Jayesh, Omar, Tycho, and Charlotte

Task: Expose our MXP to teachers nationwide

Background

For readers who don't know what the MXP is, here's a quick description. Our coach had been floating the idea of a mobile STEM lab for a while, and he was finally given the go-ahead and some money by his company, BigThought. Originally, he planned for buying a van and loading it with tech, but like all true Iron Reign projects, it grew quickly. It turns out that a used RV and a van are roughly the same price, and why not go all out if you can? So, we ended up with a RV old enough to drink sitting in our coaches' driveway. Of course, to convert a RV with outdated shag carpet and a Sea View insignia on the dashboard into a state-of-the-art mobile tech lab, you need free labor. And, where else to get free labor than 11 robotics nerds who have nothing better to do with their summer?

That's where we, the robotics nerds with nothing better to do with out summer, come in. We ripped up the shag carpet, destroyed the bathroom and bedroom, and laid new flooring and installed tech workstations in every part of the RV possible. And along the way, Best Buy, BigThought, and Dallas City of Learning caught wind of our project and gave us grants, allowing us to install four 3D printers, 40 laptops, and 10 EV3 Robotics Kits to educate kids.

The purpose of this is to deliver STEM programs to under-privliged kids in the Dallas area, in hopes of inspiring them to go into STEM fields. As well, the MXP can help close the summer achievement gap, where kids in lower economic brackets tend to forget more over the summer than richer kids. We're also targeted towards middle schoolers - they're of the age where they're learning that they probably won't be an astronaut, and showing them alternative options that are still interesting is extremely important.

Aboard the RV, we run two programs. In front and/or outside, we teach kids EV3 programming to compete in a sumo-bots competition. While kids won't be able tp directly learn from the EV3 programming language, they can take the abstract skills they learn from programming the robot and apply them to other programming and learning endevours later in life. In the back, we teach kids how to 3D model using Google Sketchup, and allow them to create and print their own keychain to take home as a keepsake.

The Trip

The NSTA Convention is a meeting of teachers from all over America and 12 other countries to hold seminars, panels, and presentations for teaching certificates. We were invited there due to our work on the MXP and its success in Dallas. We worked on the floor of the convention, with booths from various companies and agencies also presenting.

We started our trip to Kississime, Florida at 8:40 in the morning, way too early for us high school students in the summer. It was a long, boring drive. The highlight, or anti-highlight of the drive is that halfway through our first day, we started billowing black smoke as we pulled off the interstate. We pulled over on a residential farm road in the middle of nowhere. Luckily, we were assisted in our engine troubles by a guy who happened to see us pull over across the road from his house. He helped us fix our engine and drove our coach to the mechanic's, and we were on our way yet again.

Our first day at the convention was a quarter day. We started at the convention at 4:30p, and ended at 6:30. Despite our limited time, it was probably our most productive day. We talked to over 150 teachers from all over America about our experience building and manning the MXP, and gave advice on building their own. We also allowed the teachers to make and print their own keychains if they wanted.

Our second day was just like the first day, but four times as long. We brought our Argos, our color following robot. We recently fitted him with a new power distribution module by REV Robotics so that we could test it out before the new season. As well, Argos is our Vuforia-testing robot, so we demonstrated that ability too. Our coach also presented on a panel that day. As a finale to that day, we got to see Veritasium's presentation on "The Power of Un".

On the last day, we didn't present to as many people, but we got to have better and more in-depth discussions with everyone who came onboard. We had teachers that designed keychains and programmed robots for over an hour. As well, we presented to the president of the NSTA.

On the way back, we had to engage in one of three Florida pasttimes, and we didn't want to get arrested or get eaten by an alligator. So, we settled on the less permanetly damaging option, and went to the beach instead.

Reflections - One Last Ride

The convention was a roaring success. I estimate that we talked to about 400 teachers from all over America. We can say that we probably inspired teachers from 4-6 other cities to start research and development on building their own RVs. Also, we talked about running a FTC team to interested teachers and FIRST in general.

Even though, this trip was bittersweet. This was the last Iron Reign trip with the original senior members. Lin and Jayesh have been on the team for over one-third of their lives, and this was their final ride as members of Iron Reign. I, personally, have worked with them since 4th grade - one-half of my life! And, as all last rides go, one must find happiness that it was a good one, and that it ever happened. Lin and Jayesh have been great advisors and friends, and they deserve the best of luck in college and in the real world.

Moon Day at Frontier of Flight Museum

22 Jul 2017

Moon Day at Frontier of Flight Museum By Abhi, Charlotte, Austin, Janavi, and Tycho

Task: Present at the MoonDay Event

Today, Iron Reign was invited to the Frontier of Flight Museum by Dallas Love Field Airport for a day of STEM knowledge for its annual "Moon Day". It was time for us to bring in the LEGO robotics kit, 4 laptops for kids, ARGOS, and Juggernaut, our competition bot from this past season. Upon arrival at the museum, we noticed many other fascinating stations such as one explaining NASA's new rover and a model in the arena. We paired up with some other robotics members in the region to set up a station where we could help robotics beginners program the LEGO bots so that the bots could wrestle eachother like Sumo wrestlers. In addition, we fixed ARGOS so that the color sensor would be able to sense a stick in front of it to follow the sign. This allowed us to let other students drive the bot. The same was done with Juggernaut.

Our LEGO station was set up in a way such that even people who couldn't type could use it. We helped people code a bot that drives forward till the bot reached the edge of the board, turns backwards, rotates, and then repeats these reactions until the program is terminated. The students learned that the robot was able to determine when it reached the edge of the board by using the color sensor located on the bottom of the robot. Since the board is built in a dartboard sort of manner with the majority being black and a white ring around the edge, the robot was taught by the students to only stay on the black and not continue if the sensor is on the white. The students had the ability to individually change the speeds of their bots so that when the compete with one another in the "Sumo" game, there could be a winner.

We decided to use ARGOS and Juggernaut as play bots for the day and drove both around. While doing so, we discovered that ARGOS had a bug which, though controllable, was inconvenient. ARGOS' movement system was developed in a way such that the acceleration would compound based on the number of seconds the joystick was pressed in a certain direction. Currently, ARGOS had to be coded this way since we didn't have encoders and power was the only way to put speed into the wheels. We are currently working on fixing this problem. Regardless, we were able to drive ARGOS around and let other children control it using the color sensor stick we developed. The stick was developed in a way that the bot would shine a light onto the area in front of it and if it found the image we had for the color to detect, ARGOS knew to move. We programmed Juggernaut in a similar way so students were able to drive it as well. Since Juggernaut also had shooting abilities, we were able to play catch with numerous people in the area including booth sponsors. In this way, we were able to teach others about the shooting mechanism and carwash system developed to pick up balls in the bot. This fascinated many young people and inspired them to pursue a STEM activity.

Numerous students from a wide array of backrounds came to Moon Day and we were able to spread the knowledge of robotics to them. We had many parents and educators ask us about ways to get involved and we gave them more information about FIRST and their message of Gracious Professionalism. Robotics gave us an avenue to connect with kids, regardless of their socioeconomic status, race, gender, or beliefs. This allowed us to make a deep impact on people and join forces with them to pursue something we are all passionate about. In a world filled with discrimination against those of certain groups, the Frontier of Flight Museum gave us a chance to move people by the wonders of robotics and encourage them to pursue what they want in life without caring about the discriminators. We hope to continue to make an impact on people through future events.

So, You're Writing a Blog Post

23 Jul 2017

So, You're Writing a Blog Post By Ethan

Frontmatter

layout: Do not touch.
title: Title of your article (you can't use hyphens or colons.) tags: Enter as comma seperated list, case insensitive. Try to use one award and one normal tag

  • Tips - tips and tricks for other teams.
  • Journal - working on the journal, blog, and posts like this one.
  • Outreach - volunteering and special events. Ex. Moonday, NSTA
  • Mechanical - work on the robot, parts, building, ect.
  • Software - programming.
  • Business - grants, funding, ect.
  • Organization - organizing, cleaning physical things.
  • Video - if you have a video, nothing else.
  • Private - will NOT show up on the blog page
  • Pinned - pins post as first on the homepage until the tag is removed.
  • Inspire - (award) all around good posts, important things for judges like NSTA, or a post going over our robot in detail
  • Connect - business award
  • Innovate - design process and uniqueness award
  • Design - award about how well documented and designed your robot is
  • Motivate - recruitment, representing STEM/FIRST
  • Control - coding award

section: Choose team, engineering, or business.
personhours: Calculate using # of people * hours worked. One number.
rolecall: People who participated in the post, comma seperated. Author of post goes first.

REMEMBER: keep the space between the colon and the information, and dont touch the "---"s.

Rules

Task: Used for succinctly describing what you did
Body of Post: Describe what you did, how you did, ect..
Reflections: Used to say how something worked out, your creative process, expectations, ect.
Images: Must be 600px wide. Use as many as you'd like. Save in images.
Videos: Use the default YouTube embed.
Embedded Insta/Twitter Posts: DON'T put in the first paragraph. You will break the blog.
Filenames: Save as YYYY-MM-DD-NAME.html in _posts. If unfinished, Draft-YYYY-MM-DD-NAME.html

Dear Iron Reign

12 Aug 2017

Dear Iron Reign By Jayesh

Dear Iron Reign,

8 years ago, when I walked into Mr. Schulte’s room after school, I didn’t realize my life was about to change dramatically. I’d heard there was a robotics club which was attempting to be started. I’d had sparse experience with the subject, through extraneous events like the annual Engineering Saturday at UTA, so I decided to give it a shot. When I walked through that door on the second floor, I didn’t realize I would find my second family and grow in ways which were then unimaginable to me.

Iron Reign began as a play on words from a natural phenomenon on Jupiter. It began as a group of 10 energetic, passionate, and probably annoying geeks with no idea what they were getting into. Through everything I’ve learned intellectually though these years, my favorite part has been the growth we’ve gone through, both as individuals and as a group. I’ve seen us struggle through all manners of competition, conflict, and always come out on top. The team served as a place I personally could start to build, what I came to realize, my future. I wanted to acknowledge the individuals which made this group as special as it is, so here we go (in no particular order):

Charlotte, it has been a pleasure getting to know you this year. I wish we’d met and talked more earlier, but you immediately stood out to me because of your kindness and quiet dedication to what you care about. It was great talking and joking around with you. Don’t let the others (looking at you Ethan) bully you, just lemme know if they make too many Vegan comments. They’re just jealous you’re healthier than they are. I look forward to seeing how you progress.

Austin, it has been a fun two years getting to know you. Your passion and dedication to those you care about has always endeared me towards you. Your transition to Iron Reign was as seamless as I could’ve fathomed. You immediately meshed with our hardworking and fun-loving personalities, and it has given me even more hope to where this team is going to be. Stay true to yourself, and I trust you to ensure this team doesn’t lose who we are.

Ethan, you were one of the original memebers, ahem, members of the team. Since the very beginning, I knew you would be both essential to the team, as well as a good friend to me. Your technical expertise, as well as your ever- positive personality, has been essential to who we are as a team. You’ve especially made my role on the team easier, as you are always so willing to work with other people, even on tasks you aren’t comfortable doing. Stop bullying Charlotte so much, keep growing, it’s been a fun ride.

Tycho, you have been the person who has always challenged me on why I do what I do. You’ve made it possible for me to concentrate on the team as a whole, and not get lost only focusing on singular tasks. You are individually one of the most intelligent people I’ve met. It has been great seeing how you’ve advanced, especially in functioning as a team player. I hope you continue to grow in everything you commit to.

Janavi, I don’t think I’ve ever been as proud of a person on the team as I have been of you. Your growth since we met you has been astonishing. We’ve joked about your affinity towards duct tape since the beginning, but you’ve grown so much since then. When you came in, you had such a desire to learn as much as you could, and made an immediate positive impact on a veteran team. The reason people say we cherry pick our members is because we have people like you who come into the team. Keep your kind and inclusive personality, it’ll serve you well.

Evan, since day one of Iron Reign, you’ve had a direct impact to both the team’s success, as well as my progress as an individual. You’ve grown to become such a mature, and hardworking person. Seeing you take more of an assertive and self-motivated role on the team made it so much easier for us to be successful. Exploring Atlanta with you is a memory I won’t forget. Thank you for inviting us to your play, your playwriting is unique and characteristic of what may become your future. Keep your positive and dedicated personality, I look forward to see how you grow.

So, I lied earlier, I did purposely leave my seniors for last, so here we go:

Lin, you joined us a year after the team was formed. I remember how nervous you were about joining the team, especially as you were the first girl to be on it. Since day one, those concerns should’ve been voided, with how vital you’ve been to our team dynamic. You had a maturity about you, even back in 7th grade, which served as a reference and base point for us. You were essential for us, both systematically, and as the person actually caring about organization (rip). Thank you for everything, I can’t wait to see all the good things you do at MIT.

Darshan, I’ve known you for so long, it’s actually ridiculous. Since I met you in elementary school, I’ve always thought of you as a brother of mine. We’ve fought, joked around, and grown through the years. I’ve been especially proud of your courage to fight off your introverted nature, and do things for the team, both in practices, and even on our presentation (dropping bars though), which you were originally uncomfortable with. You’re going to do fantastic at UT, and I hope you continue to challenge yourself as I know you can do.

Max, since I met you in 5th grade, I knew there was more to you than the eye could see. One of my favorite parts of being a part of this team is in working and joking around with you every week. You show who you really are in front of the people you truly care about, and are comfortable with, and that’s precious to me. Your intelligence always astounds me, and I know there are good things in store for you. You are going to absolutely destroy UTD (in a good way), and I look forward to seeing what you do my bro. I look forward to seeing how you and your memes progress.

Omar, as you said, we’ll probably still be meming around by the time this all ends. You have been a brother to me since we started really talking to each other back in middle school. It has been fantastic seeing how you’ve branched out being a part of this team. I know you don’t get too much into sentimental things, but I will always be there for you my man. Your intelligence and savvy are going to serve you well. You’re going to do fantastic things at Notre Dame, and I look forward to our endless discord calls when we all have time to play.

This team wouldn’t have been possible without two specific people. Our FCE, our OTP, whichever you prefer, but Mr. Karim Virani, and Dr. Catherine Lux; you two have been the basis for everything this team has ever done. None of this would’ve been possible without you two deciding to dedicate a significant portion of your lives to all of us. You have made time and effort specifically just so we can have a better future, and I can’t even express how grateful I am for it. Your home has become ours, and your welcoming arms have always been a sanctuary for us. Mr. Virani, your technical expertise, as well as your never-ending dedication to listening to us has always been something I’ve treasured. We’ve been able to discuss anything and everything, and that openness to everything we do has been essential to forming what this team has become. Dr. Lux, your kindness and willingness to listen to us has taught us what’s important beyond the robotics which we do. You two balance each other in such a beautiful way, it inspires us to be both successful in what we do, as well as overall being good people. Thank you for all of this. You’ve sacrificed a lot for us, now it’s on us to create the positive change in our world which you’ve emphasized. Thank you for being my second family.

The seniors will be back every winter and see how everyone is doing. I have been so proud and honored to work and be with every single one of you. You have taught me the meaning and importance of what I want to do in the future. You have shown me what it is to better the world, while accomplishing difficult technical tasks. You’ve taught me that a leader isn’t just one who encourages others to do better, it’s also one who has to see the importance of even the smallest task in how a larger goal is accomplished. Thank you once again from the bottom of my heart. It has been an absolute pleasure and honor to be with you all. The future is bright for this team, and not just in regards to First ;).

Much Love,
Jayesh Sharma

Balancing and PID

20 Aug 2017

Balancing and PID By Tycho

Task: Test and improve the PID system and balance code

We're currently testing code to give Argos a balancing system so that we can demo it. This is also a test for the PID in the new REV robotics expansion hubs, which we plan on switching to for this season if reliable. Example code is below.

public void BalanceArgos(double Kp, double Ki, double Kd, double pwr, double currentAngle, double targetAngle)
 {
     //sanity check - exit balance mode if we are out of recovery range
 
 
 
     if (isBalanceMode()){ //only balance in the right mode
 
         setHeadTilt(nod);
 
         //servo steering should be locked straight ahead
         servoSteerFront.setPosition(.5);
         servoSteerBack.setPosition(0.5);
 
         //double pwr = clampMotor((roll-staticBalance)*-.05);
 
         balancePID.setOutputRange(-.5,.5);
         balancePID.setPID(Kp, Ki, Kd);
         balancePID.setSetpoint(staticBalance);
         balancePID.enable();
         balancePID.setInput(currentAngle);
         double correction = balancePID.performPID();
 
         logger.UpdateLog(Long.toString(System.nanoTime()) + ","
                 + Double.toString(balancePID.getDeltaTime()) + ","
                 + Double.toString(currentAngle) + ","
                 + Double.toString(balancePID.getError()) + ","
                 + Double.toString(balancePID.getTotalError()) + ","
                 + Double.toString(balancePID.getDeltaError()) + ","
                 + Double.toString(balancePID.getPwrP()) + ","
                 + Double.toString(balancePID.getPwrI()) + ","
                 + Double.toString(balancePID.getPwrD()) + ","
                 + Double.toString(correction));
 
         timeStamp=System.nanoTime();
         motorFront.setPower(correction);
 

REV Robot Reveal

24 Aug 2017

REV Robot Reveal By Tycho, Austin, Charlotte, Omar, Evan, and Janavi

Argos V2 - a REV Robot Reveal

This video was pulled from Argos visits to: The NSTA STEM Expo in Kissimmee FL, in the path of eclipse totality in Tennessee, and in North Texas at The Dallas Makerspace, The Southwest Center Mall, Southside on Lamar and the Frontiers of Flight Museum. We hope you find it interesting:

PID Calibration and Testing

27 Aug 2017

PID Calibration and Testing By Tycho

Task: Allow user to change PID coefficients from the controller

To allow each user to create their own settings, we're designing a way to allow the user to tune PID to their own liking from the controller. This also enables debugging for our robot.

public void PIDTune(PIDController pid, boolean pidIncrease, boolean pidDecrease, boolean magnitudeIncrease, boolean magnitudeDecrease, boolean shouldStateIncrement) {
 if (shouldStateIncrement) {
  pidTunerState = stateIncrement(pidTunerState, 0, 2, true);
 }
 if (magnitudeIncrease) {
  pidTunerMagnitude *= 10;
 }
 if (magnitudeDecrease) {
  pidTunerMagnitude /= 10;
 }
 double dir;
 if (pidIncrease) dir = 1;
 else if (pidDecrease) dir = -1;
 else if (pidDecrease) dir = -1;
 else dir = 0;
 switch (pidTunerState) {
  case 0:
   pid.setPID(pid.getP() pidTunerMagnitude * dir, pid.getI(), pid.getD());
   break;
  case 1:
   pid.setPID(pid.getP(), pid.getI() pidTunerMagnitude * dir, pid.getD());
   break;
  case 2:
   pid.setPID(pid.getP(), pid.getI(), pid.getD() pidTunerMagnitude * dir);
   break;
 }
}
public double getPidTunerMagnitude() {
 return pidTunerMagnitude;
}
public int getPidTunerState() {
 return pidTunerState;
}
public int stateIncrement(int val, int minVal, int maxVal, boolean increase) {
 if (increase) {
  if (val == maxVal) {
   return minVal;
  }
  val++;
  return val;
 } else {
  if (val == minVal) {
   return maxVal;
  }
  val--;
  return val;
 }
}

AmeriCorps Partnership

01 Sep 2017

AmeriCorps Partnership By Ethan

Task: Detail our AmeriCorps partnership

Together with BigThought, we were able to find another programmatic sponsor: the US Government. For those of y'all who don't know, AmeriCorps is a federally run program that encourages civil service. Most 501(c)(3)s are able to apply to be AmeriCorps partners, and BigThought was one of them. Because of this, over the summer, we were able to gain volunteers directly sponsored by the American government, two alumni (Jayesh and Lin) included. This was an amazing experience for Iron Reign, as we have now had partners of all types, from public to private, from local to federal. As well, this has further increased the visibilty of the MXP, having it recognized on the federal level.

FTC Kickoff and First Meet

09 Sep 2017

FTC Kickoff and First Meet By Ethan, Abhi, Kenna, Austin, Karina, Tycho, and Evan

Task: View FTC Kickoff and plan for the year

Welcome to FTC Relic Recovery! For those who don't know, this year's challenge is archeology themed, and it certainly will be a challenge. The goal of this challenge is to stack 6X6 in blocks (glyphs) in certain patterns to gain as many points as possible. The are also side challenges such as balancing the robot and hitting a specific field element to gain points. Due to the vast number of methods to score points, a robot must contain multiple mechanisms which are extremely accurate as well as quick.

Upon arrival to Williams High School in Plano, TX for the Dallas region kickoff, we quickly amazed. When the regional director, Patrick Michaud, asked the audience how many rookie teams there were, we were mesmerized by the number of hands that went up. Though the FTC organization was already very large, we noticed that the FIRST spirit and ideals of Gracious Professionalism were rapidly spreading to aspiring students of the North Texas region. This is very inspiring for both veterans and rookies because we need to work more closely than ever to mentor one another for our success in the 2017-2018 challenge.

Back to the actual game, before the game reveal, Dr. Michaud introduced the expanded compatibility for different kits and tools for this year's competition. REV robotics was present at the event and discussed their new sets of PDM's as well as new servos, etc. REV kits stuck out to us as we felt the Modern Robotics system, though did it job, had some issues. We hope to implement more REV parts this year for more accurate and efficient parts. Another change we noticed was a new set of smartphones as driver stations/robot controllers, the Motorola Moto phones. We, however, will continue to use ZTE and Samsung Galaxy S5 phones.

All teams were eagerly sitting on the edges of their seats while waiting for the 11AM official reveal of the challenge. Something unique we noticed for this year's reveal video was that there was a skit performed. We found this as enjoyable though we were all waiting for the official animation. Upon completion of the animation video, the field was unraveled and all teams were allowed to access the field and field elements. While doing so, we took note of some complications that we could run into. First, we noticed that the balancing stones had about a 2 centimeter height jump from the ground to their tops. This would mean that our robot would need to drive onto the platform which was at an elevation and then balance. Second, we noticed that the space in which the blocks needed to be placed was very tight. This means that if the robot is not very precise, it could risk the loss of valuble points and time. Lastly, we noticed that the furthest zone for placing the relics was a relatively long way away. Since the robot cannot touch the ground outside the field, this could create some complications, especially if we want to place both relics.

Taking these ideas back to the house, we put our minds together to identify a basic robot design. At kickoff, we noticed that the glyphs felt like the same material that the floor tiles were made of. Upon noticing this, we created a make-shift glyph to prototype with.

Upon discussion of our plans for this year, we decided to strip apart the past two years' bots apart to their elementary parts. We decided to take the 2015 bot apart completely and we isolated the mechanum base of the 2016 bot (Juggernaut). We decided that a mechanum base would be best for this year's competition due to easy maneuverability.

Reflections

We're in for a hard time this year, but we'll have a solid bot. We're a little worried about the glyph-picker mechanism though, and we'll have to decide that in the next few meetings. Through the prototyping of the two intake and deposition systems, we hope to identify our design by the next couple of weeks.

Meeting Log

09 Sep 2017

Meeting Log September 09, 2017 By Ethan, Evan, Abhi, Tycho, Austin, Karina, and Kenna

Meeting Log September 09, 2017

Today was the first meeting of the Relic Recovery season. Our main focus today was strategy, then organization and getting the robot ready for this year's challenges

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Write blog post for Kickoff
  • Fix dates for indexPrintable
  • Blog post catchup
  • Strategy review

Software

  • Glyph recognition OpenCV
  • Aspiring programmer's code review

Build / Modelling

  • Teardown old robot
  • Design Competition - glyph grabber

Service / Outreach

  • Kickoff

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EthanKickoff post2:002
EthanFix dates4:002
EvanDesign Competition2:004
AustinTeardown robot2:002
AustinDesign Competion4:002
TychoCode review2:004
KennaBlog review2:004
KarinaStrategy review2:004
AbhiStrategy review2:004
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001
PeopleTask2:001

Intake System Competition

09 Sep 2017

Intake System Competition By Evan and Austin

Task: Compare build designs for the cryptobox intake system

The block scoring system is going to be an integral part of the competition this year, and it will have to built sturdy. It’ll have to be reliable for us to have any shot of winning any matches. So we got to brainstorming. We spent a while at the whiteboard, drawing up various mechanisms and ways to pick up blocks. One idea was the idea of a block delivering system similar to those modern vending machines that have two degree of freedom movement. We began to design the contraption so that a conveyor belt could be placed on an up and down linear slide to position the blocks just right to make the different symbols. Another person came up with the idea to use our tank treads from Geb, our competition robot from two years ago, to push the blocks up a ramp and deposit them into the cryptoboxes. Neither of us could convince the other about what was to be done, so we both split off to work on our own models. Next week we will keep working on this build off of the century.

Makeshift Glyphs

10 Sep 2017

Makeshift Glyphs By Janavi, Abhi, and Evan

Task:

After the game reveal video was released we had some ideas on how to have our robot grip onto the blocks, but we couldn't test it without a makeshift glyph to hold onto. So we decided to upcycle some old cat and weather damaged field tiles by cutting them up into 6 X 6 squares and placing them in a cube formation. Attached below is an image of our handiwork and a image of the glyphs used on FTC fields

Our glyph real glyph

Reflections

This did not end up work very well and in hindsight we could have used other materiel like printing out a 6 X 6 X 6 frame on the 3-D printer or by making it out of foam board so it would be more similar to the real thing. But thanks to the generous donations of the DISD STEM department we were provided with a full field set so we don't have to worry about creating our own glyphs. However, we will remember this for the future.

Meeting Log

16 Sep 2017

Meeting Log September 16, 2017 By Ethan, Evan, Karina, Tycho, Austin, Charlotte, and Kenna

Meeting Log September 16, 2017

Today we had a major outreach event at Conrad HS in DISD which served around 450 people. We also planned on continuing our building competition, working on strategy, the blog, and the robot teardown.

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Conrad post
  • About page - new members
  • Strategy

Software

  • Code review

Build / Modelling

  • Complete robot teardown
  • Finish design competition
  • Install REV hubs

Service / Outreach

  • Conrad HS volunteering

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EthanConrad post2:002
EthanAbout page4:002
EvanDesign competition2:004
AustinRobot teardown2:001
AustinREV hubs3:001
AustinDesign competition4:002
KarinaAbout page2:002
KarinaStrategy4:002
TychoCode review2:004
CharlotteConrad post2:004

Further Design of the Intake

16 Sep 2017

Further Design of the Intake By Evan and Austin

Task: Design the grabbing systems further

The sun came out and it was back to the field. We got started right away, both of us building our designs. Since the cryptoboxes were wider than the 18 inch sizing cube, we started by designing a fold out for the conveyor belt. This was entirely proof of concept, purely to see if it was at all aplicable in the game this year. We spent an hour or two gathering parts and put together an extending conveyor belt. This device would swing down, like the arrow suggests, allowing for more space to move the blocks back in forth, giving us accuracy in rune completion. This will be later attached to linear slides, allowing for an up and down motion.

MXP at Conrad HS

16 Sep 2017

MXP at Conrad HS By Ethan, Evan, Karina, Tycho, Austin, Charlotte, and Kenna

Sharing STEM opportinities with kids and their families at Conrad HS

Today, we brought the Dallas City of Learning MXP to Conrad High School to support Dallas ISD's parent outreach fair call PrepU Super Saturday. The focus for this Super Saturday was making parents aware of extracurricular activities available to their students in DISD. So this was a perfect event to let parents know about the robotics programs available in Dallas ISD, including Jr. FLL, FLL, FRC and FTC. The DallasISD STEM Departments was also there and since they are responsible for curating the robotics programs across the school district, we sent parents who wanted to know more over to them.

Activities

Up in the front, we started a MinecraftEDU server and had 3 computers decicated to playing it for younger kids. On the other side, we had set up computers to program EV3s for sumobots. In the back, we ran Google Sketchup on the computers to teach kids how to make keychains and other trinkets using 3D modelling and printing. Our back setup includes 4 FlashForge 3D printers, donated to us by Best Buy.

Today we presented to somewhere around 420-450 people. The MXP was ridiculously crowded at some points, up to 25 people aboard the MXP at some points. We handed out flyers about FIRST to people who visited the table next to our MXP as well, with some significant interest. About 50 keychains were completed and printed - the photo above is Austin holding our printing backlog. Almost all of them were picked up, but we weren't able to print the last 10 or so designs.

Today was a very successful day for the MXP, and we'll break our record of people talked to easily if we keep this up. We have future deployments planned soon including another Super Saturday next weekend.

Intake Systems

17 Sep 2017

Intake Systems By Austin

Task: Work on designs for the intake system

Over the past couple of days we’ve experimented with a horizontally mounted track system that we had hoped would serve to move blocks through the entire length of the robot and into the crypto box. Immediately we noticed a few issues, the primary one being that the tread was static in terms of mounting and therefore wasn’t accepting of blocks when feed at an odd angle. To correct our feeding issue, we widened the gap between the tracks and added rubber bands in hopes of maintaining traction and adding to on demand orientation ability.

Initial tests of our second prototype went fairly well, however the design suffered from some severe drawbacks; the first was its weight and size which would limit robot mobility and take up much needed space for other components, the second issue was that keeping the treads tensioned perfectly for long periods of time was nearly impossible and they would often sag leading to loss of grip, and finally the system was still fairly unpredictable especially during intake (blocks were flung occasionally). These finding lead me to believe we may scrap the idea in consideration of time.

Aside from our track intake we’ve also been working on a gripper and slide system that shows promise.

MXP Event at LV Stockard Middle School

23 Sep 2017

MXP Event at LV Stockard Middle School By Charlotte, Kenna, Tycho, and Austin

STEM education for children and their parents at a DISD event

Earlier this morning, we drove the Mobile Tech Experience RV to LV Stockard Middle School and participated in a DISD event. We served around 250 kids, ages ranging from preschool to middle school. The morning started off slow, but as the day went on, the MXP became more and more crowded. Our spot was near the food and snack area, so lots of families came through after getting breakfast or lunch. We had a sumo field set up outside the vehicle and many people would stop to watch the robots fight, who we would then invite onto the vehicle and teach them how to program these robots themselves.

Like our previous event at Conrad High School, this DISD event was purposed to help kids discover activities that they may enjoy and want to do as an extracurricular. This was a great opportunity to spark interest in STEM in these kids and we answered any questions about who our team is and how they can join or start a robotics team at their school.  The kids rushed in in groups and were very excited to get started with the activities that we provide. A highlight of this specific event was a group of young folklorico dancers who came to learn 3D modeling, as seen above. When a group such as that comes in, it both forces and allows us to practice our teaching skills. Instead of teaching individually, we show the kids how to 3D design step-by-step on a large tv screen donated to us by Big Thought.

This rush of people happens at a lot of events that we cater, and these rushes can get very chaotic, but as a team we agree that it is this chaos that is the most fulfilling once the event ends. Being able to teach these kids and see their faces once they have accomplished something using the knowledge that they just acquired is the most gratifying part of serving on the Mobile Tech Experience.

Meeting Log

23 Sep 2017

Meeting Log September 23, 2017 By Charlotte, Kenna, Tycho, Austin, and Evan

Meeting Log September 23, 2017

We started the day by volunteering at LV Stockard MS, another DISD event. During our practice, we planned to work on robot design, blog updates, and code testing.

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • About page updates
  • Stockard blog post

Software

  • Controller mapping

Build / Modelling

  • Cryptobox grabber - competition judging
  • Install chosen grabber
  • Reposition robot hubs

Service / Outreach

  • Stockard MS DISD

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
CharlotteStockard post2:002
CharlotteCompetition judging4:002
KennaAbout page2:002
KennaCompetition judging4:002
TychoController mapping2:004
AustinCompetition judging2:002
AustinInstall grabber4:002
EvanCompetition judging2:002
EvanMove hubs4:002

Narrowing Down the Designs

23 Sep 2017

Narrowing Down the Designs By Evan and Austin

Task: Redesign our grabber systems

In an attempt to get a working lift system before the coaches meeting we will be presenting at, a linear slide has been attached to the robot, along with a pair of grabbing arms. They work surprisingly well and aren’t as complicated as my idea. Plus the importance of speed has really taken hold on me this year. We need to be as fast as possible but my contraption is slow compared to the grabber arm. I think we'll be scrapping the idea for this grabber arm bandwagon everyone seems to be hopping on. While the grabber arm allows for quick pick ups and easy placement, our idea was only bulky and unnecessary because of our use of mecanum wheels which eliminate any need for a system to go side to side. Since the grabber was rudimentary, we’ll be making improvements and new iterations. We toyed with some materials earlier on in the season, and we’ll probably be implementing that into it.

Slide Designs

24 Sep 2017

Slide Designs By Austin

Task: Figure out slide mechanism

After determining that the treaded channel was much too buggy to perfect with the time we had, we shifted attention to other scoring systems like grabbers, however before finding the right grabber we decided we needed to get the track for it completed first. We’ve had experience in the past with all sorts of rails from Tetrix kits that convert their standard channels into lifts, to the newer REV sliding rail kits which we also toyed around with in initial prototyping shenanigans.

One of our key concerns was also wear and tear, in that we have had systems slowly breakdown in the past, such as our mountain climber and catapult, since they had plastic components that broke over time, we knew that long periods of use over multiple competitions would deteriorate the plastic components of either rail sets, and other rails that used full metal parts would simply be bulky and rough to fit in snugly with our robot. After a bit more research we settled on standard steel drawer slides from home depot, mainly because they were streamline and all around sturdy. The slides also provided us with easy mounting points for our future claw and attachments.

We understood that whatever option we picked for slides would have to be easily repairable or replaceable during competition, should something go wrong. Since the drawer slide were easy to come by and needed little modification we could easily make duplicates to act as stand by and demonstration parts during competition.

These positives came to form more than enough of a reason to continue prototyping our grabber that would eventually be attached once completed to the lift, which was now mounted to the robot and used a system of spools and pullies to extended above the minimum height for scoring in the top row.

Building Competition 2017

25 Sep 2017

Building Competition 2017 By Evan and Austin

Task: Find the best robot design

The games have begun and it’s time to build. So that’s what Austin and I did. A war had been declared. Legions of the indentured collided on the battlefield. Millions were slaughtered during this new age armageddon. Austin had his army. I had mine. Two different ideas to do the same task: lift glyphs into their correct positions. A simple job but one that caused a rift in Iron Reign, an incurable rift between the forces of light and darkness.

But then I decided to stop because his design had more speed than mine and speed is more necessary this year. My idea had been a lift that could move the glyphs back and forth but I realized that it would be a little too slow for the competition. Or, another solution would have had a side to side conveyor belt that moved glyphs back and forth to arrange them in the correct order, and then push them into the slots. This movement would have been separate from the four mecanum wheels that we are using in the chasis. His idea was simpler than mine, a conveyor belt that ran through the middle of the robot to bring the glyphs to the keybox, where they could be slotted in with the side to side movement provided by the mecanum wheels. So, like an outnumbered Supreme Court judge, I decided to join the winner so I could have a say in the early design. Once he got a prototype ofhis contraption working, it was able to pick up blocks effectively but it still needs improvement. It has issues with blocks at an angle, and it has trouble slotting the blocks into the keybox, but it's a nice step toward a working block system. We are currently planning to use the mecanum wheel base we used last year but this could change anytime. We left practice with a direction and that's better than nothing.

Meeting Log

30 Sep 2017

Meeting Log September 30, 2017 By Ethan, Evan, Tycho, Austin, Kenna, Karina, Austin, and Abhi

Meeting Log September 30, 2017

Today was based around prepping for our meeting with DISD adminmistrators, getting our robots in working order, and organizing parts for the season.

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Fix stats page
  • Strategy

Software

  • Program lift
  • Program grabber

Build / Modelling

  • Fix lift string system
  • Add lift supports

Service / Outreach

  • DISD prep

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EthanFix stats page2:002
EthanDISD Prep4:002
EvanLift supports2:004
AustinLift string2:004
TychoProgram lift2:002
TychoProgram grabber4:002
KennaLift supports2:004
KarinaStrategy2:004
AbhiStrategy2:004

Testing Materials

30 Sep 2017

Testing Materials By Austin, Evan, and and Tycho

Task: Test Materials for V2 Gripper

Though our current gripper is working sufficiently, there are some issues we would like to improve in our second version. The mounting system is unstable and easily comes out of alignment because the rev rail keeps bending. Another issue we've encountered is the cervo pulling the grippers so that they begin to cave inwards, releasing any blocks being held at the bottom. By far the biggest problem is our intake. Our drivers have to align the robot with the block so precisely to be able to stack it that it eats a majority of our game time. However, there are some advantages, such as light weight and adjustability, to this gripper that we would like to carry over into the second version.

    We tested out a few different materials:
  • Silicone Baking Mats - The mats were a very neutral option because they didn't have any huge advantages or disadvantages (other than not adhering well). These could have been used, however, there were other better options.
  • Shelf Liner - It was far too slippery. Also, when thinking about actually making the grippers, there was no good way to put it on the grippers. Using this materials would have been too much work with little gain.
  • Baking Pan Lining (picked) - It was made out of durable rubber but was still very malleable which is a big advantage. We need the grippers to compress and 'grip' the block without causing any damage.
  • Rubber Bands on Wheels - This material was closest to our original version and, unexpectedly, carried over one of the problems. It still requires very specific orientations to pick up blocks, which would defeat the purpose of this entire task.

The purpose of this is as a part of our future grabber design, which will need to be relatively light, as our string is currently breaking under stress due to weight. The material must also have good direct shear and direct strength, as the grabber will have rotating arms that move in and out to grasp blocks. As well, we're replacing the tetrix parts with REV, as they're smaller and a little lighter, with the additional bonus of more mounting points.

Designing the Grabber Further

30 Sep 2017

Designing the Grabber Further By Evan

Task: Design the grabber design and make future plans

The grabber has been evolving. A column made of a turkey baster and a wooden dowel attached to servo has come into fruition. The first drawings and designs are coming along, and some 3D printed parts have been thought up to allow the square dowel to become a hexagon. An adapter of sorts. The grabber and lift have been outfitted with a back board to stop blocks from getting caught underneath the backing bar. The back board is just some 1/16th inch wood cut to fit. The new turkey baster columns are in the first stages, so more info on them will come as more is discovered and progress has been made. The sketches will explain these designs better.

Designing the Grabber

01 Oct 2017

Designing the Grabber By Austin

Task: Work on the grabbers more

With our single degree of freedom lift fastened to the robot we focused on the appendage that would grip to within an inch of its life any glyph we fed it. We initially toyed with simple tetrix channels to form a make shift rail that would hold axels for pivoting points, however we found tetrix to be a bit too cumbersome and decided to use rev rail instead. Using two tetrix U-brackets we built a makeshift grabber that used rubber bands and a servo to secure blocks without letting them slip through its grasp. To add extra grip to the long L-beams that formed the pincers of the claw, we added even more rubber bands, and moved on to testing.

Initial tests were very positive, the high strength servo coupled with a few rubber bands maintained enough of a grip on one or two blocks with ease, and because the entire system was mounted to a rev rail we could easily slide and size the pincers to the right distance. Feeling confident in our work we attached the grabber to the lift and attempted drive practice, which ended relatively quickly due to a surprising number of jams between the lift and glyphs.

The key issue we now faced was that as the lift returned to its home state blocks were getting stuck beneath the retracting claw causing jams. To fix this relatively simple problem we added a back plate to the claw that kept blocks from slipping to far into the robot, this was easily fashioned out of a bit of thin wood board we had lying around from the decks of other robots. The overall performance of our glyph wrangling device was astounding, so long as whoever was operating the robot was a well-trained driver.

DISD Coaches' Training

02 Oct 2017

DISD Coaches' Training By Ethan, Abhi, Kenna, and Tycho

Task: Present at the DISD Coaches' Training

On Monday, we went to the DISD Coaches' Meeting in order to present our robot to the FIRST DISD coordinator and other coaches in the district. This presentation was one of the reasons we got our robot working so quickly. During the presentation our coach talked with other coaches and the coordinator about funding and tounaments, while we presented in the back and demonstrated our robot and the REV expansion hubs. We also answered questions about coding and design.

Reflections

These presentations are extremely helpful to get our team's name out in the North Texas community, as well as secure funding for our team. They also assist our team in that we can exchange design ideas with coaches at events like these.

Oh No! Dying Glyphs

02 Oct 2017

Oh No! Dying Glyphs By Abhi

Problem: Glyph Damge due to Robot Design

We were tearing up our glyphs like this because our wheels had no guard for their screws:

More specifically, we had multiple issues with damaging the glyphs. First, the exposed screws on the mechanum wheels (Fig 1) tended to cut into the glyphs as seen in the above picture. As well, you can see relatively sharp edges on the wheels where the block could also be cut, and that the blocks could be pinched by the wheels on the wheel. As well, the corners on the REV and TETRIX pieces cut into thr glyphs when they were rammed into the walls of the field (Fig 2).

Fig 1

Fig 2

V2 Hexifier and Parts

07 Oct 2017

V2 Hexifier and Parts By Tycho and Abhi

Task: Creating the Parts for V2

Today we continued our work on the second grippers. We talked about this in another post, but the gist is that we iterated through various materials to find something that would securely grip the block, without damaging it. At the beginning, that got rid of most of our options, but we tested various sprays, materials, and pressures to find the right material. The baking pan liner was the best, as it had some give without damaging the block, but had enough friction that slippage was a minor issue. So, we needed the baking pan liner to adhere to the large square dowel we chose to be the base for our grippers. In order to do this, we had to design and print a hexifier, as seen below, which makes the dowel's square shape into a hexagon. We also designed and printed square pieces to go on the top and bottom of the gripper to keep it in place.

Reflections

The new grippers are probably going to be much heavier than our previous ones. Not only because of the difference in material, but in sheer size. We may not be able to retain the lightness in V2 that we had hoped to.
We used PTC Creo for all of these parts. Abhi has some video tutorials on using Creo that can be found here and here. Soon we will start assembling our V2 grippers.

Meeting Log

07 Oct 2017

Meeting Log October 07, 2017 By Ethan, Evan, Austin, Tycho, and Charlotte

Meeting Log October 07, 2017

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • DISD post
  • Fix old post formatting
  • Stockard MS

Software

  • Begin autonomous

Build / Modelling

  • Fix robot - was dropped
  • REV hub relign 2
  • Realign square base

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EthanDISD post2:002
EthanFix formatting4:002
EvanFix robot2:002
EvanRealign4:002
AustinFix robot2:002
AustinREV realign4:002
TychoAutonomous2:004
CharlotteStockard post2:002
CharlotteJournal review4:002

Chassis Upgrades

08 Oct 2017

Chassis Upgrades By Austin

Task: Upgrade our chassis

Because our robot at this point has merely become a collage of prototypes that we compete with, there are often subtle improvements that need to be made. Starting with the wheelbase, Abhi has written a blog about the shields we printed to protect the glyphs from the gnashing bolts of our mechanum wheels, and we also tensioned all our set screws and motor mounts to make sure that our base was preforming in terms of the speed and strength we needed. As we add components to the robot things often are shifted around as well, after tuning up the drive train we focused on realigning our REV expansion hubs and their wiring so that nothing would be in the way of critical lift or drivetrain components.

Any jettisoning bolts that have been catching components while moving, and any sharp edges have all been ground down to ensure that any motion is smooth and that there are minimal catching hazards during operation. Because of the earlier mentioned prototype state our robot was in, many of the key components laid outside of the 18 inch cubic limits and so these components we brought in and neatly fastened to the internals of the robot bearing in mind ease of access for future updates to components. This entire push for cleanliness was the result of upcoming scrimmages and practice matches that we would be participating in.

Texas Workforce Commission Grant

13 Oct 2017

Texas Workforce Commission Grant By Ethan

FIRST in Texas and the TWC grant

In Texas, a government labor agency called the Texas Workforce Commission gives a yearly grant to people who apply through FIRST in Texas. We got it last year and stopped by their headquarters to say thanks while in Austin. This year, we got it again. The grant can go towards any robot/tournament related expense. This $550 will cover our first tournament and a few REV parts.

FIRST in Texas also supports tournament fees for teams that advance beyond the Regional level. Thanks to them our tournament fees for the Super Regional Trip and the Worlds trip are covered, saving us $1,500. We'd like to give a huge thanks to the TWC and FIRST in Texas!

MXP at UTA

14 Oct 2017

MXP at UTA By Kenna, Abhi, Austin, Charlotte, Ethan, and Janavi

MXP at UTA

Today, we brought the Dallas City of Learning MXP (Mobile Learning Lab) to 4H’s Youth Technology Explosion in coordination with the Black Society of Engineers. Our role in this event was to offer a hands on experience for those interested in a career in engineering. We usually have three different activities: MinecraftEDU, Sumo Robotics, and CAD Keychains. MinecraftEDU runs on three computers for younger kids while six computers run LEGO Mindstorms EV3. We use Mindstorms to help people code their own robot which, once coded, will battle other robots in a sumo ring.

Unlike most events we attend, the participants were mostly high schoolers so there was a much greater interest in the 3D modeling software (as opposed to MinecraftEDU or sumo robotics). Only about 80 people came into the MXP but in very large groups at once so we switched from helping everyone individually to presenting on the TV. We walked them through designing their own keychain on SketchUp, then printed it using FlashForge 3D Printers donated to us by BestBuy. Helping people learn CAD gives us the unique opportunity to foster interest in a valuable skill on a program that anyone with internet has access to. The best part by far is giving people their printed keychains, as seen above.

Meeting Log

14 Oct 2017

Meeting Log October 14, 2017 By Ethan, Kenna, Abhi, Austin, Janavi, Evan, Charlotte, and Tycho

Meeting Log October 14, 2017

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Learn to blog
  • UTA post
  • Teach how to blog
  • Strategy post

Software

  • IMU testing
  • Autonomous

Build / Modelling

  • Install wheel mounts
  • Test string for lift

Service / Outreach

  • UTA volunteering

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EthanTeach how to blog2:002
EthanFix formatting of posts4:002
KennaLearn to post2:002
KennaUTA post4:002
AbhiStrategy post2:004
AustinWheel mounts2:004
EvanString test2:004
CharlotteLearn to blog2:004
TychoIMU2:002
TychoAutonomous4:002

Grabber Code

16 Oct 2017

Grabber Code By Tycho

Task: Create a seperate class for the grabbers on the robot

Today, we created a new PickAndPlace class to isolate the code that controls the current gripper and lift system. I also added new methods to send the lift to max, min and stacking heights with manual override. It now prevents over extension or over unwinding by setting max and minumum heights. It also eliminates the problem of having to push the lift all the way down after lifting.

The code below describes the functionality of the robot. The class names should be self-explanatory as to what they do.

+package org.firstinspires.ftc.teamcode;

import com.qualcomm.robotcore.hardware.DcMotor;
import com.qualcomm.robotcore.hardware.Servo;

/**
 * Created by tycho on 10/15/2017.
 */

public class PickAndPlace {

    DcMotor motorLift = null;
    Servo servoGrip = null;

    private int liftMax = 4000;
    private int liftStack = 2500; //stacking height
    private int liftMin = 50;
    private int liftPlanck = 450; //smallest distance to increment lift by when using runToPosition

    boolean gripOpen = false;
    int gripOpenPos = 900;
    int gripClosedPos = 2110;

    public PickAndPlace(DcMotor motorLift, Servo servoGrip){
        this.motorLift = motorLift;
        this.servoGrip = servoGrip;
    }

    public void ToggleGrip (){
        if (gripOpen) {
            gripOpen = false;
            servoGrip.setPosition(ServoNormalize(gripClosedPos));
        }
        else {
            gripOpen = true;
            servoGrip.setPosition(ServoNormalize(gripOpenPos));
        }
    }


    public void stopLift(){
        motorLift.setPower(0);
    }

    public void raiseLift(){
        if(motorLift.getCurrentPosition() < liftMax) motorLift.setPower(.5);
        else motorLift.setPower(0);
    }
    public void lowerLift(){
        if(motorLift.getCurrentPosition() > liftMin) motorLift.setPower(-.5);
        else motorLift.setPower(0);
    }

    public void raiseLift2(){
        if (motorLift.getCurrentPosition() < liftMax && motorLift.getTargetPosition() < liftMax) {
            motorLift.setTargetPosition((int) Math.min(motorLift.getCurrentPosition()+ liftPlanck, liftMax));
            motorLift.setMode(DcMotor.RunMode.RUN_TO_POSITION);
            motorLift.setPower(1);
        }
    }
    public void lowerLift2() {
        if (motorLift.getCurrentPosition() > liftMin && motorLift.getTargetPosition() > liftMin) {
            motorLift.setTargetPosition((int) Math.max(motorLift.getCurrentPosition() - liftPlanck, liftMin));
            motorLift.setMode(DcMotor.RunMode.RUN_TO_POSITION);
            motorLift.setPower(.8);
        }
    }
    public void goLiftMax() {

            motorLift.setTargetPosition(liftMax);
            motorLift.setMode(DcMotor.RunMode.RUN_TO_POSITION);
            motorLift.setPower(1);

    }

    public void goLiftMin() {

        motorLift.setTargetPosition(liftMin);
        motorLift.setMode(DcMotor.RunMode.RUN_TO_POSITION);
        motorLift.setPower(1);

    }

    public void goLiftStack() {

        motorLift.setTargetPosition(liftStack);
        motorLift.setMode(DcMotor.RunMode.RUN_TO_POSITION);
        motorLift.setPower(1);

    }

    public int getMotorLiftPosition(){
        return motorLift.getCurrentPosition();
    }

    public static double ServoNormalize(int pulse){
        double normalized = (double)pulse;
        return (normalized - 750.0) / 1500.0; //convert mr servo controller pulse width to double on _0 - 1 scale
    }

}

Travis High School Night

17 Oct 2017

Travis High School Night By Tycho, Charlotte, Ethan, and Karina

Encourage students at Travis to enroll at our School of Science and Engineering (SEM)

Today we went to Travis Middle School for their high school night where they have many high schools competing to enroll their graduating 8th graders. Travis is a Talented and Gifted school and about half of our team came from there. Mr. Newton was our lead presenter. He is a DISD teacher of the year and the head of our math department. He is the school’s killer math teacher and has done the high school night presentation at Travis for the last 3 years. Each year Iron Reign has been there to support him.

It started with Mr. Newton giving his usual presentation on how strong of school SEM is, including how well it performs on the international stage. He talked about the culture of the school and about how students there manifest their love for science, math and engineering and we are always ready to support each other. He spoke about the college readiness program and how 100% of seniors last year are entering college and have been offered a total of $21 million worth of scholarships. And then he handed it over to us to describe the robotics program.

We told them about how robotics unifies all the different subjects that they're learning at SEM. We described how it brings together fields like physics, engineering, computer science and calculus to make a real tangible product. We also showed how robotics exposes the students that participate in it to experiences that they would otherwise not have the ability to access if they were just regular students at SEM, such as connections with professional engineers and our intense local STEM outreach efforts. Charlotte shared how in just this last year we’ve been all around the country to participate in competitions and outreach events as far afield as Austin, Arkansas, Georgia and Florida. Karina helped demo the robots and showed some Travis students how to operate them, while Ethan helped highly interested students understand our robotics program in detail.

Altogether we delivered our presentation to 3 different groups and spoke with roughly 120 students and family members. We know Mr. Newton convinced most families to look very seriously at applying to SEM.

We have always said that if we make a connection that helps even a single student think of themselves in a STEM field, we’ve had a successful outreach program. We think we regularly have that kind of impact and more, but we are seldom told it straight out. Today we had two students tell us that our robotics demo directly convinced them declare SEM as their high school first choice. This was a good day for us, and a great day for our school.

Stopping Glyph Damage

21 Oct 2017

Stopping Glyph Damage By Abhi

Task: Stop Destroying Glyphs

Since damaging field elements is a huge no-no, we needed to fix this, we decided to create a 3-D part to protect the glyphs from our wheels

Model:

During the first attempt, I had just self taught Creo hours prior to construction. As a result, I was not very precise nor efficient in my design. Nevertheless, we recognized that there were some basic shapes we could use for construction such as a semicircle for the bottom half and two rectangles on the top part. We decided to use measurements that were estimated from a singular mechanum wheel. This culminated in the design below.

Result:

The part itself is made out of nylon as usual. Our main issue was measuring the wheel accurately to create a functional part. The two parts hampering the design was that the U-shape must be off the ground slightly, and that the shape's semi-circle would not have the full radius of the wheel. So, we iterated through various designs of the U-shape, changing the height off the ground by ~1mm each time. We also varied the radius, until we realized that we could measure the width of where the semi-circle segued into the rectangle and get the estimated diameter of the semi-circle.

Meeting Log

21 Oct 2017

Meeting Log October 21, 2017 By Ethan, Tycho, Evan, Abhi, Charlotte, and Karina

Meeting Log October 21, 2017

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Travis blog post
  • Work on presentation

Software

  • Work on openCV integration
  • Test out RoboRealm

Build / Modelling

  • Robot drive practice
  • Learn PTC
  • Jewel thief mockup

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EthanWork on presentation2:004
TychoTravis blog post2:001
TychoOpenCV3:002
TychoRobotRealm4:002
CharlottePTC2:004
AbhiPTC2:004
KarinaDrive practice2:004
EvanJewel thief mockup2:004

Machine Vision Goals – Part 1

22 Oct 2017

Machine Vision Goals – Part 1 By Tycho

We’ve been using machine vision for a couple of years now and have a plan to use it in Relic Rescue for a number of things. I mostly haven’t gotten to it because college application deadlines have a higher priority for me this year. But since we already have experience with color blob tracking in OpenCV and Vuforia tracking, I hope this won’t be too difficult. We have 5 different things we want to try:

VuMark decode – this is obvious since it gives us a chance to regularly get the glyph crypto bonus. From looking at the code, it seems to be a single line different from the Vuforia tracking code we’ve already got. It’s probably a good idea to signal the completed decode by flashing our lights or something like that. That will make it more obvious to judges and competitors.

Jewel Identification – most teams seem to be using the REV color sensor on the arm their jewel displacement arm. We’ll probably start out doing that too, but I’d also like to use machine vision to identify the correct jewel. Just because we can. Just looking at the arrangement, we should be able to get both the jewels and the Vuforia target in the same frame at the beginning of autonomous.

Alignment – it is not legal to extend a part of the robot outside of the 18” dimensions during match setup. So we can’t put the jewel arm out to make sure it is between the jewels. But there is nothing preventing us from using the camera to assist with alignment. We can even draw on the screen where the jewels should appear, like inside the orange box below. This will also help with Jewel ID – we won’t have to hunt for the relevant pixels – we can just compare the average hue of the two regions around the wiffle balls.

Autonomous Deposition – this is the most ambitious use for machine vision. The dividers on the crypto boxes should make pretty clear color blob regions. If we can find the center points between these regions, we should be able to code and automatically centering glyph depositing behavior.

Autonomous glyph collection – ok this is actually harder. Teams seem to spend most of their time retrieving glyphs. Most of that time seems to be spent getting the robot and the glyphs square with each other. Our drivers have a lot of trouble with this even though we have a very maneuverable mecanum drive. What if we could create a behavior that would automatically align the robot to a target glyph on approach? With our PID routines we should be able to do this pretty efficiently. The trouble is we need to figure out the glyph orientation by analyzing frames on approach. And it probably means shape analysis – something we’ve never done before. If we get to this, it won’t be until pretty late in the season. Maybe we’ll come up with a better mechanical approach to aligning glyphs with our bot and this won’t be needed.

Tools for Experimenting

Machine vision folks tend to think about image analysis as a pipeline that strings together different image processing algorithms in order to understand something about the source image or video feed. These algorithms are often things like convolution filters that isolate different parts of the image. You have to decide which stages to put into a pipeline depending on what that pipeline is meant to detect or decide. To make it easier to experiment, it’s good to use tools that let you create these pipelines and play around with them before you try to hard-code it into your robot.

I've been using a tool called ImagePlay. http://imageplay.io/ It's open source and based on OpenCV. I used it to create a pipeline that has some potential to help navigation in this year's challenge. Since ImagePlay is open source, once you have a pipeline, you can figure out the calls to it makes to opencv to construct the stages. It's based on the C++ implementation of OpenCV so we’ll have to translate that to java for Android. It has a very nice pipeline editor that supports branching. The downside is that this tool is buggy and doesn't have anywhere near the number of filters and algorithms that RoboRealm supports.

RoboRealm is what we wanted to use. We’ve been pretty closely connected with the Dallas Personal Robotics Group (DPRG) for years and Carl Ott is a member who has taught a couple of sessions on using RoboRealm to solve the club’s expert line following course. Based on his recommendation we contacted the RoboRealm folks and they gave use a 5 user commercial license. I think that’s valued at $2,500. They seemed happy to support FTC teams.

RoboRealm is much easier to experiment with and they have great documentation so now have an improved pipeline. It's going to take more work to figure out how to implement that pipeline in OpenCV because it’s not always clear what a particular stage in RoboRealm does at a low level. But this improved pipeline isn’t all that different from the ImagePlay version.

Candidate Pipeline

So here is a picture of a red cryptobox sitting against a wall with a bunch of junk in the background. This image ended up upside down, but that doesn’t matter for just experimenting. I wanted a challenging image, because I want to know early if we need to have a clean background for the cryptoboxes. If so, we might need to ask the FTA if we can put an opaque background behind the cryptoboxes:

Stage 1 – Color Filter – this selects only the reddest pixels

Stage 2 – GreyScale – Don’t need the color information anymore, this reduces the data size

Stage 3 – Flood Fill – This simplifies a region by flooding it with the average color of nearby pixels. This is the same thing when you use the posterize effect in photoshop. This also tends to remove some of the background noise.

Stage 4 – Auto Threshold – Turns the image into a B/W image with no grey values based on a thresholding algorithm that only the RoboRealm folks know.

Stage 5 – Blob Size – A blob is a set of connected pixels with a similar value. Here we are limiting the output to the 4 largest blobs, because normally there are 4 dividers visible. In this case there is an error. The small blob on the far right is classified as a divider even though it is just some other red thing in the background, because the leftmost column was mostly cut out of the frame and wasn’t lit very well. It ended up being erased by this pipeline.

Stages 6 & 7 – Moment Statistics – Moments are calculations that can help to classify parts of images. We’ve used Hu Moments since our first work with machine vision on our robot named Argos. They can calculate the center of a blob (center of gravity), its eccentricity, and its area. Here the center of gravity is the little red square at the center of each blob. Now we can calculate the midpoint between each blob to find the center of a column and use that as a navigation target if we can do all this in real-time. We may have to reduce image resolution to speed things up.

Wheel Protector Correction

24 Oct 2017

Wheel Protector Correction By Abhi

Problem: Wheel Guard Innacuracy

Refering back to the design of the wheel guard, we decided it was time to actually mount it on the robot. At first, it seemed like the part was perfect for the robot since it fit just snug with the screws on the wheel. However, upon mounting, we discovered the following:

Turns out that the part is acutely shorter than the real height of wheel relative to the horizontal axis superimposed upon the vertical plane. As a result, a second and better trial for modeling needed to be conducted. For this run, I chose to measure the dimensions directly from the robot rather than a spare wheel.

Correction:

As seen above, the corrected version of the part looks and works much better. Though there is a slight margin of error in the success of the part due to the dynamic nature of the density of the field tiles , the part should be reliable for the most part

Working on Autonomous

29 Oct 2017

Working on Autonomous By Tycho

Task: Create a temporary autonomous for the bot

We attempted to create an autonomous for our first scrimmage. It aimed to make the robot to drive forward and drive into the safe zone. However, we forgot to align the robot and it failed at the scrimmage.

Instead of talking about the code like usual, the code's main functions are well documented so that any person can understand its functions without a prior knowledge of coding.

 public void autonomous2 (){

        switch(autoState){
            case 0: //moves the robot forward .5 meters
                if (robot.driveStrafe(false, .60, .35)) {

                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    autoState++;
                }
                    break;
            case 1: //scan jewels and decide which one to hit
                if (robot.driveForward(false, .25, .35)) {
                    autoTimer = futureTime(1f);
                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    autoState++;
                }

                break;
            case 2: //short move to knock off jewel

                robot.glyphSystem.ToggleGrip();
                autoTimer = futureTime(1f);

                robot.resetMotors(true);
                autoState++;
                break;
            case 3: //back off of the balance stone
                if (robot.driveForward(true, .10, .35)) {
                    autoTimer = futureTime(3f);
                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            case 4: //re-orient the robot
                autoState++;
                break;
            case 5: //drive to proper crypto box column based on vuforia target
                autoState++;
                break;
            case 6: // turn towards crypto box
                autoState++;
                break;
            case 7: //drive to crypto box
                autoState++;
                break;
            case 8: //deposit glyph
                autoState++;
                break;
            case 9: //back away from crypto box
                autoState++;
                break;
        }
    }

So, You Want to Build Your Own RV

02 Nov 2017

So, You Want to Build Your Own RV By Ethan

How to build your own RV in 6 easy steps.

  1. Obtain the RV: To be affordable on price, opt for a 90s-2000s RV, preferably with as little miles as possible. If you can afford it, the newer the better, as we've run into mechanical problems over time with ours. Look for one with a slide-out on some site such as RVTrader or Craigslist.
  2. Deconstruct the RV: More likely than not, your RV will have amazing 90s beachwave decor. While this may be great to pick up surfer gals and guys on the beach, it probably won't make the best learning environment. So, tear it out! Remove the rug carpet and replace it with laminate flooring. Get rid of that pesky bed/bathroom. Remove the kitchem if you want! The goal is to get as much space as possible to fit as many kids in there as possible.
  3. Reconstruct the RV: You want the RV to be as kid-friendly as possible. Get rid of any sharp edges, install some workbenches so that kids can sit or work, protect the outlets, et cetera.
  4. Obtain funding for the RV: You need tech. While its possible for a team to self-finance, its much easier to apply for grants. You can go to companies such as Best Buy that are willing to give grants or donate technology for help. For example. our 4 3D printers were all supplied by Best Buy. For our RV, we have about 40 laptops to instruct kids with, as well as 3 large monitors to show.

  5. Create a curriculum: This will vary per team, but here's ours. In the front, we let kids program SumoBots using EV3. In the back, we teach them how to 3D model and help them 3D print keychains. We also run MinecraftEDU for the younger kids.
  6. Run events: Talk to educational organizations such as local schools and afterschool clubs to plan events. This also varies depending on location, but local school districts and clubs such as 4-H may be interested in hosting the RV for a day or so.

DISD Sponsorship

03 Nov 2017

DISD Sponsorship By Ethan

DISD's sponsorship of Iron Reign

As referenced in another blog post, we recently went to a DISD Coaches' meeting. Shortly after the meeting, we were confirmed to be the host of the DISD Townview Qualifier. So, DISD was able to send us a free full-size field to build and use until the qualifier. As well, since we are one of the first teams within DISD to use the REV system, we were also sent $2600+ of REV parts in order to demonstrate REV parts to other DISD teams and teach them how to use them. This was the fruit of our prior efforts to get noticed by DISD. Since we went as a team to the DISD meeting, we were able to differentiate ourselves, our team, and our work ethic from other area teams so that we could recieve a larger grant.

Reflections

This was an amazing oppurtunity for Iron Reign. Not only did this reduce our costs for running the team this year, it also allowed us to host a tournament. It covered most of our part expenses for the next year except for new batteries and some tournament fees.

Meeting Log

03 Nov 2017

Meeting Log November 03, 2017 By Ethan, Evan, Tycho. Austin, Charlotte, Karina, Janavi, Kenna, and Abhi

Meeting Log November 03, 2017

Today is one of the last full meetings until our tournament, so we need to get everything ready for judging. This post also includes the objectives for the next week.

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • 3 posts from each member
  • DISD Scrimmage post
  • Field build post
  • Strategy\Business plan
  • Print notebook
  • Finish presentation
  • Presention practice

Software

  • Autonomous
  • Drive practice

Build / Modelling

  • Respool string
  • Robot tuneup

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
Ethan3 posts2:002
EthanFinish presentation4:002
EvanTuneup2:004
TychoAutonomous2:002
TychoDrive practice4:002
EvanDrive practice2:004
AustinDrive practice2:004
AustinTuneup2:004
JanaviWork on presentation2:004
KennaPrint notebook2:004

Gripper Construction

04 Nov 2017

Gripper Construction By Tycho

Task: Making the Gripper

Standard parts were used to create the backbone. Then, we bent some tetrix parts to connect the backbone to the servos. We used continuous rotation cervos to solve the issue mentioned earlier. This was a fairly easy build but we still have a ways to go before V2 is completed.

This gripper will be far superior to our prior designs in that it will be lighter, as we are substituting wood and rubber for metal parts, which will solve our string breakage issue. As well, we will be able to grasp objects more securely, due to the rubber's larger coefficient of friction and that the gripper arms themselves have more surface area than our original design. Finally, our gripper will be more dependable due to slightly better wire organization than before.

This helps our strategy in that it will be far easier to pick up individual blocks, and helps us achieve our goal of grabbing multiple blocks at once. The wider gripper arms will make it so that we can stack blocks on top of each other before bringing them to the CryptoBox, which makes our robot 1.5x as fast in operating time.

How to make a part in PTC Creo Parametric

04 Nov 2017

How to make a part in PTC Creo Parametric By Abhi

Problem: How to Make a Part in Creo Parametric

PTC Creo Parametric is one of the best software to 3-D model tools that we can print out. I will detail how to create a part in Creo for both our team and any other teams who need help creating a piece. For this demo, Creo Parametric Academic Edition was used along with a pre designed model of the part.

To begin the model, create a new part. Make sure you are making the part in the right dimensions since the 3-D printer needs special requirements. For the 3-D printer that Iron Reign has, we chose to make all of our dimensions in millimeters. You can change this configuration by going into File>Prepare>Model Properties >Units.

Once your program is set to go, go under Model and press Sketch. This will create the base diagram which we will raise to make our part. Once the sketch menu appears, you will have to choose a plane on which we will draw. For this sketch, we will draw from the top plane since we want to raise it from the bottom. To do so, press on the top plane and press sketch. If the view is still in an isometric format, you can change the view by pressing the button indicated in the video.

Once the sketch is set up, we need to draw two concentric circles with the right dimensions. To find the dimensions, I refer often to the premade part. Once I have made the system, I set up centerlines vertically to be able to draw better. Next, I cut off the top two parts of the circle since we will put rectangles on them.

Next, select a line chain to draw two sets of rectangles with the bottom edge fused with the half circle. At the end, you should have a U shaped part. Now, we can draw another centerline along where we want the screw holes. After doing so, we can use the circle tool to make two holes in the rectangles.

We now need to extrude this part to the right size. After pressing the extrude took, we can change the size on the arrow. After doing so, we need to place two high radius thin circles on either sides. These are placed as weight pads so that when the part prints, it doesn't curve on the printing bed.

At this point, we can do some optional things to make our part..well lets say prettier. We can use the round tool so the edges look nicer and the screws are easier to place inside. After doing so, we can use the render tool to color all the edges. At the end, you will have a complete part to print

End result:

We hope you learned from this tutorial and are able to apply this to any future parts you make!

Iron Reign and Substainability

04 Nov 2017

Iron Reign and Substainability By Ethan

Iron Reign's Substainability

Iron Reign has been a team for 8+ years now through multiple competitions. We started as a wee middle school FLL team at W.B. Travis, and we've grown exponentially since then. We've competed in MoonBots and FTC, represented our school at SuperRegionals, presented at the National Science Teachers' Association covention, and built our own RV in order to serve underpriveledged communities accross the Dallas Metroplex. But, after the current original team members are gone, we would like to continue our legacy.

First, recruitment. When we recruit new members, we first take into consideration their prior robotics experience. While those with prior experience may have a better chance of being recruited, it is not the sole determinant. We also take into consideration their willingness to learn and interest in robotics. While robotics may indeed be a resume-booster. it should not be the reason that a person applies to a team. Finally. we take into consideration their dynamic with other people. There must be a balance between fun and productiveness on the team, and that must be kept in mind when recruiting.

Second, transfer of knowledge. We recently had our first alumni graduate, and we had to ensure that all the knowledge that they knew were transfered to the younger people on the team. Most recently, we had to make sure that the newer people on the team knew how to 3D model so that we could contiue making parts. Myself, I started taking over some of the blog duties last year and now have become editor of the blog. Transferring these skills not only ensure the substainabilty of Iron Reign, they also give our members real world experience that they can use in college and job settings.

Finally, we divy up labor so that no one has to do everything. While a person can choose to work on a different project than normal, everybody tends to have their own specialty that they work in, such as building, blogging, programming, 3D modelling, scouting, et cetera. Doing this ensures that new recruits can have a mentor to go to in order to learn about the skill they're interested in.

Building the Field

06 Nov 2017

Building the Field By Janavi, Charlotte, Ethan, Abhi, Karina, and Austin

Task: Build the field

Today we started the task of building the field, which we received for free, thanks to DISD and their generous donation. The first task Charlotte, Austin, Karina worked on was assembling the balancing stones and the cryptoboxes. While building the field we ran into a few difficulties. First, when we were making the balancing stone, we accidentally had on the cover plate on backwards, which made it impossible to place the screw through the center. We only discovered this after around 15 to 20 minutes of trying to get the screw to go through. However, after successfully building one of the field pieces, it was much easier to make the last three.
After completing the balancing stones and cryptoboxes, we all moved outside to set up the edge of the field and place down all of the tiles. We made the mistake of not placing the plastic tarp down before linking all the tiles. Which lead to all of us lifting the tile mat above our heads to place the tarp underneath(as you can see in the image below). In total, it took us most of practice to finish making all of the field elements and attaching all of the tiles, but we are not finished yet! We still have to set up the field border and attach the field elements, so keep on the look out for a part II on building the field!

DISD Scrimmage

07 Nov 2017

DISD Scrimmage By Charlotte, Janavi, Ethan, Evan, Tycho, Austin, Karina, Kenna, and Abhi

Task: Run and compete at the DISD Scrimmage

Today we helped run and participated in a scrimmage at the Davis Ellis Field House. Iron Reign will be hosting a qualifier in December at Townview, our home school. This scrimmage served as a practice for the preparation and execution of an FTC event. We were able to learn the best way to assemble the field, run the scoring and game software, and properly announce rounds and other information teams may need. As we should, we set up an inspection table where members of our team used the FTC approved inspection checklist to properly assess the robots of other teams along with our own robot. This is a skill that we will need to use when performing inspections during our qualifier. Additionally, we had to figure the software required to run the audio behind matches and fill in the scoring data, and having done this now will save us a lot of time during the qualifier that we are going to host.

We also learned how important it is to create an itinerary for your team and try to keep everyone moving at the needed pace. During this scrimmage we were only able to complete 8 out of 12 matches due to this being some teams first match ever and some issues with teams not arriving, or not having been registered beforehand. But this provided us with a great experience and lots of information, we will take all of the things we learned after helping run this scrimmage and apply it to the qualifier we are hosting in December.

This scrimmage was our second of the season, and while part of the team was focused on announcing, scoring, and field setup, the others worked on improving the robot and pinpointing key issues to solve before our first qualifier this Saturday the 11th at Greenhill. Also, the drive team got the necessary practice for skills that they need for upcoming competitions, like setting up WiFi direct connections between our phones and recognizing when batteries had low or sufficient voltages, skills that don’t seem very difficult but are very important for those working hands-on the robot during competitions. Also, with the removal of the “wiggle test” this year, we have to adapt and become very prepared before each match so that we can make the smooth transition that is required from autonomous period to tele-op. Although we have spent a lot of time doing drive practice on the field that we were gifted, driving under pressure in a competitive environment with other teams in our district is when we are able to decipher the most prominent problems with our robot. An example of this is our autonomous program: running it seems like second nature when we are practicing alone, but when we are with other teams there are more factors to consider, like whether our autonomous program is compatible with theirs, etc. Scrimmages are a perfect opportunity to figure out what issues we have and how to solve them, and this time we were also able to get the practice we so needed running an FTC qualifier.

Designing the Jewel Thief

07 Nov 2017

Designing the Jewel Thief By Evan

Task: Design a part to remove the jewel

The jewel thief, the mechanism for knocking off one of the jewels, was going to be one of the tougher parts of our bot to integrate, based on the chassis we began with. But, with a little engineering and some long thought, we came up with a few ways to implement it. First, we began with a side mount, and it was alright for the angle, but we switched our autonomous plan to begin pointing forward, presenting me with a new problem. The part we had used before would simply not work. We tried a modified version of the pusher we'd made, but it didn't fully suffice. It was impractical and would require more than a little wire extention for the servo. We finally decided that a frontwards approach should be taken from the side. Instead of a single middle forward facing prong, a two bar prong sticking from either side, meeting in the middle, and providing a platform for a potential relic placer. While not completely finished, we intend to have it done by the first qualifier, fully functional. It should allow us to knock the jewel off during autonomous effectively and efficiently, although that’s all to be seen.

Relic Recovery Strategy Part 1

07 Nov 2017

Relic Recovery Strategy Part 1 By Austin

Task: Determine building strategy for Relic Recovery

Any well-versed team understands that, depending on the competition for the year, a robot will either be modified to compete or be built from the ground up. In any case, however, a robot often starts at its chassis, and teams have multiple companies that provide solutions to the common robot chassis’ needs and specifications. To name a few: AndyMark® has its standard kits that include all the parts and electronics needed to build a very basic frame that includes a few mounting points for the rest of the robot’s components, Tetrix has its standard kit that provides all the parts for an entire robot if used properly (however, we’ve discovered drawbacks to be mentioned later), and even REV has thrown its hat in the ring with new motor and battery types to add to the highly adjustable REV rail chassis kits. For rookie teams there is no lack of options for starting your robot chassis. However, as a team gains experience they find the flaws that come with each kit and move towards creating robots that harness equal amounts of parts from all companies. Here’s what we’ve learned about each company:

AndyMark: overall, AndyMark is a great supplier for all the standard parts you’ll need, however we wouldn’t recommend buying their overall chassis kits because they can be on the pricier side and come with few replacement parts and too many unnecessary parts. Most of our gears, wheels, pulleys, motors, and batteries come from AndyMark in batches of parts that we keep on hand to prototype with or replace failing parts. This keeps us from paying for parts we don’t need and having what we do need on hand. The overall quality of their parts is high, but they do decay quicker with use, especially when running the robot at multiple competitions without proper repair time.

Tetrix: Tetrix is highly standardized in all dimensions, making the connections between parts easy to grasp for basic builders who haven’t developed a mental 3D idea of what they’re working towards. Tetrix kits don’t include electronics. However, their brackets, channels, and joints are very useful for making connections between various components of your robot, so keep plenty on hand for quick fixes and prototyping. Our biggest concern with tetrix are their designated nuts; we find that they often are shaken completely off respective bolts, which can lead to mechanical failure and penalties. To combat the issue of robots quite literally shaking themselves apart, we recommend using nyloc nuts. They have a small amount of nylon in them that grips the threads of bolts making them almost immovable without a pair of pliers.

Rev: Iron reign loves our Rev rails. The ability to have a mounting point at any incident on a bar is amazing, and often allows us to pull off the crazy designs we create. Rev has created a system that is beyond flexible, meaning that the limits of your designs have expanded. For those who want a chassis that is easily maneuverable, Rev rail is extremely light as well. While Rev is expanding into providing parts like AndyMark, we find that they are still in development but we eagerly await upgrades.

Overall, Iron Reign wanted a robot chassis that was stable, maneuverable, and modular to our needs, so this is our compromise that we’ve applied to all aspects of our robot;

- AndyMark FRC Standard Omni-Wheels: we chose these because of their dependability and maneuverability. They provide standard motion as well as strafing for fine-tuning movements in front of cryptoboxes. While we had to print custom mounts, and modify tetrix channels for the necessary axels, the wheels pared nicely with the rest of our components once mounted.
- Rev Rail: our entire upper chassis is made from interconnected Rev Rails that serve as a smooth, easily adjustable, and light support for the massive omni wheels that rest below it. The rails provide plenty of room for future expansion, and can take quite a beating (we learned this the hard way by dropping our robot off a table).
- Tetrix Channels and Brackets: these are the middle men, the parts we change to fit those awkward angles and fittings, such as the axels for our wheels. Overall never a bad idea to have extras on hand.
- Hardware: we always use standard hardware sizes, but we make sure that the corresponding components are snug fitting and streamlined to minimize unnecessary snags and sharp edges.

While these are the typical components that make an Iron Reign base, we have seen other teams get extremely creative with raw material, although this usually requires heavy machinery such as laser cutters and lathes. Overall, we are a team that uses what companies provide and modify it to fit our needs (which has worked well for the past years of competition.) For smaller start up teams we recommend a similar approach of learning each system and its advantages over the course of multiple years, and finding what you feel works best for your needs.

BigThought and Dallas City of Learning Sponsorship

08 Nov 2017

BigThought and Dallas City of Learning Sponsorship By Ethan

Task: Recount our sponsorship with BigThought

We have two kinds of sponsorships, money-based and programmatic. Our partnership with BigThought is the latter. For those who don't live in the greater Dallas area, BigThought is a local nonprofit that strives to provide STEM and Arts education to children so that the oppurtunity gap can be closed. As you probably know by now, *last* season we converted an RV into a Mobile Learning Lab. This year had been about substaining it and keeping it running.

To fund our Lab and get contract it to local events, we partnered with BigThought and created a program to serve underserved communities to spark an interest in STEM. They provide extra volunteers when our team isn't enough, as well as the logistics for registering to work at events. Through them, other companies also give grants to our RV. For example, Best Buy heard about our initiative and funded the technology for our RV: 4 3D printers, 30 laptops, and 10 EV3s. All of these helps our mission to assist underserved communities.

Business and Strategic Plan Pt. 1

09 Nov 2017

Business and Strategic Plan Pt. 1 By Ethan

Download PDF here

Intro

Iron Reign has existed, in one form or another, for the past eight years. We have competed in FLL, Google Lunar X Prize Challenge, and now, FTC.

While our team originated at WB Travis Vanguard and Academy, we are now hosted by the School of Science and Engineering at Townview, in DISD. Despite our school being 66% economically disadvantaged and being Title 1, our school consistently ranks in the top 10 nationwide. As well, our school has numerous other award winning extracurricular, including CX Debate, Math/Science UIL, and more.

 

A History of Iron Reign

Iron Reign has been a team for eight years. We initially started as an FLL team, plateauing in regionals every year we competed. We also did Google’s Lunar X Prize program every Summer, achieving finalist status in 2011 and 2012. Upon moving to high school, we started doing FTC, as FRC was too cost-prohibitive to be parent-run.

We have been an FTC team for 6 years, advancing further and further each year. Last year, we got to the South Super Regionals, qualifying by winning the North Texas Inspire Award. In Georgia, we were the first alternative for Worlds if another team dropped out due to cost.

Also in FTC, we compete in the Texas UIL State Championships. For those unfamiliar with UIL, it is the main organizational committee for all public school academic and athletic events. Through UIL, we helped compete in the first test program for the UIL Robotics program and since then have competed in every subsequent tournament.

 

Outreach

Iron Reign spends a large amount of time on outreach. This year alone, we have put in 500 man-hours and created 2800 individual connections to people in our community. Our goal of this outreach is to reach disadvantaged children who would not normally have the opportunity to participate in STEM programs in order to spark their interest in STEM for future learning. Some of our major outreach events include presenting at the National Science Teachers’ Association Convention in Florida, hoping to inspire people in other regions to adopt our methods of outreach. We volunteered at a Microsoft youth convention to spread STEM awareness, as well as volunteering throughout our school district.

We also volunteer for FIRST. We have hosted a scrimmage for our entire school district, DISD (one of the largest school districts in the country), and are hosting a qualifier for the North Texas region in December. We also instruct parents and educators on how to start a FIRST team when volunteering, as Iron Reign itself was started by parents at WB Travis.

Our outreach stands out from other teams through our mode of presentation. Last year, we renovated a 90’s Seaview Skyline RV, took out the “home” components, and turned it into a mobile tech lab to read underprivileged demographics within our community. Our RV currently holds 4 3D Printers, 30+ computers, 3 widescreen TVs, and 1 microwave. Our current curriculum consists of teaching kids 3D modelling in the back of the RV, using Google Sketchup, as it is free and available to any family with a computer. We usually help them design keychains, as they are memorable, but don’t take excessive time to print on our printers. In the front, we teach kids how to use EV3 robots and teach them how to use the EV3 programming language to compete in a sumo-bot competition. We also give advice to parents and educators on how to start FIRST teams. To fill and staff the RV, we have received grants from Best Buy to purchase the 3D printers and laptops, grants from non-profits such as BigThought and Dallas City of Learning to fund the building and upkeep of the RV, and staffing from BigThought and AmeriCorps, as well as our own team. The AmeriCorps staffing is especially notable, as it is a US Federal Government program to support civil service within communities.

When not in outreach service, we can transform our RV into tournament mode. We have taken numerous long-distance road trips aboard our RV, with locations such as Austin, Arkansas, and Florida. We substitute the laptops for bandsaws and drill presses, use the flat screens to program, and bring our higher-quality personal 3D printer. At tournaments, we encourage other teams to board our RV, not only to encourage them to start their own similar programs, but also to help them with mechanical and building issues.

 

Business and Funding

Normally, Iron Reign does not get major funding. However, this year, we have seen our funding, sponsorships, and grants increase exponentially. Currently, those include:

·         BigThought - RV materials, staffing, and upkeep

·         Dallas City of Learning (DCOL) – RV materials and upkeep

·         Best Buy – 4x3D Printers, Laptops for RV

·         AmeriCorps – RV staffing

·         DISD STEM - $3000 of REV parts and 2 full practice fields

·         Dallas Makerspace – Access to machining tools

·         DPRG – Robot assistance

·         FIRST – Tournament fees

·         Texas Workforce Commission – Grant

We are always seeking out new sources of funding.  In the past, we have applied for prior grants by sending letters to STEM-curious companies in the Dallas area. For example, we have previously applied for a $4000 Orix grant, a STEM foundation dedicated to spreading STEM to the underserved. Also, recently, we received an additional grant from Best Buy for our distinguished service to the underprivileged within the Dallas area.

In previous years, we have lacked the ability to get significant transportation fondant to tournaments. However, through our partnership with DISD, we have solved that problem. And when DISD is unable to provide transportation due to short notice, we can provide our own transportation due to our building of the RV.

 

Reference Business Letter from Last Season

Dear Orix,

Iron Reign Robotics, a robotics team of 7 years, is competing in the 2016/17 First Tech Challenge Velocity Vortex game. We are based out of the School of Science and Engineering (SEM) in Dallas which is a title one school.

The population of the public school is racially diverse and 68 percent of the students are on free-or-reduced lunch. In spite of our economic challenges, SEM is regularly considered the school that offers students the most growth in the entire district (highest effectiveness index) and is regularly in the top 10 in many national rankings. But as the second robotics team to be formed at this Dallas ISD Magnet, we are underfunded by the district and need to reach out to organizations that are investing in the long-term future of our community.

Each year we deepen our advanced robotics skills, improve our ability to organize around common team goals, and learn how to better communicate with technical professionals so that we will prepared make an impact as we continue through college and eventually join the workforce. Last year our team made it to the Regional Championship during the FTC season and then proceeded on to the UIL State Robotics Championship in Austin during the summer. This year, with your support, we are striving to make it to the 12-state super regional in Georgia and go from there to the World-wide competition in Houston.

Yet we spend a significant amount of our efforts investing in younger students outside the team. We work very hard to let young students in North Texas know about the opportunities in STEM education. We mentor students in elementary and middle schools. We regularly participate in a series of STEM outreach events to help younger students think of themselves as future scientists, engineers and technical professionals. This includes presenting at events like the Dallas Mayor’s Back to School Fair, Earth Day Texas, and Moon day at the Frontiers of Flight Museum just to name a few. Last year (2015/16) our outreach involvement amounted to 400 team person-hours in service to 2,200 people. We are unaware of any other FTC team in our region that does as much outreach as we do.

This year we’ve stepped those numbers up to over 500 person-hours serving over 2,000 people so far just this summer. This was because we took on a project to renovate an RV to create a mobile learning laboratory for the Dallas City of Learning. Not only did we turn the interior into a mobile technical classroom with 3D printers, but many team members volunteered to teach robotics and 3D modelling and printing on board while volunteering for AmeriCorps with Big Thought this summer. The team was featured as a “Class Act” on TV channel CW33 because of this effort.

Unfortunately, time is money and the time it takes us to contribute to each of these events costs us dollars we don’t have. We all love teaching young children who are interested in robotics and technology and we hope what they receive is beyond value. But we also need to raise our competitive game and new parts cost money. When jerry rigging and reusing parts unsuited for the job, we waste time that could be used to make more progress and continue the advancement of our robot. As we continuously refine our design, new parts are needed and some need to be replaced as we strive for an efficient and reliable entry. The other piece of the financial puzzle is transportation costs. This year we plan to take part in multiple competitions including out-of-state competitions in order to deepen our competitive potential and improve our chances of advancing to the next level. Competition expenses beyond the standard local track are some of the hardest expenses to fund.

We are asking for $4,000 to help us continue our journey into robotics and we hope that Orix can become a major supporter of our team while we continue to invest in the futures of many more students in North Texas. We would love a chance to visit with you, show you our robot in its current form, and discover together how much our mission and your focus areas have in common. Please let us know how to schedule that time. Until then, you can access much more information about Iron Reign on our team blog: http://www.ironreignrobotics.com/

                                                                                                                Warmest Regards,

                                                                                                                Iron Reign

Looking Back, Moving Forward

In the past, sustainability has not been a major concern of Iron Reign’s. We’ve essentially had the same team for seven years. This year, our eighth, we’ve finally lost members through graduation. As a result, we’ve had to substantially reconsider our approach to recruitment and how to manage our changing team.

We already have another team in our school, team 3734 Imperial Robotics. 3734 is an entirely different team, with different sponsors, members, robots, journal, outreach, and codebase. That being said, we recruit the more accomplished members of that team. The teams’ relationship is most similar to the difference between a Junior Varsity team and a Varsity team.

We tend to recruit based on robotics experience, but having robotics experience alone is not a guarantee of joining our team. Iron Reign has a specific culture, and we tend to recruit people whose personalities fit our culture. We also do not accept people who only want to join robotics as a resume booster. While robotics is indeed a resume booster, and we allow every member to claim co-captain on their college applications, members of Iron Reign ought to join out of their genuine passion for robotics, not because of it getting them ahead in the rat race of college applications.

Since this year was the first year in which we lost a substantial number of our teammates, we had to learn how to effectively transfer knowledge. First, we were losing our master of 3D modelling, Max, so we had two members, Abhi and Charlotte, learn under his wing throughout last season. Because of that effort, they have now designed a variety of parts on our robot. For the blog and engineering journal, Ethan learned under Lin’s tutelage how to use Jekyll, Shopify, and manage the blog. This year, we face difficulties, as we will lose our lead programmer, Tycho, for next season. To combat that, our members Abhi and Janavi, are learning the intricacies of our codebase that we’ve kept since we first started using Java.

 

Game Strategy

This year, we were faced with a conundrum. The central question was this – “Should we focus on scoring the cryptoboxes, relic, or jewel?”. We settled on the order of Cryptobox > Relic > Jewel.

Our game strategy was based off of the fact that we could build a robot which could score one block initially, and easily score a column, giving us 40+ points right off the bat. As well, the cryptobox process is simplistic enough that we could get to the balance stone to gain even more points in the endgame, without doing any point-risky challenges such as the Relic.

When we finish the cryptobox designs and autonomous, our next goal is the Jewel. The Jewel challenge is simplistic enough that it could be done in 1-2 meetings without interfering with any other design processes. Our current planned design process is first to create an arm with a color sensor attached like most teams, but eventually we plan to remove that color sensor and identify the Jewel only by OpenCV.

Finally, our last area of focus is scoring the Relic. Scoring the Relic involves a high degree of difficulty, and the risk grows when you consider that you have to score the Relic upright in order to gain the most points. As well, building an arm that can score the Relic while still staying within the 18x18x18 size limits increases the design difficulty of the robot.

Building

This year, Iron Reign has drastically changed how it builds its parts. In previous years, we have relied on primary Tetrix parts, utilizing AndyMark parts for the drivetrain and other moving areas. However, we happened to gain access to a motherlode of REV parts, which drastically changes our designs from previous years.

The biggest change enabling innovation is our newfound use of REV rails within our robot. REV rails allow for basically unlimited mount points for parts so that we are afforded maximum flexibility in our designs, comparable to the flexibility of 3D printing.

As well, for this year’s robot chassis, we have decided to take the use of REV parts even further, and use the REV Power Distribution Module and both Expansion Hubs. The reason for this change is twofold. First, we experienced significant connection and static issues last year with our robot, partially due to excess static buildup from our mecanum wheels. So far, we have not experienced any of those issues using REV modules, even though we are using the same base chassis. Second, the REV hubs allow us to add more features on to our robot, such as LED strips and extra servos, that allow us to signal our team as well as create more innovative components of our robot.

We also utilize a variety of 3D printed parts on our robot. While we use less 3D printed parts than previous years, that is due to the particular challenges of this year. Our parts are modelled in PTC Creo, and we have recently switched over from Creo V.3 to Creo V.4 so that we can use the more advanced features included in the new program. Our personal 3D printer can handle a variety of materials, and we have used nylon, ABS, Filoflex, and Ninjaflex in prior designs to fit various needs. In our current robot, we have settled on using nylon. Nylon has four qualities that make it more advantageous than other materials. First, nylon is less brittle and prone to breaking than materials such as ABS. Second, nylon achieves comparatively high print quality on our robot as compared to Filoflex and Ninjaflex. Third, nylon has enough give so that it doesn’t break, but is strong enough to withstand the forces felt in everyday use of our robot. Finally, nylon can be dyed so that we can give our parts a distinguishing color, a quality that we have taken advantage of in prior seasons.

An example of these 3D printed parts are our wheel guards. In testing, our mecanum drive train tended to cut up the cryptoboxes when we drove up against them. As a result, we designed various wheel guards and tested them. We also made mockups with various materials such as cardboard, to minimize design time and waste parts. We settled on a U-shaped design to prevent damage to the boxes and other field elements, while not sacrificing mobility. Then, to guarantee nothing went wrong, we iterated through various heights of the U-shape so that they would not cut into the mats or bump into other robots

Programming

Iron Reign has generated a substantial codebase over the years. Initially, Iron Reign programmed in RobotC. However, when robot phones started becoming the main form of control, we transferred our codebase into Java. We use the Android Studio IDE to code our robot.

Our most notable programming achievement has been the integration of machine vision and augmented reality libraries into our code. Currently, we use Vuforia in conjunction with OpenCV to identify and score field elements in autonomous, as well as assist in scoring elements during TeleOp. Both Vuforia and OpenCV are industrial-level technologies that we have integrated into our codebase. Vuforia in particular is currently owned by PTC, one of the sponsors of FIRST.

Another notable programming achievement is our Pose class. We use the class to determine our robot’s current position on the field using trigonometric functions. While this class currently need updating for the new season, it can still be used for any small-scale operations on the field.

Design Process

Iron Reign uses two design processes in conjunction with each other to create efficient and reliable parts. First, we use the Kaizen design process, also used in industrial corporations such as Toyota. The philosophy behind Kaizen is the idea of continual improvement, that there is always some modification to each system on our robot that will make it more efficient or more reliable. As well, design competitions are a focal point of Iron Reign’s design process. In these design competitions, team members choose their favored designs that all complete some field challenge, and build them individually. Upon completion of each mechanism, the designs are tested against each other, considering weight, maneuverability, reliability, and efficiency.

An example of these design processes working in conjunction is the process of designing our cryptobox intake system. Evan had the idea to build an arm-style grabber seen on many current competition robots. His design, however, included shorter arms for space’s sake and a more compact lift system than normal. Austin decided to build a unique conveyor-belt system which used friction to hold blocks in space and move them vertically. Through the competition, we determined that Evan’s design was more efficient and took up less space than Austin, so we settle on his design, adding in a linear slide for lifting at the end of the process. Then, Kaizen comes in. Through firsthand experience in scrimmages, we learned that the grabber system isn’t as reliable as we thought when first testing. So, we have designed a new grabber system that moves like the arms did previously, but also rotate with soft spikes attached to hold blocks with friction better without damaging them.

 

 

Budget

Bought:

REV Minibot Kit

2

125

250

REV Slim Batteries

2

50

100

Axles

4

10

40

Drivers

2

5

10

Nyloc Parts

4

5

20

Step Drill

2

5

10

Shaft Collars

4

7

28

Tetrix Competition Set

1

580

580

Control and Communication

2

265

530

REV Hubs

4

150

600

Motors

14

28

392

Encoder Cables

14

5

70

Soft Tiles

28

5

140

Tile Bags

2

60

120

Full Field

2

480

960

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Total

 

 

3850

 

Wishlist:

Per Team - 6832

FTC Control and Communications Set

265

0

0

https://ftc.pitsco.com/Control_Set

Electronics Set

150

0

0

https://ftc.pitsco.com/Electronics_Set

Build System: Competition Set - Tetrix [not recommended]

580

0

0

https://ftc.pitsco.com/Competition_Set

Build System: FTC Starter Kit - REV

475

1

475

http://www.revrobotics.com/REV-45-1170/

2nd REV Robotics Expansion Hub

150

1

150

http://www.revrobotics.com/REV-31-1153/

Batteries

50

2

100

http://www.revrobotics.com/rev-31-1302/

Batteries, Tetrix form factor

50

0

0

https://www.tetrixrobotics.com/Controllers-and-Electrical/Power-Accessories/TETRIX-12-Volt-Rechargeable-NiMH-Battery-Pack

Servo Power Module

40

1

40

http://www.revrobotics.com/rev-11-1144/

HD Hex Motor

30

4

120

http://www.revrobotics.com/rev-41-1301/

NeverRest Motor

28

0

0

http://www.andymark.com/NeveRest-p/am-neverest.htm

Lexan - 3 x 4 sheet - 3/32

87

1

87

http://www.homedepot.com/p/LEXAN-48-in-x-36-in-x-093-in-Polycarbonate-Sheet-GE-38/202038065

FIRST Season Registration

275

0

0

https://my.firstinspires.org/Teams

Per School - Science and Engineering

Game Set - Full Field

480

1

480

http://www.andymark.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=AM-3600

Game Set - Half Field

270

0

0

http://www.andymark.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=AM-3600

Game Set - Quarter Field

159

0

0

http://www.andymark.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=AM-3600

Soft Tiles Game Surface

230

1

230

http://www.andymark.com/product-p/am-softtiles.htm

Field Perimeter Kit

595

1

595

http://www.andymark.com/FTC-Perimeter-p/am-0481a.htm

Tape Set

50

1

50

http://www.andymark.com/product-p/am-3600_tape.htm

 

Adding Code Fixes to the Robot

10 Nov 2017

Adding Code Fixes to the Robot By Tycho

Task: Add code updates

These commits add said functionality:

  • Pre-game logic - joystick control
  • Fix PID settings
  • Autonomous resets motor
  • Jewel Arm functionality
  • Autonomous changes
  • Tests servos

These commits allow better QoL for our drivers, allow our robot to function more smoothly both in autonomous and during TeleOp, allows us to score the jewels, and lets us test servos.

Jewel Arm


package org.firstinspires.ftc.teamcode;

import com.qualcomm.robotcore.hardware.NormalizedColorSensor;
import com.qualcomm.robotcore.hardware.Servo;

/**
 * Created by 2938061 on 11/10/2017.
 */

public class JewelArm {

    private Servo servoJewel;
    private NormalizedColorSensor colorJewel;
    private int jewelUpPos;
    private int jewelDownPos;

    public JewelArm(Servo servoJewel, NormalizedColorSensor colorJewel, int jewelUpPos, int jewelDownPos){
        this.servoJewel = servoJewel;
        this.colorJewel = colorJewel;
        this.jewelUpPos = jewelUpPos;
        this.jewelDownPos = jewelDownPos;
    }

    public void liftArm(){
        servoJewel.setPosition(ServoNormalize(jewelUpPos));
    }
    public void lowerArm(){
        servoJewel.setPosition(ServoNormalize(jewelDownPos));
    }

    public static double ServoNormalize(int pulse){
        double normalized = (double)pulse;
        return (normalized - 750.0) / 1500.0; //convert mr servo controller pulse width to double on _0 - 1 scale
    }

}

Autonomous

		public void autonomous(){
        switch(autoState){
            case 0: //scan vuforia target and deploy jewel arm
                robot.jewel.lowerArm();
                autoTimer = futureTime(1.5f);
                if(autoTimer < System.nanoTime()) {
                    relicCase = getRelicCodex();
                    jewelMatches = robot.doesJewelMatch(isBlue);
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            case 1: //small turn to knock off jewel
                if ((isBlue && jewelMatches)||(!isBlue && !jewelMatches)){
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(10, .5)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                    }
                }
                else{
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(350, .5)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                    }
                }
                break;
            case 2: //lift jewel arm
                robot.jewel.liftArm();
                autoTimer = futureTime(1.5f);
                if(autoTimer < System.nanoTime()) {
                    jewelMatches = robot.doesJewelMatch(isBlue);
                    autoState++;
                }
            case 3: //turn parallel to the wall
                if(isBlue){
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(270, 2.0)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                else{
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(90, 2.0)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                autoState++;
                break;
            case 4: //drive off the balance stone
                if(robot.driveForward(true, .3, .5)) {
                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            case 5: //re-orient robot
                if(isBlue){
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(270, 1.0)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                else{
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(90, 1.0)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                break;
            case 6: //drive to proper crypto box column based on vuforia target
                switch (relicCase) {
                    case 0:
                        if(robot.driveForward(true, .5, .35)) {
                            robot.resetMotors(true);
                            autoState++;
                        }
                        break;
                    case 1:
                        if(robot.driveForward(true, .75, .35)) {
                            robot.resetMotors(true);
                            autoState++;
                        }
                        autoState++;
                        break;
                    case 2:
                        if(robot.driveForward(true, 1.0, .35)) {
                            robot.resetMotors(true);
                            autoState++;
                        }
                        autoState++;
                        break;
                }
                break;
            case 7: //turn to crypto box
                if(isBlue){
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(315, 1.5)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                else{
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(45, 1.5)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                break;
            case 8: //deposit glyph
                if(robot.driveForward(true, 1.0, .50)) {
                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    robot.glyphSystem.ReleaseGrip();
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            case 9: //back away from crypto box
                if(robot.driveForward(false, .5, .50)){
                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            default:
                robot.resetMotors(true);
                autoState = 0;
                active = false;
                state = 0;
                break;
        }
    }
    public void autonomous2 (){

        switch(autoState){
            case 0: //scan vuforia target and deploy jewel arm
                robot.jewel.lowerArm();
                autoTimer = futureTime(1.5f);
                if(autoTimer < System.nanoTime()) {
                    relicCase = getRelicCodex();
                    jewelMatches = robot.doesJewelMatch(isBlue);
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            case 1: //small turn to knock off jewel
                if ((isBlue && jewelMatches)||(!isBlue && !jewelMatches)){
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(10, .5)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                    }
                }
                else{
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(350, .5)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                    }
                }
                break;
            case 2: //lift jewel arm
                robot.jewel.liftArm();
                autoTimer = futureTime(1.5f);
                if(autoTimer < System.nanoTime()) {
                    jewelMatches = robot.doesJewelMatch(isBlue);
                    autoState++;
                }
            case 3: //turn parallel to the wall
                if(isBlue){
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(270, 2.0)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                else{
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(90, 2.0)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                autoState++;
                break;
            case 4: //drive off the balance stone
                if(robot.driveForward(true, .3, .5)) {
                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            case 5: //re-orient robot
                if(isBlue){
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(270, 1.0)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                else{
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(90, 1.0)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                break;
            case 6: //drive to proper crypto box column based on vuforia target
                switch (relicCase) {
                    case 0:
                        if(robot.driveStrafe(true, .00, .35)) {
                            robot.resetMotors(true);
                            autoState++;
                        }
                        break;
                    case 1:
                        if(robot.driveStrafe(true, .25, .35)) {
                            robot.resetMotors(true);
                            autoState++;
                        }
                        autoState++;
                        break;
                    case 2:
                        if(robot.driveStrafe(true, .50, .35)) {
                            robot.resetMotors(true);
                            autoState++;
                        }
                        autoState++;
                        break;
                }
                break;
            case 7: //turn to crypto box
                if(isBlue){
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(215, 1.5)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                else{
                    if(robot.RotateIMU(135, 1.5)){
                        robot.resetMotors(true);
                        autoState++;
                    }
                }
                break;
            case 8: //deposit glyph
                if(robot.driveForward(true, 1.0, .50)) {
                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    robot.glyphSystem.ReleaseGrip();
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            case 9: //back away from crypto box
                if(robot.driveForward(false, .5, .50)){
                    robot.resetMotors(true);
                    autoState++;
                }
                break;
            default:
                robot.resetMotors(true);
                autoState = 0;
                active = false;
                state = 0;
                break;
        }
    }

Greenhill FTC Qualifier

11 Nov 2017

Greenhill FTC Qualifier By Ethan, Evan, Tycho, Charlotte, Austin, Abhi, Tycho, Karina, and Kenna

Task: Compete at our first FTC qualifier

So, we were absolute failures. There's no way to get around that. We got 14th place out of 14, and our presentation flopped. But, its not the end of the world, even if it may feel like it. We have another qualifier in Oklahome in one week, and we need to analyze what we did wrong so that we can improve for the next round.

  • Match 1
  • We lost, 79-93. This was our closest match, and if we had managed our time in-game more wisely, we could have won by balancing. This was our only game in the margin-of-error.
  • Match 2
  • We lost 101-131. The other alliance outperformed us in scoring glyphs, and was able to knock an additional jewel off in autonomous.
  • Match 3
  • We lost 28-65. We failed on every level, even to balance our robot. Our bot was on for about 10 seconds for the entire match.
  • Match 4
  • We lost 111-181. We scored only 3 glyphs and underperformed in autonomous.
  • Match 5
  • We lost 61-203. Our robot was not on.

We had many failures in the robot game. Our first, main failure was lack of practice. We only really dedicated ourselves to driving practice two weeks before, and we had trouble aligning the blocks throughout the day. In prior years, we had started drive practice from over a month out, so this was a major failure on our part. A second failure that wasn't our fault was that we had connection issues between the phones, and weren't able to drive in two rounds. But, because of our collective failures, we managed not to win a single game. However, we ended up with the second heighest rank points in the whole tournament (380).

Our presentation was a failure too. We hadn't practiced our presentation enough, and it seemed a bit janky at points. In addition, our engineering journal was a bit rushed, as we'd printed the night before and had some issues printing. We also didn't turn the control award in. However, one highlight of the judging is that we were able to answer questions quickly and effectively, and the judges seemed to like that. We did end up winning the Connect Award.

Reflections

This tournament was one of Iron Reign's worst. However, we must learn from that so we don't repeat our mistakes. The silver lining of this tournament is that we can't really preform any worse :).

Driving Struggles

13 Nov 2017

Driving Struggles By Abhi

Task: Drive the Robot

Today we tried to drive the robot on the practice field for the first time since the qualifier last Saturday. However, we couldn't get in very much quality drive practice because the robot kept breaking down. We decided to dig a bit deeper and found some issues.

As seen above, the first thing that was wrong was that the lift was tilted. Due to the cantilever orientation of the plank of the grabber arm mounted on the vertical axis, the structure only had one bar for support for the lift. As a result, since the construction of our robot, the rev rail of the mount had been worn out constantly up to the point where it broke. Also because of the singular rod mounting, the lift system rotated on the vertical planar axis creating a need for drivers, such as myself, to rotate into the cryptobox every time we needed to mount. This was not a good way for the robot to function and had frustrated us.

Another issue we had was that the lift system string was caught often in all the wiring of the robot. Due to the friction created between this string and all the wiring, including the jewel system, it breaks the string and also creates a safety issue. As a result, we need to fix either the wiring of the robot or the lift system altogether.

Reflections

We hope to make improvements over this week before the Oklahoma qualifier. Hopefully, we will have a more proficient robot making it easier on our drivers.

Gripper Part 2

13 Nov 2017

Gripper Part 2 By Evan

Update:

The task today was simple. We replicated the prior work with the first gripper, as stated in the prior post, so we can begin connecting them. The biggest problem was finding all the parts to make it. We are hoping we can connect and mount them in the next couple days so it will be ready for the qualifier in Oklahoma. The improvement over last post was the addition of the rubber gripping material, as found in our "Material Test" post.

Code Fixes and Readability

13 Nov 2017

Code Fixes and Readability By Tycho

Task: Make the code more readable

So, we can't include all the code changes we made today, but all of it involved cleaning up our code, removing extra functions we didn't use, refactoring, adding comments, and making it more readable for the tournament. We had almost 80k deletions and 80k additions. This marks a turning point in the readablity of our code so that less experienced team members can read it. We went through methodically and commented out each function and method for future readability, as we will have to pass the codebase on to next year's team.

Drive Practice

13 Nov 2017

Drive Practice By Karina, Charlotte, and Abhi

Task: Become experts at driving the robot and scoring glyphs

Iron Reign’s robot drivers Abhi, Charlotte, and I, have been working hard to decrease our team’s glyph-scoring time. The past few meets, we have spent many hours practicing maneuvering on the field and around blocks, something that is crucial if we want to go far this competition season. When we first started driving the robot, we took approximately 4 minutes to complete a single column of the cryptobox, but now we can fill one and a half columns in two minutes.

When we first started practicing, we had trouble aligning with the glyphs to grab them. The fact that were using our prototype arms was partially at fault for our inability to move fast and efficiently. We also had some human error to blame. Personally, it was difficult for me to not confuse my orientation with the robot's orientation. In addition, our drive team had yet to establish a communication system between the driver and the coach, so the driver had no guidance as to which glyphs seemed like the easiest to go for or whether or not the robot was in position to grab a glyph. Below is a video that shows our shaky beginning:

Our driving has improved significantly. We have done mock teleop runs, timed ourselves on how long we take to complete different tasks, and have repeatedly tried stacking blocks and parking on the balancing stone. When our robot doesn't break, we can fill up to two columns of the cryptobox!

Reflections

Overall, we feel that we can further improve our driving skills with more drive practice. Driving the robot really does require being familiar with your robot and its quirks, as well as the controls to move the robot. Abhi, Charlotte, and I know we are still far from being driving experts, but we are putting forth our time and effort so that we can give it our best at tournaments.

Building the Garage

13 Nov 2017

Building the Garage By Ethan, Evan, Austin, and Kenna

Task: Build a cover for our field

Since Iron Reign is hosted in our coaches' house, we only have so much space. Even though we've basically taken over their house, a consequence of that is that we don't really have a place to put the field...until now.

In prior posts, we've talked about building a pool deck to store our field, and its finally become a reality. We obtained a practice field from DISD, and built it. Then, we realized that we can't really keep a practice field outside, as the tiles get water damage and the field elements slowly get destroyed. So, we decided to create a protective cover.

We bought and built an entire DIY garage set so that we can both protect our field and ourselves from the elements while driving. And, it's really cool, if I say so myself.

Reflections

This will make driving practice much easier in general, and allow us to practice regardless of weather. In addition, this benefits our sister team by giving them a place to practice.

How to Assemble parts in PTC Creo

14 Nov 2017

How to Assemble parts in PTC Creo By Abhi

Task: Learn how to Assemble parts in Creo Parametric

In addition to making parts to print in Creo, it is sometimes useful to combine multiple parts to make a model. For example, we can make a robot model by assembling parts in Creo. We have conducted a video on how to do so.

For this tutorial, we first created two simple parts which fit snugly inside one another (done before the video). Then, we created a new assembly file and uploaded the bigger part first. We placed the smaller part and did the assembly by matching the sides of the cylinder. That is how we ended up with a cylinder with its hole plugged in the end.

Reflections

We hope to use Assemblies to make models for various structures in our robot in the near future. We hope this tutorial helps you with your endeavors!

Control Award

15 Nov 2017

Control Award By Janavi

Task:

Last Saturday, after our qualifier, we had a team meeting where we created a list of what we needed to do before our second qualifier this Saturday. One of the tasks was to create the control award which we were unfortunately unable to complete in time for our last competition.

Autonomous Objective:

  1. Knock off opponent's Jewel, place glyphs In correct location based on image, park in safe zone (85 pts)
  2. Park in Zone, place glyph in cryptobox (25 pts)

Autonomous B has the ability to be delayed for a certain amount of time, allowing for better coordination with alliance mates. If our partner team is more reliable, we can give them freedom to move, but still add points to our team score.

Sensors Used

  1. Phone Camera - Allows the robot to determine where to place glyphs using Vuforia, taking advantage of the wide range of data provided from the pattern detection, as well as using Open Computer Vision (OpenCV) to analyze the pattern of the image.
  2. Color Sensor - Robot selects correct jewel using the passive mode of the sensor. This feedback allows us determine whether the robot needs to move forwards or backwards so that it knocks off the opposing teams jewel
  3. Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) - 3 Gyroscopes and Accelerometers return the robot’s heading for station keeping and straight-line driving in autonomous, while letting us orient ourselves to specific headings for proper navigation, crypt placing, and balancing
  4. Motor Encoders - Using returned motor odometry, we track how many rotations the wheels have made and convert that into meters travelled. We use this in combination with feedback from the IMU to calculate our location on the field relative to where we started.

Key Algorithms:

  1. Integrate motor odometry, the IMU gyroscope, and accelerometer with using trigonometry so the robot knows its location at all times
  2. Use Proportional/Integral/Derivative (PID) combined with IMU readouts to maintain heading. The robot corrects any differences between actual and desired heading at a power level appropriate for the difference and amount of error built up. This allows us to navigate the field accurately during autonomous.
  3. We use Vuforia to track and maintain distance from the patterns on the wall based on the robot controller phone's camera. It combines 2 machine vision libraries, trig and PID motion control.
  4. All code is non-blocking to allow multiple operations to happen at the same time. We extensively use state machines to prevent conflicts over priorities in low-level behaviors

Driver Controlled Enhancements:

  1. If the lift has been raised, movement by the jewel arm is blocked to avoid a collision
  2. The robot has a slow mode, which allows our drivers to accurately maneuver and pick up glyphs easily and accurately.
  3. The robot also has a turbo mode. This speed is activated when the bumper is pressed, allowing the driver to quickly maneuver the field.
Autonomous Field

Intake Grippers Pt2

15 Nov 2017

Intake Grippers Pt2 By Evan

Task: Attach the new intake grippers

The basters are here and in full swing. We spent a late night putting together the two intake columns. They were attached to a backing by previously, allowing to finish it by attaching the final servo and tieing it to the two columns. Since the new intake needed new code, we whipped up some code to allow us to have control. Upon doing this he realized we needed two controllers, one for movement and controlling the lift, and a second purely to work the two columns as they spun. This allowed the operator to operate the whole robot just a little easier. The new columns are set on a majority REV base, allowing for more choices in design that normal tetrix doesn’t provide. The new grabber has already been placed on the robot and seems to be working smoothly, only time will tell if it is a long term solution.

Oklahoma Qualifier Recap

18 Nov 2017

Oklahoma Qualifier Recap By Ethan, Evan, Austin, Janavi, Charlotte, Kenna, Tycho, Karina, and Abhi
Task: Compete at the Oklahoma Qualifier

Once done, our postmortem post will be here.

On Nov. 17, we went to the Oklahoma Mustang HS qualifier. Our strategy for this tournament was to attempt to qualify in multiple regions so that we have more chances to get to the South Super Regionals. For this tournament, the DISD STEM Dept. funded the tournament fees for us to attend, as well as housing for our team. We drove down there on our RV, and also fixed it up so that we could convert it into tournament mode.

For out-of-area tournaments, we have to prepare ahead of time so that we can get everything we need, since we can't really go back to get parts we forgot. So, this time, we created a packing list in order to ensure that we have everything on the RV before we leave. The complete list is below.

Tent / Pits

  • Shield
  • Main robot Cart
  • Small carts (x2)
  • Banner stand
  • Main banners (x3)
  • Aquila
  • Inspire
  • Inspire mount
  • Monitor
  • Extension cord(s)
  • Power Strip(s)

Field Elements

  • Cryptobox
  • Foam blocks
  • Jewels
  • Jewel base
  • Vuforia pattern on stick

Tools

  • Staticide
  • Shamwow
  • Threadlock
  • Red (x3), Blue (x3), Green (x3) hex keys
  • Flat heads: Large (x2), Small (x2)
  • Phillips heads: Large (x2), Small (x2)
  • Modular screwdrivers + bits (Cyan wrenches)
  • Rubber bands / Hair Ties?
  • String for pulley system
  • Container store chest of drawers
  • Chain Box
  • Tape Box
  • Glue + putty Box
  • Large pliers
  • Needlenose pliers
  • Regular Pliers
  • Power pole Box + stuff with that
  • Xacto knifes
  • Regular knifes
  • Zip ties
  • Axles
  • Drills
  • Yellow Drill (x2)
  • Drill batteries + chargers
  • Electric screwdrivers + bits
  • Plugin drill
  • Wire strippers
  • Measuring tape
  • Dremel
  • Reciprocating Dremel
  • Circular Dremel
  • Sawblade
  • Evil sandpaper
  • Battery
  • Charger
  • Hack saw
  • Hammer
  • Mallet
  • Bolt cutters
  • Lighter
  • Core power distribution Box

Parts

  • Standard nuts + bolts
  • Extrusion nuts + hex bolts
  • Prototyping wire
  • Tetrix pieces
  • U pieces
  • Plates
  • Phone cases - ZTE + SG5
  • Extrusions (Cap lift size)
  • Extrusion brackets

Electronics

  • Phones
  • All cables that we can get our hands on
  • Phone cables(new and old)
  • Coding cables        
  • OTG cables
  • Printer
  • Computers
  • Battery Box - phone
  • Joysticks
  • 9-volt batteries
  • All wrenches
  • Spare Core Power Distribution Module Box
  • M-M cable
  • M-F cable

Organization (Boxes)

  • Judging Box
  • Damaged foam block
  • Example of abs 3-D printing
  • Drawer Slide                      
  • All grabber prototypes
  • Turkey baster ones
  • Conveyer belt one
  • Current one on robot
  • Tape Box
  • Foam tape
  • Gaff tape
  • Duct tape
  • Duct tape
  • Double sided
  • More + ........
  • Glue + Putty Box
  • Battery Box
  • Batteries
  • Phone cables
  • Phone + Charging Box
  • Joystick Box
  • Powerpole Box
  • Tri-Crimp
  • Powerpoles
  • Wire stripper
  • Wire clipper
  • Needle nose
  • Container store chest of drawers
  • Chain Box
  • Spare Core Power Distribution Module Box

Before leaving, we had already encountered problems. Our RV's generator refused to turn on, which meant that we couldn't get AC, chargers, or any electrical components on board to work. So, we had to do a last-minute oil change. As well, we had trouble finding several important tool parts, such as our box of drill bits and other things. Running about an hour late, we finally left for Oklahoma. The drive took the usual 4 hours, stopping to get Schlotzky's™, and we arrived at midnight. After we were all assigned to our rooms and all, we did another runthrough of our presentation, then went to bed

We woke up by 7am the next day, and slogged our way out of bed to the Mariott™ Contentental™ Breakast™. Over breakfast, we discussed our strategies and rules for the tournaments. Some of the major points are these:

  • Unless your work requires it, stay off the RV and in the pit
  • If possible, try to talk to as many teams as possible, hand out flyers
  • When you see judges roaming the tournament, try to flag them down to talk
  • Try to get as many people as possible to see the RV
  • Do scouting ASAP

Flyer

Inspection


We didn't manage our time well for inspection. We hadn't really prepared our robot back in Dallas, nor on the way, so we had to attach the side panels and the buttons right as we arrived. As well, we had to make sure the bot fit within the sizing cube. Overall, our preparation for this section of the tournament was 4/10.

Judging/Presentation


This was our largest improvement from last tournament. This was probably the best presentation we've put on yet. As well, our engineering journal was indexed a little bit better than last time. The judges also seemed receptive to our presentation and asked in-depth questions on our robot, which was very enjoyable and signalled that we would be considered for future awards. As well, we managed to get every judge in the tournament on the RV, every single referee, and about half the teams total. So, we did well on that front. As well, our strategy of trying to talk to every judge worked well, as we were able to cover a variety of subjects, ranging from our design process, to business, to our outreach, to women in STEM.

Robot Game

Our time-management overall here was not great. We'd rush to the practice field to try and fix parts, then get immediately called back to the round. I think we almost got disqualified 3 or 4 times because of this. However, this was our most successfull tournament in the robot game ever, since this was our first time getting 1st alliance captain.
Game 1
Game 1 was one of the two games we lost this tournament. We lost by 20 points, and we managed to both knock the opposing team's jewel off, as well as not balance in the end-game. This match highlighted the problems with our autonomous' reliablility.
Game 2
In game 2, we still had autonomous problems, but won a close game due to our stacking.
Game 3
Game 3 was our best game, as we didn't experience any connection issues and got almost 200 points.
Game 4
In game 4, our robot shut down throughout the game, but despite that, we ekeed out a close victory.
Game 5
We won game 5 by about 30 points, as we stacked 2 columns, got a jewel, and balanced our bot.
At this point, we became an alliance captain and chose team 3732 Technical Difficulties to be our partner. We had connection problems throughout the next games that hampered our ability to score.
Semi-Finals 1
We won 80-100, despite connection issues.
Semi-Finals 2
We improved a little and got about 120 points as we fixed a servo between matches.
Final 1
We lost this game due to connection issues.
Final 2
This was our closest game, as we won by 2 points, since we were able to stack blocks *slightly* faster.
Final 3
We won this game by 20+ points as the opposing team failed to balance one bot.

Ceremony

The first award we won was the First Alliance Captain award, a first for our team, so we were overjoyed about that. Then, we also won 1st place Control Award, another first for our team. This was especially suprising, as our autonomous failed quite a bit throughout the tournament. Finally, we won 2nd place Inspire Award. While this is still a great accomplishment, we'd like to work on this a bit more and get 1st place next tournament in January.

Spring Cleaning in the RoboDojo

24 Nov 2017

Spring Cleaning in the RoboDojo By Janavi, Evan, Ethan, Austin, Tycho, Karina, Charlotte, Kenna, and Abhi

Task:

A few weeks leaving for our Oklahoma competition we assembled a large garage tent upon the pool deck and moved our field inside the tent to shield it from the weather. The night before the competition we moved in a projector so we could project see the code on the wall and left it there when we went to Oklahoma. We were very surprised when we came back to Dallas around midnight and found the canvas that was supposed to be covering the tent crumpled in the corner of the backyard and the frame of the tent on its side resting again the tree as you can see in the photo below

But what surprised us the most was that nothing that we let upon that table was disturbed at all, the projector lay in the same spot and even a glass of water we had left hadn't moved an inch.The next day we came back, well rested and finally wrestled the RoboDojo back from the grasps of the tree and bolted it down to the pool deck to prevent any future mishaps.

After that we started to move robotics stuff outside and Max placed a board hole onto the wall with hooks so we can hang up the tools for easy access.

We moved out all shelves that overflowed with boxes upon of boxes of robotics parts to the RoboDojo. Our plan is to move all of the robotics building out to Dojo that way we have easy access to the field and don't have to constantly move in and out to test. To start the move we labelled shoe boxes with bright orange tape to organize all of the tools and parts ,

after that we started sorting through the shelves someone exclaiming almost every five minutes " I was looking for that last time! ". Eventually after getting most of the big items sorted we worked on organising the smaller items like hex keys and nuts into grid containers.

Reflections

Making this big move has really helped us not only with organization but it has allowed us to do a deep clean of all the robotics parts, we sorted thorough all of our old motors and battery and found some that either didn't work any more or were outdated. This is very important to do periodically because it allows us to make more space and it eliminates the chance of us bringing broken battery to competitions. Moving all of the items outside has taken us a while and we are still currently still moving items outside but so far it has had an immediate effect, our two teams have been able to do more testing and we are able to spend less time searching for stuff ever since we organized. Since this has been so helpful to our teams we might plan to make this a yearly occurrence, during summer or after our season ends we can spend two weekends completely reorganizing the Dojo.

Grabber Arms v3

25 Nov 2017

Grabber Arms v3 By Abhi and Karina

Task:Develop a More Efficient System

At the Oklahoma qualifier, we saw numerous teams with similar systems to that of ours. However, since we had the mobilized gripper arms to stack with auto alignment, we were able to collect glyphs easier. In spite of that, after observing other teams in action, we realized our current gripper method had the issue of not being ready by the time we got back to the cryptobox. This is because we had to turn around everytime we needed to pick up glyphs and we also needed to pick up glyphs. This leads to longer time to fill the cryptobox, something that is not good if we plan on recovering the relic later in the season. As a result, we decided to upgrade our arms to a new level: a chain based intake system.

The idea behind this system is that the grabber arms would be on a mobilized chain system, kind of like a conveyor belt. One of the reasons this is much faster than our old system is that we don't need to turn our robot around as we approach the cryptobox. We can drive forward, pick up glyphs, and as we drive backwards, we can use a toggled button on our gamepad to move the grabber arms to the back of the robot upright. As a result, by the time we get back to the cryptobox, we have the glyphs ready to place.

Another benefit of this new system is that we don't need to stack glyphs. When we drive forward to pick up glyphs, we can tilt the grabber arms forward so that even if the pre stacked glyphs look far apart, they can still be in-took with the tilted system. Also, this system can be used for intaking the relic in the future. If the chain system is placed on an elevated level on our robot, the grabber arms will be taller than the field walls. Because of this, if we pick up the relic when it is on the ground, we can place it easily.

This picture represents our current progress. We hope to complete this system soon so we can test it on the robot.

RoboDojo Maintenance

26 Nov 2017

RoboDojo Maintenance By Coach

A mess of projects

At the end of the first regular practice since putting up our tent, the field is populated with 4 separate projects. Evidence of a lot of great work going on....

Is it also indicative of a lack of caring for what those who live here have to endure during the week? No - we recognize that at some point in the distant past the situation got beyond the control of all of us. So I'm not trying to lay fault on anyone for the unlivable situation in our house. But I also need you all to understand that living in a storm of robotics parts is something we (my family) had accepted for a time, but to be clear, this is not sustainable.

So now we (both teams) have an opportunity to do something about it. The tent / outdoor workspace gives us enough room to sort stuff out and keep it that way. For lack of a better name, I'll call it our robodojo. It's now time for us all to commit to keeping it tidy and usable, and doing the same for any spaces used inside the house.

This requires new behaviors that we all must embrace. Number one is that before we leave practice, we have to put away everything we are working on. We have project boxes for anything currently under construction. It's your job to know when you have to leave and to allocate time for cleanup of everything you are working on. That means putting tools and parts away where they belong and cleaning surfaces. If a partner is continuing to work on a project but you have to leave early, be clear about handoff and cleaning up your part of the work. From now on, if your ride arrives without warning, they will have to wait until your cleanup is done.

I could go on for pages about the behaviors we need to adopt, but I'll challenge team members to work up a full list. I'll wrap up here by sharing our common goals:

  • All things, projects/parts/tools need to be put where they belong before a meet ends
  • "where they belong" is a priority. It's not acceptable to throw something into a random box to get it off the floor or worksurface
  • The field in the robodojo must be usable for drive practice at any time with a maximum of 5 minutes of tidying up
  • Tools are in use or in their place, they are not toys or hand candy
  • Surfaces are clean and tidy - two different concepts, both important
  • Abandoned projects get pulled apart and parts resorted
  • The burden of maintaining the robodojo falls to all equally - it's not just a builder's burden
  • Any rules for the robodojo apply equally or more so to the house
  • We all want a more effective workspace and I know that you also care that my family and I have a liveable home between practices. But we've all built up some bad habits that will be hard to break. I am asking that we turn those habits around, starting now.

Oklahoma 2017 Post-Mortem

27 Nov 2017

Oklahoma 2017 Post-Mortem By Ethan, Evan, Tycho, Austin, Janavi, Kenna, Abhi, Charlotte, and Karina

Task: Recap what went right and wrong in Oklahoma

Even though we did very well in the Oklahoma qualifier, we still encountered several problems, that if not addressed, could lower our chances of getting to Super-Regionals. So, we had a team discussion on what to do differently in the next tournament, and what to keep constant.

Problems

Time management
Our time management was Not Good. First, we had trouble coordinating with different parts of the team, which lead to disorganization. As an example, we nearly missed judging because we had to go to inspection, then we nearly got DQ'd from several matcvhes because we kept going back to the practice field instead of queuing. So we need to clearly schedule when to go to practice field and when to not, as well as coordinate the judging, inspection, and other important events.
Referring to coach
We didn't realize that the judges were judges in the pit and one of our members refered to our coach for help, which probably hurt our chances.
Preparedness
First, on the robot side, we hadn't prepped for inspection the night before, so we had to be in a rush the day of to get ready. As well, we still hadn't made a coherent model of our robot in Creo by OK, which hurt our judging chances. And, we didn't emphasize the design process enough.
Presentation
For some reason, our robot kept glitching out *only* during the presentation, which hurt us. And even though our presentation was better than last time, we still had a lot of pauses that could've been remedied easily with more practice.
Robot Stability
While our robot worked pretty well during the first 5 rounds, once we hit the final rounds, our robot started shutting down and being hard to operate. We still don't know the reason, but we're currently diagnosing now.

To-do

  • Static-proof robot
  • Fix wiring
  • Organize journal for award
  • 3D Model
  • Expand engineering section
  • Build 2nd field
  • Shock mount robot

SEM Robotics Tournament

27 Nov 2017

SEM Robotics Tournament By Coach

Iron Reign (team 6832), The School of Science and Engineering and the Dallas ISD STEM Department are happy to announce that we are hosting a FIRST Tech Challenge qualifying tournament at our Townview campus on December 16th. Somewhere between 28 and 32 North Texas robotics teams will compete for awards and approximately 5 advancements to the Regional Championship to be held in February.

Calling All Volunteers

This is the first time our school has hosted an official qualifying tournament and we will need your help to make it a first-rate experience. This is a full day event on Saturday, December 16. There are also options to help with setup Friday afternoon December 15. Please feel free to circulate this message to everyone in the SEM community who can contribute their time and expertise. And if you can suggest a business that might want to sponsor the event, we'll be happy to talk with them.

We need to field some 50 or so volunteers!

One group of volunteers that support the running of robot matches include referees, score keepers, inspectors, field managers. Some of these roles require training and certification and we will generally draw from mentors already involved in FTC. Other roles supporting match play do not require training and include field management, pit management and queue management.

Another group of volunteers will support judging of teams for awards. Judges can be drawn from industry or academia and can have an engineering background or a general business backround in a technology industry. Judges assess the merits of teams' robots, their engineering process and journal, their strategic decisions, team dynamics and outreach. Judges will be led by a Judge Advisor, but will need to understand the awards criteria ahead of time.

Another group of volunteers will support the event overall. This includes team registration, crowd control, DJ, videography and photography, A/V support, floaters, runners, concessions, load-in/load-out crew, etc.

This is just a summary of the most common roles, but there are many specialty roles. Full volunteer descriptions can be found here.

For some roles it helps to understand the run-of-show for the day.

How to sign up as a volunteer

FIRST is the governing body of these competitions and they have a volunteer sign up system so that we can assure that all roles are filled by vetted volunteers. We are trying to get all volunteers processed through this year's new system. It does involve creating a FIRST account if you have not previously done so. If you have any issues or are finding the process burdensome, please use our contact form for assistance.

Please sign up for as many roles as you feel comfortable fulfilling. We may need to be flexible with assignments depending on who is available and which roles can be fulfilled by our regional managing partner. Students may volunteer for certain roles and as event hosts, Iron Reign team members will be supporting the event throughout the day.

To begin, go to the volunteer signup page for our event: https://my.firstinspires.org/Volunteers/Wizard/Search/2?EventId=34105

If you have not previously registered with FIRST, you'll need to sign up / register and activate your account first. Then you can go back to the link above and indicate your preferences. We truly need your help and look forward to working with you to create a great tournament for our students. We hope this event will showcase SEM as the premiere home for future scientists and engineers.

All our Thanks,

Karim Virani and Cathy Lux

Tournament day is very involved for the teams and volunteers. Here is a typical schedule of the day:

  • 7:30-8:30 Teams arrive, register and load their robots and gear into the pit areas
  • 9:00 - 10:30 Teams present their robots to Judges for the awards competition. They also get their robots inspected and approved for the robot game
  • 10:30 Opening ceremonies and then qualifying matches of the robot game begin. Judges are observing teams in their pits and on the competition field
  • Noon - Lunch will be provided for the teams and volunteers. Judges share information with each other about the teams they interviewed.
  • Afternoon - qualifying matches continue until each team has competed 5 times. There are 4 robots per match and we'll have two alternating competition fields to speed things up.
  • Mid-to-late afternoon is Alliance Selection, top teams from qualifying rounds will build alliances to compete in the elimnation / playoff rounds. Judges continue deliberating.
  • Playoff rounds usually take a bit over an hour
  • Closing Ceremonies and Awards
  • Pack up fields and equipment

We plan to end the tournament by 5pm, but events can run long. All volunteers are encouraged to stay until the end of the tournament, but it's not required if your role is completed earlier in the day.

Gripper v4, Octopuckers

03 Dec 2017

Gripper v4, Octopuckers By Tycho and Abhi

Task: Design a new piece for intake

Version 2 of our gripper arms worked much better than our original. Due to their silicone material and trianglular shape, we definitely had more control over the glyphs than our one degree of freedom grabber arms. However, we still had issues we needed to address. When glyphs were taken in, since the silicone surface did not have much mobility and compressibility, glyphs would often fall. Due to slight changes in glyph size, the bigger glyph would determine the space between the grabbers, meaning the other glyph would be mobile despite us wanting its control. This is when we develoepd the first version of our new rotators.

The first edition of our rotatory mechanism allowed us to play with ninjaflex printing and flexibility. They were 15mm extrusions designed to stack on one another on a REV rail or similar rigid structure. Since Ninjaflex can bend, we got more grip on the glyphs. It was definetely a well designed model but had many issues. First, each fin of the fan was very thick. Though it was able to grip glyphs well alone, the system was not able to grip much better when stacked together. We decided we needed more surface area contact with glyphs during intake.

This led us to create a new model with thinner fins and thin tabs at the end. The thin flaps allowed more grip area with the glyphs allowing us to work better. Though good in theory, when we went to print out the part, we discovered our 3-D printer didn't allow printing vertically of surfaces less than 1 mm. Since this idea didn't work, we started thinking of the idea of suction cups. This led us to our current design.

The design worked very well. We decided to name them Octopuckers since they had suction cup shape and there were 8 fins to a pucker. The surfaces of the octopuckers which would contact the glyphs were large and had a large area. Since this was heavier than the bridge connecting them to the center, the branches bent easily allowing for a grippy surface which was also flexible. After testing it on a small scale, it seemed to work well so we will continue development and implement it on our next edition of the grabber arms.

REVolution Pulley

05 Dec 2017

REVolution Pulley By Tycho

Task:Build an Army Worthy of Mordor

This GT2 pulley has rounded teeth that engage nicely. GT2 pulleys and timing belts are the most common in use with 3D printers - but those are usually of the 2mm pitch variety. We didn’t think our printer would be able achieve the fine detail accuracy needed to print at that size, so we went for the 5mm pitch belts. On our printer we can take this part off and use it right away with only the most minimal cleanup. This is a 24 tooth pulley.

Meeting Log

09 Dec 2017

Meeting Log December 09, 2017 By Ethan, Evan, Tycho, Austin, Janavi, Charlotte, and Abhi

Meeting Log December 09, 2017

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Write post-mortem
  • Update past MeetLogs

Build / Modelling

  • 3D-model
  • Work on robot flipper

Service / Outreach

  • Build 2nd field

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EvanFlipper2:004
AustinFlipper2:004
Abhi3D Model2:004
EthanPost Mortem2:002
EthanField4:002
JanaviField2:004
CharlotteField2:004
TychoField2:004
KarinaField2:004

REVolution Simple Dual Rail Plate

11 Dec 2017

REVolution Simple Dual Rail Plate By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

The dual rail plate allows you to couple the rotation of two REVrails together. The distance between the holes should be based on how you are coupling them together. This model is designed to use GT2 5mm pulleys and a 46 gap timing belt.

REVolution Basic HingePlate

11 Dec 2017

REVolution Basic HingePlate By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

This is our most used hinge plate. The 4 holes can take M3 screws to attach to a REVrail on one side at the end.

Best Buy Event

14 Dec 2017

Best Buy Event By Ethan

Task: Attend a Best Buy event and accept an award

We have been using our Mobile Learning Lab for about a year now. Initally, we were given a grant by Best Buy to get electronics and printers for the RV. Today, we attended a Best Buy event to recognize our outstanding service, and recieved a further $10,000 grant. On top of that, we signed a contract to expand our efforts to a year round program, signing onto 50+ events a year. Through this, we have finally achieved our goal - making the RV substainable, even without Iron Reign.

Qualifier Preparation

15 Dec 2017

Qualifier Preparation By Kenna, Abhi, Karina, Charlotte, Tycho, Janavi, Ethan, Austin, and Jayesh

Townview Prep Pic

We have been preparing to host our own qualifier since November when we hosted a DISD Scrimmage. Now we have to prepare our school for 26 teams to compete tomorrow. Most of our team was there to help construct the fields. The highlight of my Friday night was dragging assorted metal chairs across the cafeteria, only to be told we only wanted to use the black chairs and spending 2x longer than needed to make our audience seating. However, we were lucky enough get lots of help from our friends in DISD, Townview, and FTC Team 7172, which eased my chair-sorting pain. Our team has made several fields together and should have been more efficient in communicating and managing our time. But that is something to learn and improve on next time. In the end, however, it went smoothly because there was lots of teamwork between 6832 and Townview volunteers once everyone had time to figure out how to best assemble the field.

The main point we'd like to drive home is that you *really* have to consider logistics when setting up a tournament. While you'll consider all the big things before the final day, such as making maps, printing flyers, and placing fields; some of the smaller items can be ignored. A prime example is that we put off figuring out the judging room locations and had to figure that out; another example that we forgot to do is have a pit organization. It would have majorly helped had we organized the pit by team number or some other order for queueing, or at least had made a map of teams beforehand.

SEM Robotics Tournament

16 Dec 2017

SEM Robotics Tournament By Coach

Iron Reign (team 6832), The School of Science and Engineering and the Dallas ISD STEM Department are happy to welcome you to the FIRST Tech Challenge qualifying tournament at our Townview campus on December 16th. Twenty-six North Texas robotics teams will compete for awards and approximately 5 advancements to the Regional Championship to be held in February.

Teams

Teams - we look forward to seeing your robots compete and learning about your progress this season. Here are some documents that will help you,
Event Schedule
Team List with Judging and Inspection Schedules
Google Map
Parking Map

Volunteers

Volunteers - thank you for supporting this tournament. We could not pull it off without you. Here are some documents that will help you,
Volunteer Schedule and Prep Instructions
Google Map
Parking Map
Team List with Judging and Inspection Schedules
Full volunteer descriptions can be found here.

Concessions

Lunch will be provided to teams and volunteers. A full and economical concessions stand will accomodate most special dietary needs.
Concessions Menu

Townview Qualifier 2017

16 Dec 2017

Townview Qualifier 2017 By Kenna, Abhi, Ethan, Austin, Evan, Charlotte, Karina, Tycho, Janavi, and Jayesh

This past weekend, Iron Reign hosted a 28-team qualifier at Townview Magnet Center. Many of us attend the School of Science and Engineering inside Townview, so it was familiar territory and made the whole experience a little easier. We were lucky enough to host a Scrimmage as practice for our actual qualifier. Weeks of preparation and anticipation paid off when the FTC Affiliate Partner for North Texas told us it was "the best run qualifier this season," and the North Texas Judge Advisor, Freidrich Elliot, called it the "best judging panel he's ever seen."
Unlike most posts in our blog, this post's purpose is not to give a play-by-play. You can take a look at how the day went on our instagram. We want to use our experience as an opportunity to help out other teams who may be hosting a qualifier.

  • It is very important to manage your volunteers. We had volunteer coordinators for every task, like a match queueing coordinator or inspection coordinator.
  • Our PTSA was kind enough to donate food as a fundraiser. However, a lot of it was left over and wasted because it was perishable. Our recommendation is be careful in the amount of perishable food you make.
  • Make a playlist using FIRST-approved songs ahead of time or use the one we used. Thanks to Roaheen Neil Mansuri on Spotify!
  • Take notice of which teams queue on their own, which teams need lots of reminding, and other general manners. You and your volunteers may be asked by the judges, as we were, which teams were the best to work with.
  • This may seem obvious to some, but if you cannot find a team, they are likely at the practice field.
  • If possible, build two fields (in addition to the practice field). It helps immensely with time management and is part of the reason our qualifier went so well.
  • Competing in a qualifier, much less running one, makes everyone a little high-strung. The most important tip we can give is to be understanding of everyone there. We all understand how much FTC means to many and it can cause some to be less considerate than normal. People standing in others' way or not queueing is not helpful, but it is nothing to lose temper over. Try to give people some kindness in a stressful day, whether you're participating or facilitating.
  • Closely related to the last point, be sure to thank people. Tell your volunteers and teams that you appreciate them being there!
On the subject of appreciation, we'd like to thank a few people for helping out.
A big thank you to Karina for volunteering even though she was sick. We had so much help from Townview parents and students that made this qualifier successful. The entire event would not have been successful without the support and sponsorship of DISD.

REVolution Narrow Inside Washer

20 Dec 2017

REVolution Narrow Inside Washer By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

This washer is a stackable spacer that can be used to adapt standard bearings/sprockets/pulleys to thinned base plates.

REVolution Thick HingePlate

22 Dec 2017

REVolution Thick HingePlate By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

This is our most used hinge plate. The 4 holes can take M3 screws to attach to a REVrail on one side at the end.

REVolution Pillow Block

22 Dec 2017

REVolution Pillow Block By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

This is a standard pillow block. We had to add adhesion pads to the ends because the nylon would curl away from the print bed. But these are easily cut off with a hobby knife.

Alumni Meeting

23 Dec 2017

Alumni Meeting By Ethan, Abhi, Karina, Austin, Tycho, Kenna, Charlotte, Janavi, Darshan, Jayesh, and Omar

Task: Talk with our former members

Since we're in the last weeks of December, our schools are legally obligated to let us out. And, while colleges aren't legally mandated to let their students out, they tend to do so, as not doing that would rather enrage their students and families. So, due to this fortuitous coincidence, us simple FTC students were able to work with their dearly departed alumni to fix various problems with our team, mainly the blog.

Besides it just being nice to see all our former members come back home, we were also able to gain knowledge from their experiences in college. As well, several of our members became judges for FTC tournaments, so they were able to provide valuable insights into the judging process, which we highly appreciate. Also, as you see in the above photo, you can see we got p-r-e-t-t-y l-i-t.

Blog Fixes

post problem
PID & balance everything
rev robot reveal write more
PID further everything
zygote write more & picture
makeshift glyph why tag and task
Birth connect --> more posts
stockard meet folkloricos people
childhood see birth
rail test elaborate on wear & tear
testing materials reflective
designing the grabber fix frontmatter & emphasis
oh no! dying glyphs everything
v2 hexifier everything
7-Oct fix pic
chassis upgrade remove extra paragraph
pick and place talk about code not just place
machine vision goals more reflective & how to implement
wheel protection after photo talk about engineering & link related
garage WE, usefulness
ptc creo tutorial reason for making video
intake WE, reflection
OK qualifier fix rick roll
grabber v3 fix drawing & reflection
*Pinned Posts* change + shorter posts
working auto more than code
how to RV 10 --> 6
DISD sponsorship GRAMMAR, why we received
gripper construction more words --> strategy, hyperlink
*make new post, talking to alumn jayesh pic @ competition
designing jewel arm WE, new pic
building field GRAMMAR, head + free + DISD
adding code fixes 2 robot more than code
greenhill FTC positive spin & analysis
driving struggles WE, reflect
gripper p2 more words, WE
make code readable more writing, explain process
business plan ethan upload
all evan posts
evan need 2 add, connect posts to each other, more img
all abhi "fixes" Someone pls review these "fixes"
all code post tycho add

Our blog is one of our most important parts for competition, as it allows us to communicate our ideas, designs, and engineering process to judges. Through the help given by our former alums, we hope to improve our chances at Wylie East.

Jewel Thief

23 Dec 2017

Jewel Thief By Austin and Evan

Task: Build a Functional Jewel Thief

The jewel thief we built before *worked* but that was about it. More often than not, it failed or, even worse, knocking off the wrong jewel due to instability. And, in the Greenhill Qualifier, we lost several rounds because of a problem that could've been easily fixed. So, we had to redesign it.

The jewel thief was initially intended to be simple. It was comprised of no more than a 180 degree rotation servo and an arm with a standard rev color sensor. The arm was foldable and collapsible so that it would fit inside our robot, and as the servo turned out to its extended position the arm would open up with the help of a single bungee cord.

This plan had a few inital downfalls: first, the arms were rather large, clunky, and never really folded well into position, second the arms was heavy due to the use of tetrix bars meaning that the servo would strain, and finally the overal position of the arm was inconvenient for our autonomous programing, so we moved on completely. Rather than focusing on a single arm that could extend to reach the jewels, we decided to focus on something that would conform well to our current setup and then focus on making it long enough to reach. We realized that the outer edge of the robot was open enough to contain a V-shaped device that would rise 180 degrees over the head of our robot. The immediate perk to this was the fact that the system would be 18 inches in length. We felt no need to update which sensor we were using at the end of whatever mechanisim we finally attached, since the rev color sensor served it purpose correctly and effectively each time we had tested it in the past. Our final design was the V-shaped rim that laid flush with our robots exterior and was made from cut and bent L-bracket and was moved with two continuous rotation servos.

Meeting Log

23 Dec 2017

Meeting Log December 23, 2017 By Abhi, Karina, Austin, Tycho, Kenna, Ethan, Charlotte, Janavi, Darshan, Jayesh, and Omar

Meeting Log December 23, 2017

Our team alumni visited practice today. They imparted their knowledge to us in terms of the blog and our build plans.

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Use alumni reccomendations with number and content of blog posts.

Software

  • Investigate ways to pick up glyphs during autonomous
  • Review OpenCV viewing of cryptobox

Build / Modelling

  • Complete frame of gripper arms v3
  • Assemble new gripper arms

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:00pm.25
AllRecap Townview Qualifier2:15.5
AustinAssemble Gripper arms2:453
AbhiComplete frame v32:452
KarinaComplete frame v32:452
OmarHelp build ideas2:452
DarshanHelp build ideas2:452
KennaFix Blog2:452
JanaviFix Blog2:452
CharlotteFix Blog2:452
JayeshIdentify fixes in blog2:452
Karina3-D Model4:451
Abhi3-D Model4:451
PeopleTask2:001

REVolution 15x20 Tooth Sprocket

23 Dec 2017

REVolution 15x20 Tooth Sprocket By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

This is our REV0lution 20 tooth sprocket for #25 chain. This took a lot of trial and error to get right, because it was the component most sensitive to our print settings. We had to inset the tooth profile quite a bit because any extra material created by perimeter settings would cause the gaps between teeth to be too small for the chain to fully engage, and because nylon is so slippery, this would radically increase the likelihood of the chain slipping. Or you would have to make the chain super-tight and that would increase the friction at the bearing. It still requires a pretty tight chain. And it requires a lot of post-print cleanup. The lip where the lowest layers spread out on the build plate have to be trimmed with a hobby knife - all the way around. And then the chamfers at the tip of the teeth have to be rebuilt. We used a reciprocating sander to do this. Nylon is one of the hardest materials to sand effectively, but fresh 220 grit paper will eventually do the job. We only need 2 sprockets for our new Glyph System, so it was worth the effort. This would be the first component that we would recommend replacing with a regular flat aluminum sprocket if you have the means to accurately broach a 15mm square hole in it. Or switch over to timing belts entirely - the timing pulley works fine right off the print bed.

REVolution Rail End Cap

23 Dec 2017

REVolution Rail End Cap By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

End caps are stops placed at the end of a REVrail. Five of the holes are for M3 bolts that can be screwed into the standard holes in the cross section of the extrusion. We highly recommend tapping these holes and then using threadlock to retain the bolts. So far we’ve only had to use a single bolt since we haven’t experienced very large forces The other 4 bolts are for attaching to a bearing on the far side of an attachment plate.

REVolution Thin Bearing

24 Dec 2017

REVolution Thin Bearing By Tycho

Task:Build an Army Worthy of Mordor

This is the standard bearing / bushing that allows a REVrail to rotate inside a plate. It is typically coupled with a glide washer and two stops to bind it to an attachment plate or pillow block.

REVolution Rail Stop

25 Dec 2017

REVolution Rail Stop By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

This stop can be placed anywhere on a REVrail to trap mounting plates inside bearings. They are usually used in pairs.

REVolution Custom Dual Rail Plate

26 Dec 2017

REVolution Custom Dual Rail Plate By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

This shows customized version of the Dual Rail Plate. This is for our 4th generation rolling gripper system. The small ears are designed to hold a long M3 bolt that have a stack of mini ball bearings on them. These ball bearings squeeze our timing belts together, forcing them into a more oval shape, but still allowing them to glide. This reduces friction quite a bit. Otherwise we had to put a lot more tension between the pulleys to get the belt to fully engage. This plate also has grooves to attach servo pulled wires to control the plates angle one of the REVrails and it has a flange to mount our beater guards.

REVolution Narrow Bearing Washer

27 Dec 2017

REVolution Narrow Bearing Washer By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

Washers can be used as spacers. They are also used to smooth out the rough top layers. Keep the bed very clean and smooth and the bottom surface of parts should be very slippery against other nylon. Put these in between the rough top bearing surface of one part (with rough surface facing rough) and the smooth bottom surface of the next part, and the friction will be substantially reduced.

REVolution Inside Washer

27 Dec 2017

REVolution Inside Washer By Tycho

Task: Power to the REVolution

This is an inside washer. It will fit entirely inside the standard plate hole. We don’t use these much, but they can be useful as spacers.

Flipper Prototype

29 Dec 2017

Flipper Prototype By Evan

Task: Build an alternate glyph-placing mechanism

The world advances on innovation. We strive to make the most efficient devices and aparati to complete jobs for us. There’s a hundred different ways to work a task, but only one will be the best at functioning in the areas of efficiency and timeliness. Just as America runs on Dunkin, advancement runs on efficiency. That’s why the robot must be outfitted with a flipper system to intake and deposit blocks. It’s the only design that will make it to the world competition, and it’s the only way that we will make it out of local competitions. I personally have taken it upon myself to develop the prototype while the majority of the team is focussed on a new grabber arm.

While our grabber arms were *good*, they weren't great. The arms currently attached to the robot, which use the turkey-pans, didn't grip as much as we hoped, and while we're designing a new version which has specialized 3-D printed arms, we can't put all our eggs in one basket. So, we decided to make the flipper system. The advantages of the flipper system as compared to the other systems is that the flipper system:

  • Does not depend on friction to hold blocks
  • We had previous issues with block slippage with the arms model, and this should fix our dependency on high-friction materials.
  • Faster
  • Our old arms depended on stacking to get more than one block, while this one wheels blocks in, reducing the time needed.
  • Less precision needed
  • Before, we had to align blocks directly with the arms to pick them up, but this can just use the wheels to intake blocks.

So far I have built a flipper and an intake system, both that function well, but have yet to get the teams’ permission to attach it directly to the robot, as it would require a lot of dismantling. Since it won’t be able to be put on before the upcoming Wylie qualifier, it’s been put on a backburner as I also throw myself at the new grabber arm. The flipper is being held in a frame I built around it but as a system is comprised of a board attached to a servo attached to a drawer slide that works as a vertical lift. The intake system is composed of two intake wheels made of the same foam tiles that make up the field floor attached to two axles that are chained to two opposite rotating gears powered by one of the new REV motors. The intake works with the flipper well and only needs some side guards. I’m half of the way through designing. It should be on the robot before any regional qualifiers we go to.

Business Plan Updates

30 Dec 2017

Business Plan Updates By Ethan

Task: Update the Business/Strategic Plan

See the first post with the full text here.

Cumulative Updates to 12/31/2017

MXP

Update (10 November 2017): The Mobile Tech Experience program described above received a grant from Best Buy for its outstanding performance, and to fund more outreach events and upkeep of the MXP. The company that schedules MXP deployments, BigThought, also signed onto a year-round deployment schedule for the MXP.

General Fixes

  • Removed acronyms
  • General spelling/grammar
  • Added explanations
  • Fixed tables
  • Added volunteer information
  • Added extra detail

Download the pdf here.

Introducing Kraken

01 Jan 2018

Introducing Kraken By Abhi and Tycho

Task:Design the robot model

We have finally completed assembly modeling Kraken, Iron Reign's Relic Recovery robot. Named after the sea creature due to the robot's OCTOPUCKERS, Kraken stands as a fierce competitor in FTC.

To the chassis, we added the glyph system mounting. We first designed a linear slide replica and constrained that to a small TETRIX U connector piece which attached to the REV rail base. On the other side of the linear slide was a TETRIX bar attached by distance and coincident contrains. Onto this, we mounted the grabber system, and assembly done with a combination of normal, distance, and coincident contrains.

As on our robot, this linear slide system is supported by a small TShaped piece with two aluminum bars. This required tangency constrains with the inside of the T piece along with angle offset to the REV rail base.

Finally, we attached the jewel thief mechanism via subassembly, We first attached servos to either side of the custom designed pentagon piece. Then, these servos were constrained to the REV rail base and partly to the phone mount bar extruding out.

All of this went over our amazing chassis design. To see more info on the chassis assembly, refer here

What's next?

We hope this chassis provides an alternate testing mechanism for sizing of our future prototypes. Another version of the chassis is underway based on changes to our robot.

Chassis Model

06 Jan 2018

Chassis Model By Abhi and Janavi

Task: Use Creo Parametric to CAD the chassis

After making significant development on our robot, we decided to model it. So far, we have developed the chassis of the robot seen below

To develop this, many types of contraints were used.

The entire model is dependent on this tetrix bar. The bar was constrainted using the Default feature since it was the base of the model. To this, the lift motor was attached as well as the battery box. These two were constrained by the Distance feature to the end of the bar.

Four REV rails were attached to the TETRIX bar. These supported the wheels and their motors. They were constrianed through the Coincident to the bottom of the tetrix bar and Distance to the side of it.

There are custom designed motor mounts constrained to th side of the REV rails using Coincident and Distance measurements. To this, there are TETRIX wheel mounts attached onto which the mechanum wheels are attached. On the outside, wheel guards were attached. The motors that drive the wheels are attached to REV motor mounts which were constrained to the underside of the REV rails. Attached to the motor is an axel which connects to a sproket to turn the wheel.

The REV hubs were the hardest to constrain in this model because they didn't have typical sides. To mount them, we used a combination of Distance, Coincident, and Angle Offset features. The final part of the model was the phone mount which was simply constrained using coincidents.

The next steps of this robot is to complete the robot model. This chassis was actually reused from last year. Due to licensing issues, we had to redevelop this model. We hope to experiment with this model to make space for the new, larger gripper arms.

Talking to REV

06 Jan 2018

Talking to REV By Austin and Tycho

Task: Talk to REV about our REVolution System

On an excursion to the Rev Headquarters located conveniently in North Dallas, to pick up a few extra servos and other miscellaneous parts we decided to bring a couple of our 3D printed REVolution parts to show to the founder of Rev. if you aren’t familiar with our REVolution system, essentially what it is, is a way to turn Rev extrusion rails into axels to be used for more robust and modular axels. These new printable parts can be seen in their corresponding blog post and can be found on Thingiverse along with instructions.

After waiting for Rev’s founder to see us, we had the chance to demonstrate the new parts we had come up with. The REVolution system peaked his interest and he would like to follow up at some point to possibly work on making the parts and selling them as part of the Rev product line. While you won’t be able to find our parts anytime soon, you can look for them in the future since Rev is currently working on a few other priorities.

Part 2

We want to have further talks with REV about mass-producing these parts, as we believe that these could benefit teams everywhere and allow their designs to be more flexible. As well, we plan to further develop our REVolution system so that it has greater functionality.

Meeting Log

06 Jan 2018

Meeting Log January 06, 2018 By Ethan, Evan, Charlotte, Kenna, Tycho, Austin, Abhi, Karina, and Janavi

Meeting Log January 06, 2018

So, today's the last Saturday before the Wylie Qualifier, and we're pretty unprepared. We're a little behind on our blog posts by about a week, we still haven't added our octopucker attachment, and we need to finish our 3D model of our robot.

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Spring Cleaning Post
  • Code Improvement
  • SEM Tournament Post
  • Flipper Post
  • Octopucker Post
  • 3D Model Post
  • Proofread
  • Fix presentation

Software

  • Fix autonomous jewel code

Build / Modelling

  • Finish 3D model
  • Attach octopucker grabber
  • Work on flipper

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EthanReview Posts2:004
EveryonePresention2:001
EvanWork on octopuckers2:004
AustinFix wiring issues2:004
CharlotteFix Presentation2:004
EthanFix presentation2:002
KennaProofread posts2:004
TychoWork on auto code2:004
Abhi3D model2:004
Karina3D model2:004

Fixing the Robot Chassis

08 Jan 2018

Fixing the Robot Chassis By Austin

Task: Redesign the robot chassis, fix issues

When we designed our new grabber with the octopuckers, one of the variables we neglected was the width of the new grabber once assembled and resting. After the grabber was completed it’s width was actually greater than that of the housing bay we had built into the current drive train, so to get the grabber to fit we actually had to widen the bay. We had know from past experience that the base was never truly square, so we took this necessary widing as a chance to resquare the base and drastically improve the efficiency of our mecanum drive. We added ¾ inch to the inside base and the resquared the frame before finally bolting everything down and attempting to mount the new grabber. Because the closed grabber barely fit within the new widened bay we had to cut away portions of the frame over the front wheels to allow the octopuckers room to actuate.

The other key chassis modification needed to accommodate the new grabber system was a lift bolstering. We decided that to handle the newly doubled weight of the grabber we would share the load across two strings and convert to a double pulley system. The lift was also strengthened with newly squared and adjusted cross beams similar in length and angle to the other iteration. Because of the double pulley, we also centered the drive motor and utilized a second spool. The pulleys rest on either side of the lift system and are both being run by the same motor.

The Grabber V. Kraken

08 Jan 2018

The Grabber V. Kraken By Austin and Evan

Task: Build a new version of the grabber

One of our issues with the previous iteration of the gripper was the fact that the material that coated the actual pincers weren't even and would often lead to blocks slipping from the bottom of the gripper and falling out. Our solution to this was to retest materials and in this process we decided to try our hand at 3D printing a circular and pliable material that could be part of our new rotating pincers. We designed the OCTOPUCKERS and built the rest of the grabber around that. Because the octopuckers were designed to slide onto typical rev-rail extrusions we also had to design a new system of bearings that could house the rails with skewered octopuckers.

We developed a “revolutionary” new 3D printed rev-rail bearing system that was liked with a series of chains and pulleys that could be attached to our current lift system and not severely alter the base and drive train. Previously the grabber was actuated via a system of servos controlled by a rev hub back on the main drive train, however in this newer iteration of the grabber, we decided that all of the necessary wiring would be kept inside the grabber to eliminate tangling by mounting the rev hub on the back of the grabber. While this grabber was a major upgrade that drastically improved our glyph handling capabilities, it did in fact double the weight that our lift had to bear.

Creo Parametric, a Learning Journey

09 Jan 2018

Creo Parametric, a Learning Journey By Abhi

Task: Learn Creo Over Time

Over the course of this past season, I have been learning how to use Creo Parametric to learn 3-D modeling. Since this is Tycho's last year on the team (so far he has been our main modeler), I decided to learn from him so the modeling legacy would continue.

The first project I was tasked to design was the wheel guard on the robot. As a very early learner, I ran into many issues. For example, I used to eyeball all my dimensions. This clearly didn't work out as evidenced by my epic fail of the first form wheel guard. However, after experimenting with the constriants, I jumped all the early hurdles and learned the basics.

My first assembly project was to CAD the conveyor belt we hope to eventually mount the grippers onto. As someone who had never dealt with assemblies before, I felt like someone going through a maze. Even assembling basic parts like an axle hub to the axle, it took me 10 minutes because I struggled changing dimensions and such. This project, though very basic, seemed impossible to me. However, after working through it, I was able to become more familiar with constraints to apply to the next biggest task, the robot model.

So far this is what we have constructed of the robot chassis. After training on the conveyor system, I was able to complete the chassis easier. By doing this, I have dealt with more constraints and have been moving faster.

Next Steps

After learning a lot so far from Tycho, I hope to finish the model soon and continue growth on the model. The only thing remaining on the model is the vertical bars connecting the lift and the lift itself.

DISD STEM Expo Preparation

10 Jan 2018

DISD STEM Expo Preparation By Charlotte

Task: Prepare for DISD STEM Expo

Next Saturday, Iron Reign will be participating in the DISD STEM Expo for our second year. As we did last year, we are bringing our Mobile Learning Experience to the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center and will serve children in our community to spark an interest in STEM fields and learning. Dallas City of Learning, the non-profit that schedules the Mobile Learning Experience, runs a featured exhibit in the expo, so we expect lots of traffic to our vehicle. Additionally, we have partnered with Best Buy, who is providing 12 volunteers including store employees and geek squad members to work with us on the vehicle. This will be immensely helpful as these extra sets of hands will allow for more kids to be served.

For our presentation, we are going to have the usual two components, sumo robots and 3D printed keychains. We will teach the kids how to program our pre-built Lego sumo robots in Lego Mindstorms, the same program used in FLL. This is usually our best opportunity to promote First and tell families of kids who enjoyed working with the robots how they can start a team or join an existing one. Also, on our vehicle we have four functional 3D printers and plenty of laptops with Google SketchUp pre-installed, and with these we teach kids how to design and print their very own keychain with their names on it or anything else they would like. Because of our extra volunteers and the size of the event, we expect to have lots of kids coming through our vehicle and participating in these activities.

Iron Reign and Sponsorships

10 Jan 2018

Iron Reign and Sponsorships By Ethan

A Summary of the 2017-2018 Iron Reign Sponorships

Iron Reign, generally, has not been great at finding sponsorships in prior years. However, this year has been much more successful. We can attribute some of our success to the fact that we won the North Texas Inspire award last year, in that we got our name out there more. As well, the fact that we built our MXP helped get our name out, and we recieved staffing and contracts for the RV through BigThought.

Team Sponsorships

DISD STEM - $5000
We first communicated with the DISD STEM department at the DISD Coaches' Training, where we presented an early form of our robot. We soon were able to form a partnership with them to host a 18-team scrimmage for DISD, and later hosted a 26-team qualifier at Townview. In return, we recieved two full field sets, and well over $1000 of robot parts, including two REV kits and 1 TETRIX competition set.

RoboRealm - $1500
RoboRealm, a machine vision software company, gave us three full licenses to their software for free, each worth $500. They are partners with FIRST and assist teams every year.

Texas Workforce Commission - $500
Texas Workforce Commission has been our most consistent sponsor every year. When we first built our RV, we visited the TWC headquarters and talked to TWC Commissioner Hughs about how their grant directly helped us. Ever since, we've recieved a grant. They are also a FIRST in Texas sponsor.

Arconic - $500
Arconic started a grant system for any team near an Arconic facility. We were eligibile due to that, and filled out an application for the grant, then got it. We have yet to visit\thank them, as we recieved this days before the tournament.

FIRST - $250
If you fill out an application on the FIRST website, and meet minimum qualifications, you can earn a grant meant to cover entry fees for tournaments. This covered our first qualifier in Oklahoma.

REV - $50 & Invaluable Advice
Well, the $50 the gave us was about $50 for one servo and its components. However, the real value that REV has given us is advice in building our robot. Iron Reign was one of the first adopters of the REV hubs and rails, which helped us create a connection. Also, we are relatively lucky by having our base of operations by the REV headquarters, a ~20 minute drive, so we have been able to drive over and present ideas to them.

Outreach Assistance

While our MXP was built by us and bought by our coach, we can't do everything on our own. We rent the MXP to BigThought, a Dallas-based educational nonprofit, and also recieve funds for upkeep from them. Through them, we have been able to provide outreach with a variety of different programs, including the City of Dallas, DISD, and Society of Black Engineers. As well, various programs assist in staffing the MXP when our team members alone won't cut it. We have partnered with Dallas City of Learning, Americorp, Best Buy, and BigThought to provide staffing.

Best Buy initially funded the technology aboard the MXP, such as our 4 3D printers, the EV3 bots, and laptops. Later, as we proved that our program was effective, we recieved an additional grant and more staffing for the MXP.

How to Make a Robotics Team in 7 Easy Steps!

11 Jan 2018

How to Make a Robotics Team in 7 Easy Steps! By Janavi

Task:

So you want to make a robotics team? No fear! We'll show you how to in 7 easy steps!

Step 1: Find Support Resources
First(get it), familiarize yourself with the FIRST Robotics Competition. Then locate your region’s Regional Director or FIRST Senior Mentor. These people know the FIRST teams, participating schools, and FIRST-friendly businesses in your area. He or she can help you form a plan for getting your team funded, organized, and in touch with other teams in the area.

Step 2: Enlist Coaches & Mentors
Each team needs at least one adult Mentor with technical expertise that is willing and motivated to “coach” the team through the build and competition season (and beyond). Also highly recommended are two or more other adults to help with administration, fundraising, community outreach, and other tasks.

Step 3: Register and Pay
You can register and create your team on FIRST's website. All coaches and members should create their own FIRST account, register to your team, and sign their consent & release form. They estimate cost per season for rookie teams to be around $2,250, including robot kit, event registraton, travel fees, and more. Registration fees themselves, however, are $275.

Step 4: Build your team
Find and invite at least 10 students who want to be part of a robotics team (the easiest part!). Be sure to emphasize that no technical skills are required, just enthusiasm and a willingness to learn. Recruit all kinds of talents, not just engineering and electronics.

Step 5: Raise funds
Your team will need a steady supply of funds. Recruit local businesses to sponsor you. Many of them may already have a relationship with FIRST. Grants are available for both rookie and underserved teams.

Step 6: Learn about safety
At FIRST, student safety is always paramount. Every adult must become familiar with the Youth Protection Program (YPP). Take the time to watch the videos and read the materials. OSHA also has a 10-hour safety certification that can be completed online.

Step 7: Time to Build Robots!
Part of the fun is designing and building your robot; FIRST provides a wealth of information in their Resource Library to help you. Find everything from technical guides to fundraising ideas to fun activities for your team.

Reflections

Often when we participate in outreach events with the Mobile Tech Lab, we get questions from students and parents alike about how to start their own robotics team in their community, school, etc. It is hard to try and explain the steps as well as direct them to the FTC website in memorable way. So, we created this easy-to-read checklist to hand out while at outreach events. We're so exited to be able to get other kids just like us involved in Robotics. Robotics has changed all of our lives for the better, without robotics many of us wouldn't have gotten to experience working with technology let alone at the level that we are now.

Helping Other Teams

12 Jan 2018

Helping Other Teams By Austin and Tycho

Task: Help a rookie FTC team

In the week before the Wylie east north Texas qualifier, Iron Reign was going about our normal development schedule when we received a request for assistance from a smaller startup team, team 13376 Cyber Wolves, that had jettisoned from an FRC team to compete in FTC. On one of our regularly scheduled nights, which actually ended up being the night before competition day, they arrived at Iron Reign’s headquarters with all of their gear and teammates in one car. They had brought two smaller robots with simple degrees of freedom and no code. The coaches also had numerous questions about how the competition would ebb and flow.

Tycho diverted from his normal autonomous coding to assist the teams coders in polishing up their control scheme and the robot was worked on by their builders, who asked for assistance and general information from our build team that was keeping to its rhythm. While their lack of resources led to a lackluster performance at the actual qualifier, they shone through and were excited to build their reserves and team for next year's competition. We were ecstatic to help an up and coming team when we got the chance, and would offer the same kind of support to any team that comes knocking.

You can contact us at ironreignrobotics@gmail.com!

Prepping for Wiley

13 Jan 2018

Prepping for Wiley By Janavi, Karina, Ethan, Charlotte, Kenna, Abhi, Austin, Tycho, and Evan

Task:

It was countdown time before the competition, we had to practice driving our robot, pack the MXP, and practice our presentation. So we decided to split up into smaller groups to accomplish more. Tycho, Charlotte, and Evan drove together to practice communicating quickly and effectively. They also played against our sister team so both teams could get practice with other robots in a competition-like setting before the real thing.

Inside, Ethan and I worked on putting the final touches on our team's journal. We hole-punched papers, decorated tabs, and double-checked the whole journal. Austin, Tycho, Abhi and Kenna were helping out our guest team with their phones and their robot(click here to read more about that!).

Every 30 minutes we all met up as a team in the tent and practiced our presentation. This really helped all of us work out any kinks or problems we had in our presentation. After each dry run we gave and received constructive criticism as well as new ideas, which really helped to improve our overall presentation.

Reflections

This method of splitting up into sub-teams really helped us organize and coordinate our time. In the past this has worked well for us, so applying this to our competition prep was a good move. By splitting up we could divide tasks more evenly and have a clear understanding of what we had to do. Another really beneficial thing we did were the practice runs every 30 minutes. By doing this we were able to practice our presentation and give each other feedback. Leaving 30 minutes between each run gave everybody time to review their slides and incorporate any new ideas into their presentation.

Wylie East Qualifier 2018

13 Jan 2018

Wylie East Qualifier 2018 By Ethan, Evan, Charlotte, Janavi, Karina, Tycho, Austin, Abhi, and Kenna

Task: Compete at the Wylie East Qualifier

Introduction

It was a cold and dark morning. The howling winds of a cold front rushed through the grass. Under this cover of darkness, one car after another pulled up to a house, dimly lit. A car door would open for a second, letting a child out into the cold night. Under these auspicous conditions, each child wandered into the house, only for a moment, and left again, and boarded an RV. Thus began the Wylie East Qualifier.

Inspection

We arrived at Wylie about 7:50 AM, and unloaded. Unlike previous tournaments, we had actually prepared our robot the night before. So, we were able to get in and out of inspection pretty fast, which was nice and definently reduced our stress about time management. Our only worry was that our robot was too big for the sizing cube, as we had measured the robot to be 17.96875 inches in length, leaving 1/32 of an inch. And since that is *probably* within the production error of a sizing cube, we were mildly worried. Still though, our robot barely slid in. We passed the rest of inspection with flying colors.

Unloading

We had been preparing to pack Friday, so we had all our tools ready. However, we didn't use the packing list we had previously, and we felt the effects. We forgot encoder cables, and even a flathead screwdriver. While this really didn't hurt *us*, it hurt our sister team, and we weren't as helpful with other teams when they came to us. The one pro of forgetting a lot of our stuff was that the unload was really fast, and we set up our table and got it organized in under 5 minutes.

Judging

Next up was judging. We'd neglected working on our presentation previously, as we had to prioritize even more neglected items such as drive practice. And, it was pretty obvious. We had a few stumbles, a few missed cues, and we even managed to miss a slide. Despite that, we were able to convey our team's progress and history to the judges effectively, and they seemed to be enganged and asked relevant questions. If there was one thing we could change, it would not be the prior errors, but that we took too much time in the presentation, and didn't leave enough time for questions. NOTE: A judge later told us that we should clairify information about our MXP in the presentation

Scouting

Team # Team name Autonomous Glyph Jewel Safe Zone TeleOp Glyphs Columns Rows Pattern Balance Stone Relics
3734 Imperial                      
3899 Terror Bytes YES no yes no yes 6   2 r no yes mo
7172 Technical Difficulties ys 1 with view yes yes yes 24 full full full no no
7904 HSA Dallas Robotigers no       yes 6 0 2 no don’t know no
8418 The League of Legendary yes 1 no viewfoia no yes yes   1-20000   yes yes no
8565 Technicbots yes 1 with view yes yes yes 8 2 3 no yes no
8626 Prototypes yes 1 no viewfoia yes yes yes   3/2 col 0 yes yes no
9386 Elmer & Elsie Robotics yes 1 no viewfoia yes yes yes 24 3 4 no yes no
11097 Cybersurge yes no no yes yes 4-6g yes no no yes 3 and up maybe
11339 Williams Warriors Robotics yes no no ys yes     2-4 r no no no
11341 ViBoTs                      
11366 The Smarty Party yes no yes yes yes 4-5 g wonky 3-Feb no yes not focus butr can
11425 Murphy Maverick Robotics no       yes no test 4   1 no yes no
11563 Hedrick Garage yes no yes yes yes max 6   2 yes yes no
11594 FireCats no       yes 1   1 no yes no
11629 Todoians yes 1 no viewfoia no yes yes   0 2-3 r no0 yes no
11791 Marvin the Martian                      
11793 TRICERABOTS yes no yes no yes     max 2 no yes no
12061 Long Buccaneer Engineers                      
12430 Raider Robotics yes no yes yes maybe yes 5 no 2 no yes no
12810 QuantumX yes yes yes yes yes 8 2 0 yes yes 1-2 zone
12930 ScitoboRRobotics yes no no yes yes 6 1/3/2002 no yes no could try
13376 Cyber Wolves                      
13850 Raider Robotics 2 yes   yes yes yes 8   yes no no no

Robot Game

Game 5
We won this game by a large margin -> 122-40. Our autonomomous definitely pushed us over the top here.
Game 12
We lost this game. Our teleop speed and strtegy didn't work against our team, and our partner had connection issues.
Game 15
This was a surrogate match, but we were still very happy about winning this. We performed pretty well *and* the opponent's bot shut off.
Game 20
We won this game with our largest margin, 106-12. We performed well in all aspects of the game, and we should replicate this success.
Game 26
We lost this game by our largest margin, 236-76. We were outperformed in the autonomous and teleop by large margins, and failed to get on the balance stone.
Game 32
We won this game, again by a decent margen. We did very well in the autonomous, and the other team just couldn't catch up.
Semis Game 1 & 2
We lost both these marches by good margins, we couldn't really compete with Tech. Diff's teleop with our autonomous.

Ceremony

Usually, judges come and talk to your team if you're being considered for an award, so we have at least two people at our table at all times, and we sound an alarm so that the entire team can come and answer questions. And so, we sat, and we sat, and we sat, and no judges came. But then, with just five minutes left, we were blessed with an apparition of judges. We walked into the ceremony more confident than we were, and were reasonable impressed when we won 1st-place Inspire.

DISD STEM Fair

20 Jan 2018

DISD STEM Fair By Kenna, Tycho, Evan, Ethan, Charlotte, Karina, Abhi, Janavi, and Austin


DISD STEM Fair was one of our busiest events, but it was also one of our least chaotic. Our team has trouble turning anyone away because we want to introduce as many people as possible to STEM, but letting everyone onto the MXP usually results in more stress and less efficiency because it becomes so crowded. This time we implemented some of the improvements we had been discussing for the past few weeks like a keychain waiting list and regulating entrance to the MXP. We were able to reach 400 students with our three activities and spoke to over 1500 parents and students. We had the opportunity to set up a field and demo our competition bot for everyone there, including some FLL and FTC teams, which is something we don't usually get to do. A lot of kids actually got to drive the robot, as seen below.


We offer two activities on the Mobile Learning Experience(MXP):3D Modeling & Printing and EV3 Lego Bots.



Using laptops, presentation monitors, and 3D printers donated to us by Best Buy, we teach students how to design and print their own keychain. We use SketchUp, a free 3D modeling program by Google, because our hope is that if we teach people the basics they can go home and use SketchUp themselves. They learn the basic functions of CAD, such as the push/pull tool, shape tool, and 3D text. We had lots of people express interest in SketchUp for their kids or students. The highlight of my day was seeing kids who had been taught SketchUp helping those who were still building their keychain.




With our EV3 kits, we help everyone code their own robot and battle it against other bots. Most of the time, it's someone's first interaction with code so what they are coding is fairly basic. The simple code gives them a real taste of programming in a way they can understand.

Among our sponsors that make our outreach possible is BigThought. They help us with the costs of maintaining the MXP as well as staffing. What we do would not be possible without them. During this event, the CEO of BigThought was able to tour the MXP and see what we do to further interest and ability in STEM for young students.

Friction Coefficients of Various Materials

24 Jan 2018

Friction Coefficients of Various Materials By Ethan

Task: Test Friction Coefficients of Various Materials

Introduction:

Iron Reign has used many different materials in years past. In those years, we usually preferred materials which were more durable. We started with ABS, but while hard, it was relatively brittle. We attempted to use Filoflex and Ninjaflex, and they were more durable, but too soft. Finally, we had used nylon for the past seasons, as it was extremely durable but also was hard enough to get the job done.

However, our needs have changed. In this challenge, we have to consider not only durability, but also how well the material works with other materials. And, the most important dynamic we must consider is the interaction with the foam blocks and the gripping material, since it is the major point-scorer.

The coefficient of friction determines the power of the force in the opposite direction of motion. While friction is determined by ƒ=µn, we can ignore the normal force when using the same object repeatedly.

Procedures:

In this, we created an inclined plane that rotated around the base so that we could change its angle slowly from 0 à 90. The coefficient of friction is equal to the tan(ɵ), where ɵ is equal to the angle of slippage. We had to overcome some hurdles, most notably the higher center of gravity of a standard foam glyph, so we cut it down to one-inch of height so that it wouldn’t slip. Another way to restate the tan(ɵ) is the opposite/adjacent of the triangle formed by the incline.

We slowly increased the slope’s angle until the block slipped, then recorded the angle of slippage to calculate the coefficient of friction, µ.

Data:

Surface

Opposite Edge

Adjacent Edge

µ

Standard Polycarb

8.925

8.125

1.098

Sandpaper (120 grit)

9.5

8.25

1.152

1-layer Ninjaflex, no ridge

10.925

5.5

1.986

1-layer nylon, no ridge

10.25

6.125

1.673

Nylon ridged

6.75

10.5

0.643

Drip Silicone Sheet

6.25

8.6

0.727

Full-Thickness Ninjaflex

12.2

less than 1

Immeasurably High

Results:

We found, as we expected, that the Ninjaflex sheets have the highest coefficient of friction. The most important thing to do to further increase the coefficient of friction is increase the area of the contact. While we obviously can’t increase the surface area of the block, what we can do is increase the contact points between the sheets and the glyphs. The main way we can do this is decreasing the quality of our prints, counterintuitively. The reason for this is that the decreased quality creates little fibers that stick up from the print which create more contact points.

The meaning of the coefficient of friction is how easy it is to slide an object across a surface, and as it gets higher, it gets harder to push across the surface. When the coefficient becomes greater than 1, it becomes easier to lift the object vertically than slide it horizontally (This can be qualitatively confirmed by touching the test block). And, for the conveyor belt, we need a high coefficient of friction.

In the future, we should test multi-layered prints, as that ought to further increase the number of contact points. We also plan to impregnate the prints with fine garnet dust, which will hopefully make the sheets more abrasive, and therefore have a higher coefficient of friction.

A critique of this experiment could include that the actual type of friction in the robot game is kinetic, or rolling, not static. In this case, the friction would be higher than rolling friction but lower than kinetic. This is due to the grippers pushing the blocks in, increasing the normal force. However, most coefficients of friction are proportional, so we can extrapolate from the static friction we gained to assume that the material with the highest coefficient of static friction will also have the highest coefficient of kinetic/rolling friction. In the future, we will also test kinetic friction with a spring scale.

References:

This source serves to prove the higher coefficient of friction of Ninjaflex – our experiment varies as we leave the 3-D printing artifacts on the sheet. As well, this measures a different type of friction than ours.

https://ac.els-cdn.com/S2212827117300793/1-s2.0-S2212827117300793-main.pdf?_tid=0b998c36-02ac-11e8-bb23-00000aacb361&acdnat=1516980039_4970d0ef82d6f5d0a8bdd886b6005602

Wylie East Qualifier Postmortem

27 Jan 2018

Wylie East Qualifier Postmortem By Ethan, Kenna, Janavi, Karina, Evan, Abhi, and Charlotte

Task: Analyze our successes and failures in the Wylie East Competition

We have a new format for our postmortems. We start by asking a series of questions to figure out our problems, and we cover 4 catagories to do so.

STRENGTHS

  • What are our strengths?
  • What do we do better than other teams?
  • What unique capabilities and resources do we possess?
  • What do others perceive as our strengths?
WEAKNESSES
  • What are our weaknesses?
  • What do other teams do better than us?
  • What can we improve given the current situation?
  • What do others perceive as our weaknesses?
OPPORTUNITIES
  • What trends or conditions may positively impact us?
  • What opportunities are available to us?
THREATS
  • What trends or conditions may negatively impact us?
  • What are other teams doing that may impact us?
  • What impact do our weaknesses have on the threats to us?

Preparation

Strengths
This time, we prepped our engineering journal a good while beforehand, which was good. Last time, we spent the last night panicking over how our journal wasn't finished and dealing with a printer that craps out every other page. We also became more productive as the tournament drew closer, but this can also be a drawback as we need to be *consistent*.

Weaknesses
We didn't really ever get our parts and tools together before the tournament. We were helping a team the night before, and we had our tools out to help them instead of packing, then never really reconsolidated them.

Oppurtunities
We should take full advantage of non-Saturday practices to prep before the tournament. While some people did show up, not everyone was able to, and we'd like to increase attendance as much as possible. We also need to prepare ASAP, not right before the tournament. We also ought to make flair for our team like pins or something similar to get our name out and bribe teams with.

Threats
We're high school students at one of the top schools in the nation, so we're pretty busy. Despite that, we really should increase attendance so we can get more work done.

Judging

Strengths
We won the First Place Inspire Award, so we're definitely doing something right. We got mentioned for every single award but Motivate. We got all our content across, and we told a good story, but we still have room to improve.

Weaknesses
We need to smooth over our presentation in several areas. First, we need to sync up our presentation so that our laptops show the same slides. We also need to clarify our content between last year's accomplishments and this year's. Our transitions need a bit of work - we came off as rusty - and we also need to cut our time down by doing so.
We also need to be more effective in the pits of the tournament. We need to look active, and we don't do a great job of doing that. We also need the team to become more educated in the intricate parts of our team.

ALSO: ENTHUSIASM

Oppurtunities
We want to make our engineering journal stand out more - we have some ideas such as adding robot parts to our journal to make it snazzy. Also eventually, we want to get a tent for the pits to stand out.

Robot Performance

Strengths
For the *first* time ever, we had ZERO disconnects on our phones. We can partially attribute this to using new phones, the Moto Gs. As well, our jewel auto worked every single match, 100% success rate. The newest glyph system worked amazingly, but we still have room for improvement.

Weaknesses
We need a way to build more 3D-printed parts to outrace the constant wear and tear of the tournaments. We also had issues with Vuforia, and we ought to work on phone placement to fix that, which ties in to retuning our autonomous glyph tuning. We also need to add strain relief to the hub power cable.

Oppurtunities
We need to work on driver practice more with the new gripper. We also need the drivers, as well as everyone else, to get more sleep.
We're going to try and assemble more intake systems, such as a chain flipper, improved glyph system, and forward rake to test the intakes.

Scouting

Strengths
Abhi did a great job scouting. This was one of our best scouting tournaments, and there aren't many critiques of it.

Weaknesses
We need to make sure teams can follow up on their claims because some teams frankly just bs when asked about their robot. We also need to take more photos for blog posts and the presentation.

Oppurtunities
We need to have better accounts of the matches, and we need to watch other teams' matches.

Meeting Log

27 Jan 2018

Meeting Log January 27, 2018 By Ethan, Karina, Charlotte, Abhi, Tycho, Austin, Kenna, Evan, and Janavi

Meeting Log January 27, 2018

We are very behind on updating our engineering journal and discussing our performance in Wylie. This was the main focus of the day.

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • STEM Expo Post
  • Chassis Post
  • Driving Post
  • Wylie Postmortem
  • Create poster

Build / Modelling

  • Work on new chassis
  • Attempt to update gripper

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
EthanWork on poster2:004
CharlotteDriving2:004
JanaviWork on chassis2:004
KarinaDriving2:004
TychoDriving2:004
EvanGripper update2:004
KennaWork on chassis2:004
Abhi3D Model2:004
AustinGripper update2:004

Flipper+

31 Jan 2018

Flipper+ By Evan, Abhi, and Janavi

Task: Build a new glyph scoring system

As the season wears on, the robot game looms over Iron Reign since the bot we built scores only a fifth of the world record. To lessen the gap, we continue to invest in the flipper system I contrived earlier on in the season. As of late, we’ve furthered the project by building a chassis for it to rest in. It’s a slightly modified version of the one on the current robot because we want to still keep the lovely mecanum wheel drive for that extra mobility. We’ve had one major hiccup that has slowed progress which is that the spare set of mecanum wheels we have are all too thick. It turns out there’s about a centimeter of extra wheel depthwise, and this has made us have to try and refit the chassis to accommodate the discrepancy. We're going to rearrange the frame to fit the wheels.

The first thing we did when trying to design the new chassis to go around the flipper system was to arrange the different components of the flipper onto the base where they would go in the future. We were able to secure the intake system I designed a while back to the part where it would suck up the blocks. Then we started to rearrange the supports that are used to keep the robot base square to different places around the robot where they wouldn’t interfere with the flipper and instead utilize the space that would be under the flipper board.

To give the required room the flipper needs, we’ll have to rig the motors upward, so they won’t take up space in the center of the robot. Doing this will require gearing it in a one to one ratio, then allowing those to be connected to other gears what are then chained to the larger mecanum wheels. This is a necessary part of the design because there’s not many other places we can put the motors that won’t collide with another function of the robot. Since the last competition, I’ve been assisted by numerous members such as Ahbi and Janavi in the quest for a high performing robot, and it wouldn’t be as far as it is without them. The flipper has potential, and we're going to push it towards its full.

Building a new chassis

03 Feb 2018

Building a new chassis By Karina and Janavi

Task:

Janavi and I have started to build a new chassis for Kraken 2.0., modelled after Kraken’s current chassis.

First, we had to measure the chassis of Kraken, then cut REV rails to these measurements. Lastly, we assembled the pieces to look as it does above.

With this being the first build project Janavi and I have taken the lead on, we had to have some help from the more experienced builders on our team: Evan and Austin. The most difficult task we came across was having to figure out at which angle to cut the REV rails to fit diagonally on the main frame of our new chassis. After we found this measurement, it was easy cutting the pieces using the miter saw and safety equipment and then we assemble all the REV rails with handy-dandy brackets.

Our current plan is to use this chassis as a base for our fifth generation grabber system. Going forward, we have to figure out how we are going to mount our conveyor belt onto our chassis, and then how to mount grabber arms onto the conveyor belt. We also have a new set of mecanum wheels which we are going to attach to the chassis. However, it came to our attention that they are thicker, so we will have to adjust the rails that run parallel to one another so that the wheels can fit in between.

Normally during the season the build team, the programming team and the drive team all need the robot and this can be difficult. Often times this can hinder our performance since the drive team doesn't get the practice it needs. Therefore the team decided to build a new chassis because having a second base will enable us to dedicate more time to drive practice with Kraken while simultaneously testing out new designs on what will be our second robot. Additionally, having two robots will allow to choose which robot we will take to competition based on performance.

Conveyor Belt V2

03 Feb 2018

Conveyor Belt V2 By Abhi

Task: Develop Conveyor System 2

After analyzing the lack of speed from our last competition, we decided to continue the journey of attaching the gripper arms to a conveyor belt as previously designed. To do so, we realized that we needed to utilize the REVolution system to make the grippers work better. Also, we needed two points of attachment for our robot after seeing that one didn't work with the first version of the conveyor. To figure out how to do all this, we went to our best tool: Creo Parametric.

The assembly began with an assembly of two REV rails through distance and coincident constraints. To this, we mounted two bearing holders with bearings inside on either side of the bars. Inside, the plugs holding the REV rails were attached with coincident constraints. This combined assembly was added to the final assembly and was set with a default constraint. To the inside of the plugs, REV rails were attached using coincident constraints. Next, a copy of the bearing assembly was added and attached to the REV rails attached to bearings.

For the next part of the assembly, we had to make a couple of subassemblies. First, we attached a Sprocket hub that we custom designed for the REVolution system and attached it to a 35 Sprocket from Andymark. The other end was plugged into another hub. This sub-assembly was replicated 4 times so that it could fit on all of the conveyor belt pieces. Also, we had to make a similar subassembly for the 25 sprockets since those are what our motors were designed to do.

Finally, we mounted two motors on the insides of the REV rails. The sprocket attached to this motor would connect to the REV rails so that the whole system could actuate. This was constrained using coincidence.

Next steps...

We really liked how this model turned out. By starting to build it based on the model, we realized how useful Creo is to our design process. We hope to use it again soon for determining how to mount the grabber arms to the belt system.

Robot Drive Team

03 Feb 2018

Robot Drive Team By Charlotte, Tycho, Karina, and Evan

Task: Build a solid drive team.

One of the leading problems Iron Reign faces is our ability to allot time to effective driving practice. Driving practice is essential for our success in the robot game, but it is sometimes difficult to find time to practice due to other team members working on various robot improvements. We have created two different drive teams, a main team and a backup team, so that despite who is available at meeting we can always have some kind of drive practice going on. The bulk of the time spent in driving practice is spent practicing putting glyphs in the cryptobox, trying to better our previous time and complete as many columns as we can. We focus on performing and scoring timed runs, and sometimes when our sister team 3734 is available, we scrimmage our robots against each other. Another smaller, yet equally essential, part of drive practice is setting up the robot in the correct orientation for every situation and running our autonomous. It is important that we make all of our mistakes during practice, so that when it is time to compete we run autonomous perfectly every time. The main challenges we face in driving practice is consistency in filling the cryptobox, adjusting to significant robot design changes, and our time management (actually finding the time to get in good practice).

In the future, the drive team is going to meet more often and hold more efficient practices. Our main goal is to significantly decrease the time that it takes to fill the cryptobox, and to accomplish this we will need to clock in many hours so that we are very comfortable in driving the robot. Ideally, any error that might occur during competition will be mechanical errors that are out of the drivers' control. We have improved a lot, but we still have a long way to go.

Meeting Log

03 Feb 2018

Meeting Log February 03, 2018 By Ethan, Kenna, Charlotte, Karina, Janavi, Evan, Tycho, Abhi, and Austin

Meeting Log February 03, 2018

This is the last Saturday meeting before the tournament. We have to finish bringing the engineering journal up to date, as well as work on the presentation.

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Update blog posts
  • Finish poster

Build / Modelling

  • Update 3D Model

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AllPlanning Meeting2:10pm.25
AllFinish past-due blog posts2:004

Designing a Poster

03 Feb 2018

Designing a Poster By Ethan

Task: Design a poster to tell Iron Reign's story

Our presentations to the judges usually turn out well. However, looking back at the last tournament's awards, we could've performed way better. To get a better chance at Inspire, we really need to get 2nd place in every other award, and in the last tournament, we got 3rd, and really only got the Inspire Award just because the other major team already got the 1st Inspire in another tournament. So, our number-one priority is to better communicate our timeline, story, and information to the judges. While a good portion of this is journal improvements and presentation improvements, we hope to further communicate our story to the judges by providing a visual representation of our story through the timeline.

Further Updates to the Engineering Plan

03 Feb 2018

Further Updates to the Engineering Plan By Ethan

Task: Update the Strategic Plan for North Texas Regionals

Download the full, updated plan here.

Beyond superficial changes, we hadn't done much else to the Strategic/Business plan since it was written. So, in order to not look like idiots when we give it to the judges, we had to update it.

What we did:

  • Added section about testing materials
  • Added section about new design changes
  • Updated list of sponsors
  • Updated list of outreach events
  • Updated strategy section
  • Updated building strategies
  • Updated 3-D modelling section

What we need to do:

  • Expand code section
  • Talk about REVolution
  • Expand build and outreach section

Control Award Updates

06 Feb 2018

Control Award Updates By Janavi

Task:

In the past few months we've made a lot of improvements and updates to our robot and code. For example, we changed our gripper system again; it now includes an internal which makes it easier to despite out collected glyphs into the cryptobox. So we have decided to update our control award submission to reflect these changes.

Autonomous Objective:

  1. Knock off opponent's Jewel, place glyphs in correct location based on image, park in safe zone (85 pts)
  2. Park in Zone, place glyph in cryptobox (25 pts)

Autonomous B has the ability to be delayed for a certain amount of time, allowing for better coordination with alliance mates. If our partner team is more reliable, we can give them freedom to move, but still add points to our team score.

Sensors Used

  1. Phone Camera - Allows robot to determine where to place glyphs using Vuforia, taking advantage of the wide range of data provided from the pattern detection, as well as using Open Computer Vision (OpenCV) to analyze the pattern of the image.
  2. Color Sensor - Robot selects correct jewel using the passive mode of the sensor. Feedback determines whether the robot needs to move forwards or backwards to knock off opposing team's jewel.
  3. Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) - 3 Gyroscopes and Accelerometers return robot’s heading for station keeping and straight-line driving in autonomous, while orienting ourselves to specific headings for proper navigation, crypt placing, and balancing.
  4. Motor Encoders - Returned motor odometry tracks how many rotations the wheels have made and converts into meters travelled. In combination with feedback from the IMU, can calculate location on the field relative to starting point.

Key Algorithms:

  1. Integrate motor odometry, IMU gyroscope, and accelerometer with trigonometry so robot knows its location at all times.
  2. Uses Proportional/Integral/Derivative (PID) combined with IMU readouts to maintain heading, corrects any differences between actual and desired heading at power level appropriate for difference and amount of error built up. Allows us to navigate the field accurately during autonomous.
  3. Vuforia to tracks and maintains distance from patterns on wall based on robot controller phone's camera, and combines 2 machine vision libraries, trigonometry, and PID motion control.
  4. All code is non-blocking, allowing multiple operations to happen at the same time. Extensively use state machines to prevent conflicts over priorities in low-level behaviors.

Driver Controlled Enhancements:

  1. Internal Lift System is a conveyor-belt-like system that moves blocks from the bottom the grippers to the top and makes it easier for the drivers to deposit the glyphs in the cryptobox.
  2. If the lift has been raised, jewel arm movement is blocked to avoid a collision.
  3. The robot's slow mode allows our drivers to accurately maneuver around the field as well as gather glyphs easily and accurately.
  4. The robot also has a turbo mode. This speed is activated when the bumper is pressed, allowing the driver to quickly navigate the field.
Autonomous Field

Relic Recovery

07 Feb 2018

Relic Recovery By Abhi

Task:Develop a relic arm

Now that we had developed a glyph game and a stable autonomous, it has come time for Iron Reign to conquer the true challenge of the 2017-2018 competition: Relic Recovery.

After seeing that many record setting teams have built "dump truck" robots that can fill both cryptoboxes with incredible speed and accuracy, we realized that if we developed an accurate relic arm, such teams would ally with us and our alliance would be able to maximize the RR score. At the start of the season, we prototyped this project a little but in the intensive time dedicated to the grabber, the prototype was left to rust. When I picked it up again, I realized a drawer slide system would be heavy and not preferable due to its unwieldy mounting. While the discussion continues on what the release mechanism of the arm should be, we developed a CAD model of the relic arm itself, as seen above.

The primary components of the arm are a TETRIX plate and small aluminum bar. The aluminum bar is made of the same material as the Jewel Thief. This bar is attached to a servo sticking at the end of the arm which can move to close in on the relic. The red material is a rubbery material we hope to use for better traction of the relic. We are considering the same silicone material as seen on grabber arms v2

Next steps

We hope to prototype this and place it on the robot as soon as possible (maybe in time for our regional tournaments). This would make us a good alliance partner for other teams so we are working hard to making this model a reality.

Designing Grabber V. 4.5

08 Feb 2018

Designing Grabber V. 4.5 By Ethan, Evan, and Austin

Task: Build an Updated Grabber System

So, we probably won't finish both the Grabber V.5 and the Flipper designs by the North Texas Regional this Saturday, but we really need to improve our grabber system so that we have a chance of doing well in the robot game. From our last post-mortem, we decided that while our grabber performed *well*, it obviously could have been better. So, in comes our new design.

Our main problems with our last grabber were twofold. First, our internal conveyor belt did not work as well as we had hoped. The point was to deliver blocks to the upper areas of the grabber, and it wasn't really doing that. The first cause of this was that it wasn't catching the block in the first place, as we had designed the internal lift too high off the ground to catch. The second issue occured when the block happened to be in the lift system. It was supposed to stay in place due to friction, and to have friction of an effective magnitude, the normal force must be reciprocated. And, ours wasn't, as the only thing that the block was able to push off of was the rubber mesh we designed, which had a high coeffiecient of friction, but not the rigidity needed so that the normal force was reciprocated 100%. So, so solve that, we installed a backer plate behind the mesh that the block can push off of, which has a higher reciproccal force than before. A final, more minor problem was that the block weren't always staying in the lift at the top, so we designed new Octopuckers to both push them in, and damage the glyphs less.

Part 2

Our eventual intention is to do away with this system, and move on to the v5 system which carries the blocks over the robot entirely, but for now, this should do.

Last Minute Robot Fixes

09 Feb 2018

Last Minute Robot Fixes By Ethan and Evan

Task: Add last-minute design changes to the robot

It was a temperate night. The waning moon shone overhead, a blazing reminder of the continuity of time, for as the moon dipped lower in the sky, our precious little time until the tournament dripped away. Under this oppressive, singular symbol, we labored, trying to outpace the continual march of time.

Over the past week, we had worked tirelessly on the robot. In Wylie, we had used the Octopucker Gripper System, but it didn't perform to our expectations, as the internal lift didn't work. However, in this week, we fixed that issue, and designed the Gripper 4.5, which can be found here. Now, all that was left was to actually attach this new gripper.

At 9PM, things were already going downhill. Apparently, "people have to sleep" or "the team should be well rested for the tournament", so we watched our members drip out the door, one by one, until only us two were left. The task still remained - attach the gripper to the robot. From the get-go, we experienced problems, most prominently that since we had extended the height of our grabber, our phone now stuck out of the 18x18x18 sizing box. Now, we as a team already have significant experience just *barely* passing the sizing cube requirements - before this, our robot was 17.5x17.96875x17, in width, length, and height respectively - so we had certain tricks to get our robot just under it. However, this time, our phone stuck a solid inch outside of the cube, so there was no reconfiguration with the parts attached to the grabber at the time that would allow us to fix this.

So, with traditional Iron Reign ingenuity,we had to devise a solution to our problem. In the words of of the legendary Lil Darsh', "First you gotta analyze\see the problem\conceptualize so you can solve 'em". And, we must follow in the words of our elders, as all good robotics members do. So, we devised these ways to fix our phone problem:

  • Position the phone under the grabber system
  • No, vision was hampered too much in this position.
  • Position the phone on another side of the robot
  • No, this autonomous would be too slow, as the robot would have to turn to locate blocks
  • Attach the phone to a servo, which then moves off the grabber after autonomous
  • This may have been the dumbest and the most difficult solution, but it was the best for our robot
So, we set out to create a moveable phone-mounting system. First, we designed the servo.

The next issue was attaching it. We had to find a position that could view the blocks, pattern, and cryptobox from the same angle. We ended up positioning the phone right in the middle of the grabber, about here.

Next Steps:

In our postmortem, we will talk about the issues caused by these last-minute changes.

North Texas Regionals, 2018

10 Feb 2018

North Texas Regionals, 2018 By Ethan, Evan, Abhi, Tycho, Janavi, Charlotte, Austin, Karina, and Kenna

Task: Win at the North Texas Regionals

Introduction
All over the city, lights turned on. In each house, a member departed, on their way to a secretive location, Iron Reign headquarters. Each member entered the HQ, took a parcel, and boarded the equally secretive Iron Reign Mystery Bus, on our way to an even more undisclosed location, the North Texas Regional, at Wylie East Highschool.

Inspection
For the first time this season, Iron Reign breezed through inspection. There were no issues with sizing, we had all of our signs and warnings attached, everything was good. It was so good that there's not really anything left to say.

Presentation
Earlier this week, we practiced our presentation with our new SEM principal, and did a pretty decent run. We still had issues, i.e. running overtime & switching off between parts, but it still impressed our principal. However, we wanted to do better. We had a brainstorming sesssion and talked with past judges, and found that if you make your presentation a little more enertaining while still keeping the necessary information, your presentation will stick in the judges' head for longer. So, that's what we did. We added pieces that improve it just a little, some informative (juggling balls representing the engineering process), and some for our sake (miming being trapped in Iron Reign for 9 years). But, these changes definitely paid off. As well, we fixed our timing, leaving 3 minutes for questions, and fixed some gaps. However, we still did stutter and stumble a bit, but the overall quality of our presentation outshined our mistakes.

Scouting

Robot Game
While we spent all night adding parts and doing mechanical fixes, we should have also spent time fixing our code due to these changes. But, we didn't, so we spent the first three matches trying to debug our code and fix unexpected mechanical issues with the grabber.
Match 1
We lost this match. We hadn't practiced with the new gripper, and on top of that, the Octopuckers 3.0 didn't perform as well as we expected, resulting in a disappointing loss that we really shouldn't have.
Match 11
We also lost this match, most of our code issues were fixed, but we encountered an unexpected mechanical issue with our grabber - it caught on a small piece of plastic that stopped it from engaging fully.
Match 14
We had everything working in this match, but we were simply outperformed. This match really served to show us that we needed to improve in all aspects of the game.
Match 23
We won this match! We were pretty dejected over the past results, but our drivers strapped up and give us the W.
Match 27
We also won this match by a large margin, due to our great performance, and also due to a robot on the other alliance not working.
There are those times where everything seems to fall in place just perfectly, and this was one of those times. We had really good scouting, and we were able to worm our way into alliance with the 4th seed, allowing us into the semifinals. This helped give us the boost we needed for awards.
Semi Match 1&2
We lost, badly. We were simply outperformed, and this taught us we need to improve.

Ceremony
We walked into the ceremony uncertain. We had done well in judging, but we were iffy with our performance in the robot game, and thought that our performance had cancelled out any benefits of the Think and Innovate awards. However, we were able to show our design and engineering process well in additional questions, and the judges seemed pleased with the answers. As well, we answered a question about gracious professionalism that really impressed the judges. In the ceremony, we were awarded several small awards, and the 1st place Connect, but we needed a higher award to advance. Then, we heard 2nd place Inspire...goes to team 6832!

Meeting With Mr.Palacios

14 Feb 2018

Meeting With Mr.Palacios By Janavi, Charlotte, Ethan, Evan, Abhi, Austin, Tycho, Karina, and Kenna

Task:

At the end of last semester our principal, Ms.Hewitt was promoted to the ED of our feeder pattern. This semester we got the opportunity to meet our new principle, Mr.Palacios. He previously served as the Academy, Science & Foreign Language Department Administrator at Hillcrest High School, and was interested in learning more about SEM and what our students did to contribute to the school. We wanted to show him SEMs Robotics program ,so Iron Reign arranged a meeting with him. During the meeting we planned to give him a presentation much like the one we give to judges. We changed up the presentation a little by adding the FTC competition video to introduce him to the competition and give him a little background about what First is.

Presentation Notes:

Mr. Palacios said he enjoyed our presentation and it gave him a good insight into Robotics, in the past he has not worked with Robotics and our presentation showed him that in First Robotics goes much deeper than just building a robot and competing with it, First is also about giving back to the community and promoting STEM. He plans to follow up with us to see our progress in the following months, and has been following up with our team members individually in the hallways or whenever he sees us.

North Texas Regionals 2018 Postmortem

14 Feb 2018

North Texas Regionals 2018 Postmortem By Charlotte, Ethan, Tycho, Austin, Janavi, Abhi, Karina, Kenna, and Evan

Task: Reflect on The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of our performance at North Texas Regionals

Preparation

Strengths
Some of our team members put in a lot of hours of work the night before the competition and we were able to successfully prepare the robot for the robot games.

Weaknesses
Though it proved very necessary, the fact that people had to pull an all-nighter before the competition shows that we have a long way to go before we have perfected our preparation strategy. We need to work on limiting our last minute robot changes/focus more on the robot in the weeks before the competition instead of the hours. Also, with any changes we make we need to make sure that we are able to practice driving with them.

Opportunities
In the future, we must take advantage of after school practices in the weeks leading up to the competition,as we historically can't accomplish everything solely on Saturday practices.

Threats
There is a threat of laziness and the lack of high priority in the weeks leading up to higher level competitions. We must work hard not only on the night before the competition, but in the days and weeks leading up to it. There is a huge threat of time crunch.

Judging

Strengths
In the presentation room we had more of an air of enthusiasm than in our previous presentations, and while we can always have more energy, it was a step in the right direction. We got a sheer mass of information out in our allotted time and did so effectively. It was evident in the fact that we won 2nd Inspire and 1st Connect that we were successful in bringing our point across.

Weaknesses
We still have the problem of coming off as inactive or lethargic in the pits. It didn't help this time that some of us were running on a very small amount of sleep. During the presentation itself we ran overtime, as we always do, and barely left any time for questions. Also, in our time crunch we didn't get to show the full demo of our robot, which is obviously a very important aspect of the presentation.

Opportunities
We can practice our presentation to make our transitions smoother and our content more concise so that we can relay all of the information that we strive to.

Robot Performance

Strengths
After our losses, our robot started to perform a lot better and won a couple of matches. While the grabber system could perform better, this competition was a good opportunity to see what works and what doesn't.

Weaknesses
We lost our first three matches due to our lift not being completely tested and fixed. It got caught on the robot, stopped lifting, and had other performance issues early on in the competition. We had to do a complete replacement of the grabber, so there were still some parts that were not completely secure; we had to make many last minute and between match fixes.

Opportunities
We were able to prove that grabber v.5 works! And now we can move on and make additional improvement so that we can truly bring forward our robot game during supers. We are using our current model (the model from the competition) and working on mounting it to a conveyor belt to flip to either side of the robot. This competition proved the ability of the grabber and opened up the opportunity to make additional modifications with it.

Scouting

Strengths
This competition we were able to talk to other team throughout the day and form connections, that way even though we were in 13th place by the end of the competition we were able to explain that we lost our first three due to some minor changes but we won our last two games because we finally got our robot to work. This helped us get into the semifinals as part of the fourth place alliance.

Weaknesses
We need to make sure teams can follow up on their claims because some teams frankly just exaggerated when asked about their robot. We also need to take more photos for blog posts and the presentation. We needed to do more scouting this competition, while we were able to talk to teams we didn't do a very good job in keeping up with a spreadsheet of all of our data that meant by the end when we were trying to see what teams to talk to we had a hard time remember their stats or much about their robot.

Opportunities
We need to have better accounts of the matches, and we need to watch other teams' matches through doing this we can keep an accurate spreadsheet and know what each team is truly capable of.

Oklahoma Regionals, 2018

17 Feb 2018

Oklahoma Regionals, 2018 By Ethan, Evan, Janavi, Charlotte, Abhi, Tycho, Austin, Karina, Kenna, Shaggy, and Justin

Task: Compete at the Oklahoma Regional

In November, we went to a Oklahoman qualifier in Mustang. The reason for this was purely strategic - by competing in multiple regions, we have more chances of advancing, as well as having more in-tournament experience overall. There, we got 2nd-place Inspire and advanced to the Oklahoma Regionals. Then, when we came back to Dallas, we ended up advancing to the North Texas Regionals as well, on Inspire 1st place. Then, North Texas Regionals happened to occur before Oklahoma, and we advanced there with 2nd place Inspire. Finally, we had the Oklahoman Regional. Since we'd already won a regional, this tournament proved as a testing ground for robot, presentation, and strategy changes.

Inspection

Again, we went through inspection with ease. We really hope that this will be a continuing trend because this gives us *way* more time for practice, and this helped with our performance in the game.

Presentation

The presentation...oh man. The presentation is usually the high point of Iron Reign's day, and we forgot the Engineering Journal. That's right, the one thing that allows us to get awards, our main advancement strategy. So, we panicked. Mrc. Lux was still in Texas, and theoretically would be able to get us the Journal, but we didn't want to hedge all our bets on that. So, we bought an entire printer from Walmart™ so that we could print if she was too far out by 4:30. But, luckily, she got there in time, and we didnt have to print approx. 400 pages.
Besides forgetting our engineering journal, we had other issues to deal with. We recently took on three new members from our sister team, team 3734 Imperial Robotics, and two of them had to learn parts in our presentation for Oklahoma. As well, we added new lines to the presentation to talk about our connections with outreach and mentors.
Despite all this, our presentation went really well. Our judging panel interrupted us to ask questions, which threw us off a bit, but we were able to persevere through that and pull off a good presentation.

Robot Game

We were hoping to have our new gripper system installed in time for Oklahoma, but it fell through the cracks. So, we had to reinstall our old gripper, but other than that, we made few changes to the robot.

Match 5
We won this match, 237-230. Our autonomous performed extremely well, and together with a partner, we were able to beat most teams.
Match 20
We won this match, 154-148, even though we thought we lost. It all hinged on whether our balancing stone was counted or not, but it barely was.
Match 28
We lost this match, 139-154. The only way we could have won this match was to improve our teleop performance and gripper system.
Match 37
We won this match, 133-90. We were about evenly matched, but our alliance had better performing autonomii than the opposing teams.
Match 45
We won this match, 349-54. We did everything right, as well as our partner team, and our opponents just happened to underperform that round.
Match 51
We won this match 233-187. We didn't think that we'd win this one from the get-go, but we managed to skate by with two relics being placed.
Match 65
We lost this match, 196-273. We were obviously outclasses and this match demonstrated our need for a better teleop strategy.

Ceremony

Even though we performed decently in the robot game, we didn't communicate well with some of the groups of roving judges, so we were unsure about how we'd do in awards. We ended up with a 1st Connect and a 3rd Inspire, as well as a few other award mentions.

Next Steps:

OK Regional Keychains

17 Feb 2018

OK Regional Keychains By Kenna, Ethan, Charlotte, Austin, and Evan

Task:

We came to the Oklahoma Regional woefully unprepared for the amount of stuff other teams would give out. As soon as we arrived, we received every trinket imaginable. There were keychains, pins, 3D-printed symbols, business cards, patches, and tons of other creative designs. Luckily, the MXP was there and had 4 3D printers on board. Normally, we use them to print out keychains for kids during our outreach in Dallas, but this time it was for our own use. We whipped up a quick design on SketchUP and started printing. The design wasn't especially memorable (something we want to improve on for Supers), but it was nice to have something to give out to passing teams.

Tycho also enjoyed our efforts (the red things are all keychains). We printed throughout the entire day since we hadn't come with any. It added a bit of stress to the whole day, which we could have done without.

For Superregionals, our goal is to come prepared with a creative keychain or card. Janavi and Kenna have already started working on a few designs to use to connect with other teams. We're very excited to see what all the other teams have at Supers.

Intake Stars

18 Feb 2018

Intake Stars By Tycho

Task: Improve the functionality of the gripper

Our grabber is good, but it isn't achieving 100% of the potential it could. One thing we're doing is creating the Grabber V.5 previously blogged about, but we also want to increase the speed of the grabber in other ways, in order to get every single bit of performance out of our robot, since we want to really impress at Supers. So, we designed star-grabbers. The purpose of these are twofold. First, the unique star design we made allows the gripper to fish single blocks out of a pile of blocks so that we no longer have to fully align ourselves with blocks, which reduces the time we spend retrieving blocks. As well, these grab blocks more securely.

Next Steps:

The next step is to mount the modified grabber system with the stars on the newer Kraken chassis.

Preparing for South Super Regionals

18 Feb 2018

Preparing for South Super Regionals By Ethan

Task: Prepare for the South Super Regionals in Athens, Georgia

We currently have a bit over two weeks to get ready for the South Super Regionals, and we're not quite ready. Actually, if we want to get competition-ready, we've got a long way to go. From prior experience, we're currently 55% on awards and 45% on robot game for advancement, but we want to get both to 60-70+%. So, we created a list so that we could break our workload down into discrete tasks.

Engineering Journal

  • North Texas Regionals PostMortem
  • OK Regionals Play-by-Play
  • OK Regionals PostMortem
  • Meta-PostMortem
  • Reindex Journal
  • Super Regionals Packing List

Business

  • Talk to AWC for Sponsorship

Build

Relic Arm
  • 3D Model
  • Code
  • Improve Gripper
  • Posts
Octopuckers
  • Print Latest Design
  • Next Design\Post
  • Print Old Versions
Gripper
  • Space Attachment Links
  • Test Code
  • Phone Mount
  • Posts for Above
  • Mount Pulley Clips
  • Star Intake/Post
  • Update to V5
  • Extend Internal Lift
  • Bottom-Mounted Jewel Thief
  • Posts

Code

  • Automate Balancing
  • Auto-Column w/ Vuforia
  • Cryptobox Alignment w/ Vuforia
  • Posts

Organizational

  • Clean RoboDojo
  • Clean MXP
  • Design Pit
  • Make List of Pit Items
  • Design Posters

Next Steps:

As you can see, we've got a lot to do, but I'm confident we'll finish a majority of these items.

Grabber V5. Diagrams and Pictures

19 Feb 2018

Grabber V5. Diagrams and Pictures By Austin

Task: Implement the new grabber system and record how it works

So, we've been talking about our new gripper system for a while - we've made prior 3D models and started it, hoping that we'd have it done by the Oklahoma Regional, since that was sort of a low stakes tournament for us. Unfortunately, we didn't get it just in time, so we had to go back to the basic Kraken model of our robot. We really don't want to repeat this mistake again, so we're doing a last-minute drive towards adding V5 to the robot.

First we had to build a new base, in case we had to suddenly revert back to the old bot. We've detailed that in the Building a Chassis post. Next, we had to make the design. We wanted something with more versatility than the static up-down gripper system, and looked at the flipper that our sister team had designed for inspiration. However, we didn't want to give up the whole design process that we'd used for the gripper. We decided on a comprimise, a gripper-flipper system that would intake blocks on either side of the robot, but then had the capability to flip over the entire robot and deposit blocks.

First, we made a model in Creo to see how we would get the gripper to be mobile over the entireity of the robot. This system continued to use the REVolution system that we'd previously designed. Described, the design was a gripepr system hooked to two chains which in turn moved the gripper system from one side to another. The default configuration is to let the gripper rest on top of the rotation system in order to relive stress on the chains.

Next Steps:

Next, we need to hook all of this up onto the robot and test them - we don't have much time, so we've got to act fast.

Designing our Wheel Mounts

20 Feb 2018

Designing our Wheel Mounts By Tycho

Recall the discussion and design strategy regarding our wheel mounts

The side shield design process involved much thought and discussion. We have experienced difficulty with the wheel mounts we have been using, which are the ones from last year. These are made of a composite of nylon and aluminum, but they are too thick and consume a lot of space on our already large robot. Also, the our new Mecanum wheels are thicker than before, so it was about time that we use a thinner material that is just as strong. We decided to use 1/8th inch thick 6061-T6 aluminum plate. We then designed the mounts in such a way that the axles of both of the wheels on a side are joined to increase the stiffness of our robot.

In the beginning of the season, we noticed that the Mecanum wheels would damage glyphs, so we designed shields to protect that from occuring. In this design we also had to protect against glyph damage, so the lower circular areas cover the Mecanums, and there is an indent in the bottom between the two wheels so the mounts don’t get in the way of parking on the balancing stones. Additionally, the middle region is thinner so we can move the mounting regions of the robot inward if need be due to sizing restraints or if we change intake design.

Beyond mounting the wheels, we decided to extend the design into the upper region of our robot as attachment support for the relic arm that we are currently building. In this upper region, we decided to incorporate a unique design based on the name we chose for our robot earlier in the season, “Kraken.” The choice of this name came from the “octopluckers” we designed and use in our intake system. Often, teams will make circular or triangular cutouts to remove weight for the robot, but to remain consistent with a design motif, the cutouts we made show silhouettes of tentacles, like a Kraken.

Making our design a reality

Now that we have a completed design, we intend to schedule a meeting with Advanced Waterjet Cutting to discuss the possibility of them cutting out our design for us. We have incorporated tolerance for a waterjet machine so after sending our design to them they can put it right on one of their machines. Hopefully we can also share our robot and our Mobile Learning Lab with them.

Revolution Flyer

22 Feb 2018

Revolution Flyer By Tycho

Task: Create a flyer for our Revolution system

We've talked to REV before about our unique REVolution system that we've detailed in other posts, but for those who are unaware, its a system that we've personally designed to turn REV extrusions into axles, which enable us to have more flexibility in design. But now, we've designed a flyer to get people on board with the system.







Relic Arm V2

22 Feb 2018

Relic Arm V2 By Abhi and Christian

Task: Revise Relic Arm

As were continuing development of the relic arm, we realized we needed to make several modifications. That resulted in the following design.

This demonstrates the latest version of the relic recovery arm. You may be saying "WOaH that doesn't fit in sizing cube!" Good news: The servo in the middle folds out the second part of the arm to that the entire mechanism fits in the sizing cube but can extend to reach over the field perimeter to zone three.

One modification we made from the previous version is the grabber itself, pictured below

We realized that the long TETRIX plate from before wasn't exactly the most efficient tool as a grabber. Though we will eventually design a claw for the relic, we temporarily decided to use two small aluminum pieces.

One final new addition we made was the servo on which all of this lies on.

We added a servo mounted upwards in the last stage of the arm. This makes the arm swing out from the top of the robot, allowing for a rotating degree of freedom when perfecting the relic placement.

Next Steps:

As stated previously, we will need to design the relic claw. Doing this will allow us to get better grip of the relic.

Meeting with Advanced Waterjet Cutting

22 Feb 2018

Meeting with Advanced Waterjet Cutting By Tycho and Austin

Advanced Waterjet Cutting

Today we visited the Advanced Waterjet Cutting office and spoke to Sal Copado and Chris regarding our side shield designs. We had called a couple days in advance to set up this meeting, and we brought both our robot and our Mobile Learning Lab to demo. They were impressed by our work and were happy to support a local team competing at the Supers level. Sal agreed to cut out the side shields for our robot, though because of their heavy work backlog, they said that the side shields would not be complete until next Wednesday. While this is before Supers, we decided to go to the Dallas Makerspace to laser cut the design out of high density fiberboard so that we can start assembly based on the new design during our Saturday meeting and the following evenings. These cut-outs are pictured below.

After the demo of our robot, we discussed the design of the side shields. At first they assumed that we needed assistance in putting together the design, but we had already prepared a design and had it ready for the meeting. After having a look at it, they identified a mistake that we had made. We are used to designing files for manufacturing - mostly on our 3D printer. We typically include machine adjustments into our designs so we can upload them right to the machines. For example we adjust our designs to compensate for 1st layer spreading or for material expansion into small holes. In designing our side shields for waterjet machines, we figured out the kerf we needed to work with and made adjustments accordingly. They saw this and said that there was no need for these adjustments, as they recommend that they make those adjustments themselves due to the variance in kerf for the different machines they use. They can cut industrial sized parts with either their waterjet or their laser for finer tolerances. We told them we wanted them cut out of 1/8" thick 6061-T6 aluminum and they confirmed that this was a good choice. The final files we sent them include designs for our side shields, mounting plates for our new 6in Mechanum wheels, and internal wheel mounts. We're basically covering the cost of the material and they are covering all other expenses.

Next Steps

We hope to pick up the new parts next Wednesday and get them on the robot that evening. We would also like to return with the full team to AWC and get a tour of their manufacturing facilities and machine shop. But we'll need to look for a student holiday to get that done since we're always at school during their opening hours. We'd also like to show them the updated robot and see if they have any ideas for further improvements.

Oklahoma State Regionals 2018 Postmortem

24 Feb 2018

Oklahoma State Regionals 2018 Postmortem By Charlotte, Ethan, Tycho, Austin, Janavi, Abhi, Karina, Kenna, and Evan

Task: Evaluate our strengths and downfalls at Oklahoma State Regionals

It wasn't a great regional, but it wasn't a bad one either, it was an OK Regional.

Preparation

Strengths
Because we had already been to North Texas Regionals, we were one step ahead of the teams in OK that hadn’t been to a regional yet this year in that sense. We already had everything in some sort of order from North Texas, so we were prepared for the challenges we know we will encounter at a competition at the regional level.

Weaknesses
We left the engineering journal in Dallas. If it weren’t for our chaperone, we would have had to re-print all 300-400 pages of our engineering journal in Oklahoma. This is the worst example of us not following the checklist when packing up our vehicle. Also, we left polycarbonate, so we had to go to Walmart and use the lid of a plastic box for the polycarb pieces on our robot that needed replacement. Because we had already qualified, we were not as serious in our preparations as we could have been, and that cost us in the robot game.

Opportunities
In this competition, we 3D printed keychains to hand out to teams (pictured below). We started this process a couple of hours before the competition, so we only had enough to hand out to our alliance partners. A lot of teams also had extravagant pit setups, so during Super Regionals we should strive to set ourselves apart in the pits, especially since a large part of judging occurs in the pits.

Threats
As always, a large threat is lack of urgency for the competition in the days leading up to it. We only had one week to prepare and we will only have two weeks to prepare for Supers, so our head has really got to be in the game in the days leading up to it.

Judging

Strengths
In the presentation room, there was a great environment and our presentation flowed more as a conversation than a lecture. The judges were curious about some of our accomplishments, like our REVolution system and the RV, and interrupted us during the presentation to ask questions. This made us feel more relaxed and the presentation ran very smoothly. Unlike last time, we had enough time to demo the robot and show off its capabilities. Also, a lot of judges visited our pit and we were able to show many of them to our Mobile Tech Lab.

Weaknesses
We didn't mention to the judges that we have already qualified, which would have been helpful for us as we won't have been seen as a threat to Oklahoma teams. Also, we added many parts to the presentation on the day of judging, so we were less practiced on those parts.

Opportunities
Now we have the opportunity to refine the parts that we added to the presentation so that it flows smoothly with no awkward breaks.

Robot Performance

Strengths
Our autonomous is where we do best during matches, especially the jewel portion which we did successfully every match. When it worked, the internal lift was helpful in making out game and although we didn't score a lot of glyphs, we were consistent in getting 1.5 columns every time. With practice we could continue that consistency but with more columns.

Weaknesses
Our robot performed decently, but the grabber was slow and we never got more than 1.5 columns. The internal lift broke many times throughout the day. Because we changed the grabber recently, we mounted the phone in a position that it can't read the target so that it places the glyph in the correct column and didn't have time to fix it. Also, we were one of the few teams without a relic arm which I think hurt us in both our success in matches and in not getting picked for an alliance. We won all of our matches except for one, but that was mostly due to luck which we can't count on at Supers.

Opportunities
Our grabber system is now at v.5, which is the old lift (the one we used in OK) but on a conveyor belt system that flips it to either side of the robot. We think that this grabber is going to be our best and hopefully, paired with a lot of drive practice, is going to significantly improve our robot game.

Threats
The robot game was strong in Oklahoma. There were many teams that had working relic arms and we witnessed the 3rd highest score in a game this year. It will be even stronger in Super Regionals, so in order to qualify for worlds we need to really up our robot game while maintaining our potential for awards.

Scouting

Strengths
We were able to make some connections with teams that we are going to see in Georgia for Super Regionals and further practice our communication with other teams.

Weaknesses
We did a poor job in advertising our robot to other teams and were not picked for alliances despite our decently high ranking after the qualifying matches (12th place). We have had a lower ranking and been picked before, so we need to start scouting earlier in the games and form connections with competitive teams so we have a chance to get picked.

Opportunities
For Supers, we are going to prepare handouts, like flyers, keychains, and pins to give to the other teams and make our name known. Also, at this point in the season there is a lot of data for each team, so we can get a lot of the scouting done before the competition. We can also prepare our spreadsheets or whatever method we choose to use to get information from the teams at the competition.

Relic Arm Design

24 Feb 2018

Relic Arm Design By Ethan, Abhi, and Shaggy

Task: Design and implement a new Relic Arm mechanism

At the North Texas regionals, we realized that if we really want to go further in the robot game, we need to significantly improve. Part of this is designing the new grabber-flipper system detailed in a later post, but another good way to score points is to score the Relic. So, we designed v1 of the Relic Arms, as detailed in this post.

However, designing a model and designing a real-life part are much different. First, we didn't have the Tetrix piece needed for a backing plate, and it is easier to say you can attach unrelated materials than actually doing it. As well, having a single 18-inch deploying arm would test the size limits more than we already do.

In comes Relic Arm V.2. This version is twice as long as the previous version so that we can score in the third zone for 40 points. As well, we have an updated relic-grabber that uses the silicone sheet from our Grabber V.2, so we can grip the relic more securely. Finally, we have a new mounting point on the robot that allows us to extend even farther than before.

Next Steps:

We now need to build and attach this design before Supers, in less than a week.

Iron Reign's Meta-Post Mortem

26 Feb 2018

Iron Reign's Meta-Post Mortem By Ethan

Task: Evaluate how well Iron Reign has stuck to its priorities

As Super Regionals approaches, we'd like to evaluate our past performance on post mortems, to see how well we've done, to modify our future post mortems, and to find new approaches towards solving our problems.

Past posts are:

Mustang Qualifier at Oklahoma

ISSUE: Time Management
We've definitely gotten better at time management in tournaments since this one, and haven't had any issues since.
ISSUE: Referring to Coach
Again, we've gotten much better on this. We've all grown more familiar with the information about our team. I think this was mostly a one-time issue.
ISSUE: Preparedness
We have gotten much more prepared for each tournament than the last. We made the 3D model we needed of our robot. We have our robot inspection-ready before the tournament now. We do still have issues with packing however, especially when we travel out-of-state.
ISSUE: Presentation
We've done a lot of practice for our presentation and eliminated a lot of stuttering and pauses. As well, our robot is much more functional than it was, so we're good there too.
ISSUE: Robot Stability
We switched to the LG 4 phones and eliminated all shutoff issues, so theres no problem there anymore.

Wylie East Qualifier

ISSUE: Packing
We haven't gotten much better at this, we even forgot our engineering journal in Dallas when we went to the Oklahoma Regional.
ISSUE: Judging
See above.
ISSUE: Robot fixes
  • More 3D parts to combat wear and tear - fixed
  • Vuforia fixes - not fixed
  • Strain relief - fixed
  • Lack of driver experience - fixed
ISSUE: Scouting Gaps
We have gotten much better at scouting, with more accurate spreadsheets, some of which we've already included in other posts.

North Texas Regional

ISSUE: Last minute robot changes
We did this at both this tournament and the next tournament, so we haven't done much to combat doing this. At the time, it always feels needed, but in retrospect, it doesn't. Here, these last minute changes helped, but ideally we should have finished them the week before and not the night before. At the next tournament, we made a system a week before, but ended up reverting to the old version the night before.
ISSUE: Lethargy
One of Iron Reign's trademark moves is being apathetic as possible, and this doesn't always shine well on us in tournament. We really haven't improved much on this, and we really should.
ISSUE: Robot Weakness
All of these issues were tournament-specific and won't come up again.

Oklahoma Regional

ISSUE: Preparation
WE FORGOT OUR ENGINEERING JOURNAL IN DALLAS. We really really need to work on packing for Georgia, and make a definite list and plan with people responsible for it.
ISSUE: Design Keychains
We want to have a trinket to hand out to teams. We started this in Oklahoma, but we should mass-produce items before the tournament.
ISSUE: Speed
We have designed a new gripper-flipepr system to increase our speed and have already built a new chassis around it.
ISSUE: No Relic Arm
We've designed a new Relic Arm that'll work, we just need to attach it to the robot and program it.

Polycarb Deformation

27 Feb 2018

Polycarb Deformation By Ethan

Task: Find a constant for polycarb deformation

Recently, we've been having an issue with our gripper in that the shielding for the sides of the intake have been bending torsionally, so that they deform and interfere with our glyph take-up. So, we created a lab to find the torque required to cause this deformation.

We cut a length of polycarb with a similar width but different length to test this (thickness 3/32 of an inch), hooking it into a vertical vice. Then, we attached a vice grip of length 8.75 inches to the side, then attached various weights to the vice until the polycarb deformed.

Under a ten-pound weight, the polycarb finally deformed. Using calculations, we can determine:

d = length of moment arm = 8.75 in = .22225 m
x = 0 degrees
F = 10 lbs = 44.482 N
Torque = Fdsin(x) = 9.886 N*m
Since torque to create deformation is roughly inversely proportional to the length of any object in a single dimension (keeping thickness and width constant): L' = expiremental length = 4.5 in
L = actual length = 14.5 in
T' = T(L'/L) = 3.068 N*m

This amount of torque isn't hard to generate at all, which explains why our gripper shields bend so easy. To prevent this, we must reenforce the shields with something with a higher resistance to deformation, such as thin metal strips.

Next Steps:

We're going back and recording many of our robot's constants so that we can be better able to predict how our robot functions in various situations. This is the first of many posts.

Promote Award 2018

28 Feb 2018

Promote Award 2018 By Kenna, Austin, and Ethan

image coming ASAP

With SuperRegionals just around the corner, everyone is going into overdrive and we almost forgot about our video for the Promote Award. We got lucky with the due date being extended for the South, so we had two extra days to make ours.

We wanted to this year's Promote Award video to be a little different from last year's. This entire season we've been trying to move away from the creation of the MXP and more towards its sustainability (as well as Iron Reign's sustainability as a team). Last year's video focused on the MXP. Through FIRST, Iron Reign has affected the lives of all of its team members so we had no lack of stories from members who wanted to share what FIRST and robotics means to them.

We decided on a more personal approach. Austin had the great idea of doing a flashback video in which a FIRST alumni remembers their 'good old days' competing in FLL and FTC. We drew from our own members' experiences like Ethan's growing up as part of Iron Reign or Jayesh coming back to help us improve our presentation.

Our plan was to have an older robotics member reminisce about their days in FIRST, then we flashback to a slideshow of photos of our team from 2012 to 2018 with a voiceover talking about what we want the world to know about FIRST.

We scavenged through years and years of photos saved on our Google Drive. We even got to see the famed salad bar video where some very young Iron Reign members present a sanitary alternative to a salad bar through song. Some of my favorite pictures are below:

Ethan Smal

Jayesh Smal

The video clip at the beginning took about an hour to film and record. Kenna outlined a script for the whole video which Austin narrated and acted with Ethan filming. The audio for the intro where Austin pretends to be a retired FTC member had to be recorded separately so the transition from live video to slideshow. After several tries, we had a few good clips. But those just made up a couple seconds of the entire video because most of it was the slideshow. Below is Austin recording the voiceover.

Austin Records

Using VideoPad Video Editor, a free program, Kenna screenrecorded the slideshow and added the intro clip with the voiceover files as the audio. For anyone who is inexperienced with video-editing and needs to do it in a hurry, VideoPad is a good way to go. Be warned, you can only download your final video once or twice without paying. To be very honest, everything was done in a bit of a hurry. We liked our idea, but we wish we had more time to execute it. Next year, hopefully, we will plan ahead of time and have a few weeks to create our video.

Update: Since we have been lucky enough to be selected to go to Worlds, we will be making an updated version of our Promote Video.

Poster Designs

28 Feb 2018

Poster Designs By Ethan

Task: Make team informational posters for South Super Regionals

Last year, we didn't spend that much time on the poster/aesthetic side of things for Supers, and we ended up getting the Judges' Award. While we can't really prove a cause-and-effect relationship between the two, we want to improve in all aspects so we don't repeat last years performance. So, this year, we're going to try to convey more information to the judges so that we can bolster our chances for awards.

While we were in Oklahoma, we saw another team's pit setup/poster design that we liked (FTC Team 4962, the Rockettes), and we realized that having posters stand by in the background that we can refer to would significantly help our chances in judging, as we would be able to further back up our claims during questions from roving judges. So, we made our own designs that will sit in the pit for the judges to see. All 3 were made in Adobe Illustrate.

Next Steps:

After this, we need to make new posters and Aquilas, as both are currently water damaged.

Joining Iron Reign

02 Mar 2018

Joining Iron Reign By Shaggy and Justin

The Transition from Imperial to Iron Reign

It all started when both teams went to the North Texas Regional - I was part of Imperial at the time, with high hopes for our robot. We worked really hard on the robot, though we were only a team of three, so all were eager to see the robot compete. But, once the matches started rolling, we saw we didn't have what it took to compete against power houses like Technical Difficulties.

This really made us feel bad because we had only worked on the robot game and not on any of the awards. At the end of the day, the Imperial team waited for the awards with our sister team, Iron Reign, because they worked really hard toward the awards. Sure enough, their hard work paid off because they were able to get the 2nd place Inspire award. They were heading to Supers. We all went out to celebrate their victory, some of us happier than others.

While everyone was talking, our mentor made us an interesting offer. He saw us put extreme effort into making a competetitive robot and, liking our work ethic, said "You guys are varsity material." So he decided to offer Justin and I a spot on Iron Reign to continue our adventures with robotics. We could not believe Iron Reign would be so generous as to take us in with open arms. We accepted right away because we couldn't pass up such an opportunity - our team hasn't been to Supers for years.

It came with conditions though: we had to start doing blog posts, which we had never done before, and our mentor wanted to see the same work ethic from when we worked on our Imperial robot. We were also given many opportunities here at Iron Reign. Since Iron Reign goes for all the awards, I have been able to learn what each award means and how to work towards getting them. We have also learned more on software and hardware. Tycho is an experienced coder and Austin is an experienced builder, both ready to teach anyone willing to get their hands dirty. These opportunities could not have been found anywhere except Iron Reign.

Progress of the Octopuckers Over Time

02 Mar 2018

Progress of the Octopuckers Over Time By Ethan and Tycho

Task: Chart the progress of the octopuckers over time


This design was too rigid, we overlooked the fact that triangles tend to be the strongest shape, and therefore this octopucker wasn't as compliant as we wanted, damaging the blocks.

This design was really good, and we used it for 3-4 tournaments. Our initial design of these wouldn't damage the blocks significantly at the levels we used, but at extraordinary conditions they would gouge the blocks, and under normal conditions they would leave superficial scratches.

This design was really bad. They would catch on each other and get stuck on themselves, and as a result wouldn't pick up blocks. However, they did not damage the blocks in any conditions. We never brought these to tournament.

This was a step in the right direction. They didn't grip the blocks that well, but they worked and didn't get stuck on each other or jam.

This is the design we're currently using. It's impossible to damage the blocks with them, and with the slightly larger cylinders, they grip the block really well. We're going to use these going into the South Super Regionals.

These aren't octopuckers, but they deserve an honorable mention. We're using these intake stars at the bottom of the grabbers to securely grip the glyphs before fully loading them into the grabber system. As well, these have the added bonus of slightly increasing the speed at which we can take in blocks.

Designing the Tent

04 Mar 2018

Designing the Tent By Janavi and Kenna

Task:

So, its Supers time again! And that means its time to design our tents and pick a theme for ourselves. Last year, when Iron Reign went to Supers for the first time, we got to see all of the other teams' displays; before, we had only been to regional level competitions and weren't ready for the displays at Supers. We saw the coolest tents and got some really cool trinkets. For example, one team from Louisiana passed out miniature Tabasco bottles and another team laser cut wood into the FTC logo.

We need to make sure that our tent has a good design and we have memorable trinkets to pass out, if we have a recognizable team it will help us with scouting and sponsors. If we can show sponsors that their name will be on our display then they are more likely to either continue supporting our team or think about starting. And for scouting we are more likely to get chosen for an alliance if we have a memorable robot performance and pit.

This is what our tent looked like last year at Supers, we plan to take this design and improve upon it based on the feedback we received.

Next Steps:

So, I decided to create a 3D model of what our tent might look like, taking measurements of the carts, banners, and tables, so that we can make sure that we not only have space for all of the items we intend to place in our pit, (Inspire banner, sponsors, school banner,team aquila, carts, banners, tables, etc.) but we also need enough space to move around in our area. I used SketchUp to create the model, photos are below.

Last year, Austin created a Roman-style shield with old field mats as the plating and sawed off broom handles (left over from the hats) to keep them stiff. We plan to use those again this year keeping with our Roman theme. We also plan to add to this by hopefully creating another (hopefully lighter) shield to carry around; this way we will be recognizable for both our helmets and shields.

Trinkets:

Kenna and I worked together last Saturday to create business cards and design wooden coins that we would laser cut out of wood. We decided that we really needed to advertise about 4 main things:

  • Our team logo with our name and team number
  • Our game stats
  • Info about the MXP
  • Social Media accounts and our website

So, after thinking about all of this and looking at other teams' cards and trinkets, we came up with this design for the business cards. For the wooden coins, we put our logo on one side and for the other we put our social media info.

Update:

Getting everything printed out was quite a hassle. First we sent the cards to get printed out three days before we left, already cutting it close and then due to some error the order was cancelled. Then, after getting the error sorted out, we got 1,000 bushiness cards printed out in 24 hours.

Then for the laser cutting of the coins, we realized that it would take around 8 hours to complete and since we don't have access to a laser cutter at school, one of us would have to go to the nearby maker space and wait 8 hours for it to finsh. Since it was right before the completion, and we needed to spend our time focusing on the robot, so we decided to 3-D print the coins and pass them out. This worked wonderfully and since we brought along the R.V. any time we ran low we could print out more on board.

Other teams loved our merch and we got to see some other great trinkets, one team from Louisiana gave out miniature Tabasco bottles, and another gave us a laser cut horseshoe game for luck!

The Kraken Awakes

04 Mar 2018

The Kraken Awakes By Abhi

Task: Develop a new robot model

After continual development and adding the fifth grabber, it became time to make a new model.

With some sick upgrades, Kraken has become reborn just in time for Super-Regionals. With some new mechanisms and constraints, we developed a better and more efficient robot.

Gripper v5 was added to the chassis via 4 small REV rails which could keep the grippers attached to the conveyor belt. These were constrained using coincidents.

The relic arm was constrained onto the model using a REV rail on the side of the robot. Though the arm may look longer than in the 18 inches, the current picture demonstrates it at its extended distance.

And last but certainly not least, we added cool new side shields. Cut from AWC, the shields will replace our current wheel mounts and wheel guards to create a protective metal layer and look awesome on the field.

Next Steps:

At this point, we have everything on the robot. However, we need to figure out what to do with the jewel arm before we go to Athens. That will take time to develop and place onto the robot. Upon completion, we can complete the robot model.

South Super Regionals Day One, 2018

08 Mar 2018

South Super Regionals Day One, 2018 By Ethan, Evan, Kenna, Charlotte, Austin, Karina, Janavi, Abhi, Tycho, Justin, and Christian

Task: Set up and present at SSR 2018

A placid stillness hung over the dark, cold room. The early sun flashed through the pale window curtains, ineffective against the onslaught of light. Outside, birds started to chirp and sing, starting off the new day. All over the city, teams were waking up, walking to the Classic Center (the Thunderdome of Robotics), to see their fate, either as champions of the last ever Super Regionals, or to go home defeated and never again see the light of Dean Kamen and his vision. However, through all of this movement and energy, this hotel room stayed quiet. Slowly, a beeping slowly grew more loud, blaring its morning call throughout the room until no one could deny its existence. In spite of the warm and soft Holiday Inn™ beds calling their users back to slumber, the team members had to wake, under the threat of death by coach. Thus started the journey of Iron Reign's 2018 Supers.

The Pits (Setup and presence)

This day marked the first official day of the 2018 South Super Regionals, the last one ever being held. With FIRST moving to the Qualifier-Reigional-Worlds system, we wanted to make a good impression and show off, and thats exactly what we did. First, we overdesigned a robot that impressed judges and looked nice to other teams, as well as making sure we had little goodies to hand out. But, we really worked on our pit presence, to make ourselves really known to other teams. We made posters detailing Iron Reign's season and hung them up; we brought LEDs and lights to give our tent that good old rustic Roman Feeling™; we had business cards to hand out; we went around and talked to other teams and took pictures of their robots. All of this served to make it feel as if Iron Reign was really *there*. While this eventually proved ineffectual to get picked, this still was a good strategy - it got us noticed - and we will feel its effects at Worlds. We still could've done more with the pit setup though, it would've helped to find a place for posters and the like beforehand, and we ran into some placement issues of our robot and award carts that irritated the safety officials. But, overall, 9/10 would do again. (We will)

Judging

Our judging didn't go that well. Our presentation was fine, we still had breaks and pauses like usual, and we got the majority of information across, but we didn't deliver on important information correctly. Our energy was a little low, we had a power outage while going over our outreach which distracted the judges, and on top of that, the judges' paradigms were a little closer to the engineering side of things. Now, this isn't necessarily a bad thing - having a skewed mindset makes a judge more likely to defend for some awards - but for an outreach-heavy team like ours, we were at a disadvantage for the Connect and Motivate awards. In the questioning, we only had one connect-related question, with the rest on Innovate and Design, so we knew we probably wouldn't be up for our usual awards from the get-go, which is a shame as we've gotten the Connect Award at every level of competition this year.

That was the end of the night, so like all Good and Responsible Teams™, we went to bed early and got enough sleep to be rested for the next day /s.

South Super Regionals Day Two, 2018

09 Mar 2018

South Super Regionals Day Two, 2018 By Ethan, Evan, Kenna, Charlotte, Austin, Karina, Janavi, Abhi, Tycho, Justin, and Christian

Task: Complete the first day of competition at SSR

After finishing judging and setup, all we had left to do was the entire robot game. Knowing this, we stayed until 12, tattooing pictures of Minions™ on each other. Thus, we were perfectly prepared for the tournament the next day.

Match 5
We won this match, 207-256. We mainly won due to the autonomous, our partner and ourselves scored 170 points and the other side couldn't catch up.
Match 16
We lost this match, 236-297. We suffered as a result of having a broken relic arm and not focusing on the end game. We really need a relic arm for Worlds.
Match 23
We lost this game, 412-105. We were up against two of the top ten teams in the tournament and we couldn't compete on any level. We didn't even get the balancing stone point because our robot turned off on the field.
Match 29
We won this game, 285-351. While we were outclassed in TeleOp, our combined autonomii were able to overcome that and give us a win.
Match 38
We lost this game, 109-286. We were outclassed on every level, and it didn't help that our robot was unresponsive. This was a wake up call for our team to improve.
Match 49
We lost this match, 572-221. This wasn't even close and was a huge disappointment.
Match 56
We lost this match, 196-374. Again, we underperformed in every aspect of the game and ended our day with a 2-5 record.

Besides our subpar performance in the robot game, we were also interviewed by a team of judges that we guessed were responsible for the Innovate or Design awards. They asked a little more in-depth questions than what we were used to, but we were able to answer them effectively and demonstrate our engineering process. The judges were reasonably impressed by our robot - our design was fairly uncommon - and it made us canidates for the Innovate award by our estimation.

Janavi, Karina, Abhi, and Tycho stayed up to work on driving and autonomous to prepare for the final day while the rest of us slept so that we would be restful and awake for the next day.

South Super Regionals Day Three, 2018

10 Mar 2018

South Super Regionals Day Three, 2018 By Ethan, Evan, Kenna, Charlotte, Austin, Karina, Janavi, Abhi, Tycho, Justin, and Christian

Task: Finish SSR and attend awards ceremony

It was the final day. Tumbleweeds drifted over the land, rolling and turning through the abandoned Athens streets. Over the horizon, a dust cloud rose, brown and shifting and twisting, speckled with the detritus of an abandoned city, flashing and siezing, lighting up the city through its inky blackness, devoid of all light. Under these auspices, with the flashing lights of the looming cloud highlighting every crack, every pore of our grim, stone-cold faces, we trekked through these dark streets, against the cold, whipping winds blowing in, through the debris and detritus of the lost, fallen FTC teams that succumbed to the biting winds and the shooting lightning. Through these harrowing conditions, we perservered and arrived at the fabled Classic Center, the home of all southern FTC teams' dreams, and their doom.

We started out with our 2-5-0 record, so we didn't have a great outlook on alliance selection or for the tournament in general. However, through our discussion the night before, we decided to give our newer team members a shot at driving and working on the robot. So, Justin and Karina became the main drivers for the day, since we didn't have much to lose.

Match 70
We lost this match, 379-267. Even though we lost, we did way better than expected, so this is still a win in our hearts. Had we executed our autonomous correctly, we could've won this match, or at least gotten closer and impressed more people.
Match 78
We won this match, 388-348. It definitely helped that we were partnered with the top team in our division, but it was certainly a morale booster overall. This ended the SSR with a 3-6 record.

With the fresh feeling of defeat in our hearts, as we didn't stand a chance of actually getting picked, we went to a nice italian restruant and talked about potential plans while eating good food. If you ever have the chance, eat at Depalmas Italian Cafe.

We walked back to the tournament, bellies full of prosciutto and cheese, reasonably not confident for our chances to advance to worlds. So, we sat in the stands, waiting, hoping that our names would be called (except for the Promote Award, ours is kind of embarrassing). As we slowly slipped into deep slumber, we heard a but a whisper from the announcer, "And the 2nd place Innovate Award goes to............Team 6832 Iron Reign!". And so, we advanced to Worlds, and rode off into the sunset.

Kraken LED Installation

10 Mar 2018

Kraken LED Installation By Ethan, Austin, Evan, and Abhi

Task: Install LEDs on our robot

This has been a low-priority task for the robot throughout the season. We wanted to be able to a) look cool and b) signal team color and problems with the robot with LEDs. And, at Supers, we just happened to have access to a Fender switch, servo, and a roll of LEDs, so in our downtime we decided to take advantage of it. If we knew we weren't going to win, we could at least make our robot look cool.

The installation was relatively simple. We attached a servo to a Fender switch so that we could automatically toggle between colors, and rewired our servos to accomidate that. We threaded the LEDs above the wheels so that we could have a nice backlit effect on our robot.

Next Steps:

Next, we need to code the appropriate signalling for the colors and the servo to move the switch.

Kraken LED Modes

12 Mar 2018

Kraken LED Modes By Tycho and Janavi

Task: Attach and Code LEDs

We added LED's to Kraken's base. After that, we coded the lights to change color depending on which mode we are in. Though a small addition, it helps take stress off of our drivers. By glancing at the robot, they can immediately tell what mode we're in and can adjust accordingly. It also keeps us from making an crucial mistakes like activating our autonomous for blue alliance when we're on red.

  • Cyan - End-game mode, changes control scheme to support relic arm control. Resets forward direction so drivers can think of relic gripper as forward. Enables automatic balancing mode.
  • Magenta - Glyph-scoring mode for higher rows. Reverses which way motors are and slows down motors.
  • Blue/Red = Blue or red depending on alliance. Regular driver mode, collects glyphs for lower columns.
Here is Kraken in end-game mode:

Which Cipher?

13 Mar 2018

Which Cipher? By Abhi

Task: Find which cipher works best

By this stage of Relic Recovery, we have finally discovered an efficient strategy for the glyph game. At this point, it is important to get consistent driver practice. While doing so, it is important to think of the cipher patterns. Seeing that world records are being set by teams who can double cipher efficiently, it is important that we can complete ciphers at Worlds. But which pattern should we choose? At first glance, all the ciphers seem just as hard (or easy) to do. However, after some analysis, we found some will work better for our team than others.

Based on our current design, the bird cipher is the easiest to complete for drivers. This is because of the pick up pattern of our grippers. For each column, each pair of glyphs can be picked up with the same color order. For example, if we start with a gray glyph during autonomous and put it into the center column, after placing a brown one on top in teleop, we can pick up another gray then brown. Then, when we go to the left column, we pick up brown then gray for first two rows then brown gray again. This makes it easy on our drivers to remember which glyph colors to pick up.

The next easiest cipher is the snake cipher. Though this may conventionally seem hard since mirror snakes are not allowed, it is easy for us because we have the ability to pick up stacks. We would start the same way as the bird in the center column and then pick up pre-stacked same color glyphs.

Finally, we have the frog. The frog is the hardest to do because though the first two rows are the same as the bird, the final two rows have flipped pickup of glyphs. This can cause a high chance of error for our drivers. This is why we will try to stray away from this cipher but can do it if necessary.

General Advice:

Though we focus on specific ciphers, we can setup our cryptobox to allow multiple ciphers. The best thing to do is setting up the center column in a 1221 pattern (each number represents either gray or brown). This sets us up to do either a bird or frog cipher, our two favorite ciphers to do. If this isn't possible or if we are focusing on rows, we have to set them up with an alternating glyph pattern, like the frog and bird bottom two rows. This allows us to set up the cipher for our alliance partner if they choose to complete both cryptoboxes.

Gripper Physics Diagrams

15 Mar 2018

Gripper Physics Diagrams By Ethan

Task: Describe the physics of the gripper

We always struggle a little with describing our robot to the judges. So, this post will be the third in a series of posts describing the physics of our robot (four if you count the coefficients of friction). First, we have the free body diagrams of the gripper.

Next, to further describe this, we created an expiriment in which we determined the maximum force one octopucker can apply. We took a traditional octopucker and rotated it so that the arms of the pucker would barely impact the sides of the scale. From that, we applied force until the octopucker moved to the next arm. We then averaged the forces recorded to determine the maximum force an octopucker arm can apply.

Under these circumstances, we recorded an average maximum of 4.125 oz of force, which translates to 1.147 N. This translates to an increase in the normal force of +6.882 N. This, in turn, increases the frictional force of the internal lift by fk=uN, where u is the coefficient of friction of the internal lift to the glyph. fk=1.96*6.882=13.489N. So, the simple creation of modified intake octopuckers allowed us to increase the frictional force by +13.489N, which allows our internal lift system to operate.

Force exerted by the octopuckers vs time

Next Steps

On Saturday, we will continue this series of posts, finding the series of constants in infopost #2.

Field Oriented Control

16 Mar 2018

Field Oriented Control By Abhi

Task: Implement a drive system depending on field perspective

We are always looking for ways to make it easier to drive. One way to do that is to modify our code such that no matter where the front of the robot is, moving the joystick in a certain direction will move the entire robot in that direction. This allows our drivers to only think about the field and align with the cryptobox easier. I knew that some FRC teams used libraries developed by WPLIB to implement this sort of drive. Reading their code, I figured out how to implement field-oriented drive in our codebase.

The code began by getting the joystick axis readings. This data then needed to be processed to account for the heading of the robot. This needed a special method depicted below.

Some math needed to be done for the angle. This is no easy feat so I will explain it in case if any other teams want to use this code. The first thing we need to do is the find the sine and cosine of the heading. This allows us to find the power to the x-axis and the y-axis respective to the angle.

Now that the trig is done, we needed to apply these values to the joystick axes. In this method, x represented the forward direction and y represented the strafing direction. That is why, when we look at out[0] which would tell the output forward direction, it considers the joystick's y direction and modifies it with the x-direction so that the joysticks get converted to their respective axes. This applies to the strafing direction as well.

Going back to the original method, the directions output from the method are applied to the actual powers of the motors. Before this happens, in case if any dimensions are over 1.0 (the max speed), they need to be scaled down to to 1. This is what the normalize and clampMotors methods do. Therefore, in the end, the code allows drivers to control the bot respective to the field.

Next Steps:

Now the drive team just needs to test the code out and see what happens.

Engineering the Flag Holder

17 Mar 2018

Engineering the Flag Holder By Abhi

Task: Find a place to put the flag

When we went to Super Regionals, we forgot about where to put our flag with the new design. That led us to strapping a zip tie to a side shield, ruining the aluminum aesthetic. We decided we need a specially designed part to put our flag in since duct tape didn't look nice (we're classy like that). I embarked on a mission to create a 3-D printed part for it. That led to the part you see above, which has worked very well. It didn't always look that nice though. The part endured a very special process, one that Iron Reign has used for years and has carried us through the hard times. If you guessed the engineering process, you are correct.

This was the first iteration of the flag holder. The reason it looks so circular was that it was originally going to stick into the Relic arm so that when it extended, the flag would go with it. I built it around those specifications. However, when I went to print it, I realized that there was no good way to print it without supports (nylon doesn't clean very easily for big supports). I also saw that the holder wasn't modular enough to encompass different flags and had to be mounted only one way. I threw this design in the trash and started over.

Inspired by REV's pillow blocks, I decided to make something similar to that. I wanted the part to be able to mount in different ways in case if robot design modifications were required. That led me to the the design above. It worked much better than the previous design. However, the holes for the flag weren't big enough to fit even a pencil. This is a problem because we don't know how flags will be at worlds. I went back into Creo to make a new design.

As many other people have said, third time is the charm. After enlarging the flag circles and making overall dimension modifications to fit this change, the holder ended up accomplishing both tasks I need it to do. It was big enough to fit a pin with some wiggle room and actually held the flag as seen the first picture. We will use this at worlds and possibly hand them out to teams like us at Supers who are using zip-tie holders.

Meeting Log

17 Mar 2018

Meeting Log March 17, 2018 By Abhi, Tycho, Ethan, Janavi, Austin, Karina, and Kenna

Meeting Log March 17, 2018

Today we focused on changes we planned from Supers. Also, we decided to have a mini discussion about good and bad things from Supers (not a post mortem).

Today's Meet Objectives

Organization / Documentation / Competition Prep

  • Review Journal
  • Post Mortem
  • Assigning Blog Posts

Software

  • Implement Field Oriented Drive
  • Open CV Progress
  • Fix Viewforia demo mode
  • Driver Practice Modifications

Build / Modeling

  • Build Sparring Bots
  • Make flag holder
  • Learn how to 3-D print
  • Build Relic Arm

Service / Outreach

  • Promote video redesign
  • Reveal Video footage

Today's Work Log

Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
AbhiFlagHolder11:003
Abhi,KennaLearn to 3-D print12:00.10
AustinPromote1:001
AllPlanning Meeting+Assign Blog Posts2:00pm.5
AbhiCode changes2:301
TychoOpenCV+Demo Changes3:002
Kenna, JanaviSparring Bots3:003
KarinaRelic Arm3:001
EthanPost Mortem3:001
Karina,AbhiDriver Practice4:002
Austin, AbhiReveal Video4:001
EthanReview Journal4:002

South Super Regionals 2018 Postmortem

17 Mar 2018

South Super Regionals 2018 Postmortem By Charlotte, Ethan, Tycho, Austin, Janavi, Abhi, Karina, Kenna, and Evan

Task: Reflect on our accomplishments in South Super Regionals

Judging

Strengths
In previous presentations, we have had difficulty with timing and conveying everything we have to in the allotted time. This time, we got all of our information across and had enough extra time for some questions and good discussion with the judges.

Weaknesses
Although we did improve our timing, due to a lack of practice we had some poor/awkward transitions, and we had to shuffle a bit every time we needed to demonstrate something we have made which made for awkward periods of silence. Also, we tended to ramble, so with practice or by making a script we can be more precise. We didn't stress connect/first specific events and we didn't stress the year round deployment of or outreach program as much as we usually do, so we didn't get any visits to our Mobile Learning Lab from judges. The main logistical error we had was that one of the computers didn't have the latest version of the presentation on it, and we couldn't download it because the venue didn't have internet connection. As always, we were lower on energy then we could have been, so we may have come off as less enthusiastic as we really are.

Opportunities
The greatest improvement we can make is practice: with practice we can make our presentation crisp and flushed out to avoid those awkward pauses. To avoid the awkward shuffling to the presentation box, we can have every person hold different versions of the grabber. We are going to make a bar with every version of the octoplucker because this would be helpful to demonstrate. Also, FIRST specific events are very important to us and the judging.

Threats
Our Mobile Learning Lab is going to be at an Earth Day event during Worlds, so we will not be able to share it/give judges tours.

Robot Performance

Strengths
At Supers, we had the best gripper flipper that we have had yet, it worked alright and it looked nice so it impressed the judges. Our robot didn't die during matches which is a welcome improvement. We won 2nd place innovate award for our REVolution system. Also, we noticed our robot has good speed and maneuverability.

Weaknesses
We were ranked 32/36, so overall our robot game was weak. We assembled our final Supers robot too late, so we didn't have nearly enough driver practice.

Opportunities
Driver practice is key. In the weeks leading up to Worlds, we are going to avoid major robot changes and practice driving the robot as much as we can.

Threats
In Worlds, we are going to face the toughest competition we have thus far, so we are going to have to work very hard to stand a chance.

Scouting

Strengths
This time, we had things to hand out to teams that we visit and those that stopped by our pit. We made 1000 business cards and a lot of keychains that we 3D printed previously. Also, we visited a lot of pits, both in Kilrain and Pemberton, and made friends with teams, connections that will continue into Worlds. We even took pictures of everyone's robot and made a collage, pictured below.

Weaknesses
Our pit was disorganized and crowded, we were having. A few members of our team got sick, so there was a lot of sitting around and looking lazy. Apparently they will not be supplying chairs at Worlds, so that should help. We aren't known for being particularly high energy, but it is essential to be active in the pits on competition days.

Opportunities
By Worlds, we hope to have completed the awards case that we had planned for Supers, and hopefully we can create more Roman inspired items to give our pit a more unique touch.

Journal

Strengths
Our engineering journal was effective in portraying the progression of the robot design. It had an enormous amount of posts that show all of our accomplishments this year. The many posts we made for the REVolution system probably helped us catch the attention of the Innovate judges.

Weaknesses
Some of our sections were a bit empty, such as our control section which only has 6 posts and the business section.

Opportunities
Before Worlds, we are going to organize the posts into their respective awards a bit better as well as writing abstracts for each award and why we are good candidates for them. We are running out of space in our binder, so we are going to split it into two which will be nice so two judges can read our information at the same time. For our control section, we are going to add an Open CV post, which is something we talk about in our presentation but we don't have many details about it in our journal.

Threats
When we split into two binders, a judge may mistake each on for a full journal, so we must make it clear on the cover of each journal that it is only half.

Motor Constants and Future Plans

20 Mar 2018

Motor Constants and Future Plans By Ethan

Task: Find constants for the motors for future calculations

In order to better predict how our robot will work, we first need to find a few constants to do calculations. Luckily, our school has an engineering class, so many of us have the skillset to do these calculations.

The base data we needed was:

NeverRest 40s:
&tab;160 rpm\16.755 rad/sec
&tab;369 oz-in\2.6057 Nm

NeverRest 60s:
&tab;105 rpm\10.996 rad/sec
&tab;593 oz-in\4.188 Nm

REV Servos:
&tab;.14 s/60°\7.143 rpm\.748 rad/sec
&tab;187.8 oz-in\1.326 Nm

Next Steps:

We are going to record these variables using the calculations or by video analysis next:

  • Mass of robot
  • Acceleration curve
  • Max speed
  • Max turning speed
  • Center of gravity
  • Chain speed on gripper-flipper mechanism and drivetrain
  • Gear ratios of gripper and drivetrain
  • Bungee elasticity under various conditions
  • Torque of various motors on the robot

Business Plan Updates

22 Mar 2018

Business Plan Updates By Ethan

Task: Update the Business/Strategic Plan

See the first and second posts here.

Cumulative Updates as of 3/22/2018


MXP

To make Iron Reign’s history entirely clear, we built the RV last year. We do not claim any credit for the actual construction of the RV; however, the goal of this year was to make our Mobile Learning Lab run year round, make it sustainable, and expand the programs to more communities around the nation. We have done all of this.

BigThought, our programmatic sponsor for the Mobile Learning Lab, is helping educators and professionals in five cities across America create their own programs like the ones we run.

Business and Funding

This year, we went further in finding local businesses by looking up relevant companies that can directly benefit Iron Reign as mentors and sponsors. So far, one company has come to our aid: Advanced Waterjet Cutting. We contacted them over phone and asked about an initial meeting to see if they would sponsor us for creating side-shields and other specialty parts. They agreed immediately and we created a mentor partnership that assists us in materials research and design.
Recently, we have designed our own 3D-printed-parts kit, called REVolution. Our intention was to convert a normal REV bar, as seen on our robot, into a usable driveshaft for design flexibility. Upon finishing, we went to the REV headquarters and presented our design to them. We also have shared the basic designs on Thingiverse so that any interested FTC or FRC team can print them out and use it themselves. Note: The main REVolution discussion is in the building section.

Building

Iron Reign’s pinnacle of design and building so far this year is our REVolution system. We were sick of stripping set screws and twisting axles, and wanted something dependable that also was reusable. Thus came the REVolution system, the purpose of which was to turn REV extrusions into driveshafts so that we could have a solid base and more adaptability in our robot. To these ends, we created a library of parts: mounts, bearing holders, and connectors so that we could use extrusions to do almost anything on our robot. Attached in our engineering journal is a complete list of parts with names, descriptions, and pictures.

Design Process

Later, we further improved upon the grabber design, attaching it to a conveyor belt so that we could move glyphs all across our robot in order to score higher, using our REVolution system. This is the most ambitious use of our REVolution system yet, and we strongly encourage the reading judges to view it at the pits.

You can download the full plan here.

Iron Reign Engineering Journal Summary

22 Mar 2018

Iron Reign Engineering Journal Summary By Ethan

Task: Write a summary page for the engineering journal

The generic engineering journal rubric given to teams by FIRST heavily recomends having a season-summary intro page at the front of the journal. As well, every winning example journal includes the summary. So, we figured out that it might be a good idea to actually make one.

Summary

Iron Reign has been a FIRST team, in one form or another, for eight years. In prior seasons, we have gone to South Super-Regionals and won the North Texas Inspire Award.

We often participate in outreach events. Last year, we fully renovated an old 90’s RV to turn it into a mobile workshop for low income neighborhoods. We now drive the RV all over the Dallas Metroplex in order to reach kids who normally wouldn’t have access to STEM programs, in hopes of inspiring them to go into STEM one day. We have also presented on the national stage in hopes of spreading our RV program to other cities. We recently travelled to the National Science Teachers’ Association Convention in Florida so that we could represent our school as well as inspire educators in other areas to adopt our ideas.

We program our robot in Java, using the Android Studio IDE. We have integrated Vuforia and OpenCV to use our phone’s camera for computer vision to identify the field patterns. OpenCV was an Intel computer vision technology that recently spun off into its own company, and Vuforia is a PTC-owned augmented reality library.

We use a variety of parts in our robot design. For example, in past years we have used a combination of AndyMark and Tetrix parts, using AndyMark materials for our drivetrain, and Tetrix for the rest. However, we are increasingly integrating REV parts into our design, as they let us be more flexible and pull off tougher designs. We also have switched from using the basic power distribution module to using the REV PDM and two expansion hubs.

In our engineering process, we use the Kaizen process, which means that we continually improve each individual part of our robot. We also have design competitions, in which two or more team members each create a part made to solve the same issue. When we were designing our cryptobox grabber, we started with a design competition. Evan built an arm-grab system for the cryptobox grabber, and Austin created a conveyor belt to grab cryptoboxes. Through testing, we determined that the grabbers were more efficient and reliable at picking up blocks than the conveyor belt. As well, the arm-grabber was more compact than the conveyor belt, which was unstable and unwieldy. Then, as we used the arm-grabber, we realized that it still needed work, as the grabber missed some blocks and the driver had to be extremely accurate. So, we designed a new rotating grabber, with soft spikes to hold blocks better, to grab blocks quickly and grab more than one at a time, then one with 3-D printed arms. Afterwards, we decided this wasn’t efficient enough and created a new system with an octopucker design, then mounted the new gripper to a 270° conveyor so that we could move glyphs around the robot with enhanced speed.

We also utilize 3D printed parts throughout our robot. We design parts using PTC Creo, and can print parts in a variety of materials, including nylon, ABS, Filoflex, and Ninjaflex. Usually, we opt to use nylon, as it is flexible enough as not to break under stress, but is strong enough to handle our needs during the game without breaking. Printed parts on our robot enable us to create more flexible designs and circumvent issues that pop up. For example, originally, our robot’s mecanum wheel would damage blocks when hitting them, so we had to design wheel guards to protect both our robot and field elements. We iterated through multiple designs, eventually settling on a u-shape that covered our wheels while not affecting mobility. Then, we changed the height until the part wouldn’t cut into the mats while turning.

More specifically, we have created a personalized library of parts called REVolution for REV extrusions to turn them into driveshafts. We have had great success with these and have shared them with other teams to spread our parts. Refer to our additional handout and presentation for a more in-depth idea of what these do. This is the best part of all of Iron Reign’s designs this season, and we think it is very useful and important.

This year has been an extremely successful year for our team as far a business goes. Normally, we receive FIRST sponsorships, and other minor sponsorships to cover tournament fees. However, this year, we have received sponsorships from a variety of sources. First, in building our RV, we received money from BigThought, a Dallas nonprofit, to run our RV, as well as money from a Dallas initiative called Dallas City of Learning. We also received a grant from Best Buy for 4 onboard 3D printers and 20+ laptops to educate on. Then, we received $3000 of REV parts, two practice fields, and a sponsorship from our school district in exchange for hosting a qualifier and running a DISD scrimmage. We also partnered with AWC to cut our side shields out of aluminum.

Our strategic + business plan is on the next page, and then our Tables of Contents follows, with exceptional posts that we would like you to read highlighted.

Download the pdf here.

iMake 2018

24 Mar 2018

iMake 2018 By Ethan, Charlotte, Karina, Austin, Justin, and Tycho

Task: Present at the Fort Worth Science Museum iMake Festival

The iMake Maker Fest is an annual event held by the Forth Worth Museum of Science and History to celebrate innovation and Maker culture. We've presented here before, most recently in the Rescue Recovery season. We really wanted to get in one more outreach event before worlds, and we already had a good connection with the museum from prior events, so we contacted them asking them if they had extra space for a 12x12 robot field. They did, and we came.

We came early, around 8, so that we could set up an entire field for practice. Even though we're planning on volunteering, we still can't reasonably give up an entire day of drivers practice. So, we turned our outreach into a combined event - talking to parents and educators about FIRST, as well as more directly demonstrating that by driving our robots around the museum.

We talked to about 900 people today from all over Texas, and had an overall very successful day. We had many parents interested in putting their kids in FIRST programs, and had a former FIRST official talk to us!

Next Steps:

We don't have much time to do any more outreach events before Worlds without sacrificing valuable time, so our next focus is solely on the robot and journal.

Lab Planning

28 Mar 2018

Lab Planning By Ethan

Task: Design labs to find more physical properties of our robot

Lab #1: Batteries

Procedure

  1. Obtain a fully charged REV battery - should say ~13V on our battery charger
  2. Record the voltage upon being plugged in to the robot
  3. Start a timer at the same time as drivers practice starts - this should be intensive practice
  4. When done driving, stop the timer and record the final voltage

Data

Vi Vf Runtime(t) ΔV
Run 1
Run 2
Run 3

After recording the voltages, we will calculate ΔV=(vf-vi)/t for each run, hopefully totalling 10 runs so that we can safely use statistical analysis to calculate standard deviation and outliers for each battery. The purpose of this is to find our best batteries for use in competition as well as set a baseline for future batteries.

Lab #2: Videoanalysis

Procedure

  1. Record videos of the robot accelerating to full speed and rotating at full speed
  2. Put the videos into LoggerPro
  3. Perform videoanalysis, finding the acceleration curve, max linear speed, and max angular speed

Data

Vmax Wmax Amax

Next Steps

We will perform these labs on Saturday; as well, we will find the gear ratio numbers.

The Cost of Mistakes

31 Mar 2018

The Cost of Mistakes By Abhi

Task: Analyze Failures

Two words describe the picture above: "Oh dear". The wires shown above are connected to our jewel thief on the bottom of our robot. The reason the wires are so shredded and torn is because the chain on our grippers would rub against the wires when the lift was in the lower position. However, it was not always like this.

This piece used to be on the robot prior to stripping. It's purpose was to protect the wires from damage of grippers. However, at SSR, I decided to take the piece off temporarily because it halted the gripper too short from the optimal intake position. Ignorance led to this piece becoming forgotten about and left in a random box. Since then, the robot had experienced many issues.

The first and most evident effect was the wires being stripped. This created a safety hazard and made the robot dangerous to others on the field. In addition, this cutting led to the color sensor becoming unresponsive many times, taking away valuable time from autonomous testing. Another issue was that the wires shorted out our batteries, leading to destruction of valuable batteries. This is shown below.

From this, we lost over 4 hours of driver practice since we would constantly be waiting for batteries to charge (unaware of the issue at this time). As a result of losing one piece of the robot, we lost many things in the process. To fix this, we had to: order new sensor cables, use a new color sensor, rewire the robot, use new batteries, and reassemble the jewel thief.

It took me about 3 hours just to remove the jewel thief and reassemble it to get it ready for rewiring. After this, someone who was better at electrical had to rewire the robot. In the end, the fix took close to 7 hours.

Aside from physical build, I also made a mistake on the software side. Being a novice at Github, I managed to create a collection of merge issues for our game repository. As a result, Tycho had to take about 2 hours to fix all merge conflicts and make the robot functional again. This again led to loss of driver practice-something we are very bad at.

Though I have made many failures recently, this post is also about the team as a whole. As a team, we have not been the best at organization. For example, after returning from Georgia, we left the poles for our tent in the middle of the backyard. Though we were very tired, we should have put the poles in a safe location. Since we neglected them, we now have to wash them because of rain damage in the following days. Another issue we have is phone and battery management. It is always exciting to be on the practice field driving around but we seem to forget about the most important thing: charging. After some driver practice, we seem to just leave the phone and used batteries on the field and go home. Therefore, we lose valuable time to charging, time that could be used for driver practice or autonomous testing. Finally, we are terrible at putting things back where they belong. If you look at our practice space currently, you cannot see one clean spot as it is either occupied with another chassis, some rev rails, or nuts/bolts. Spreading all these items around leads to not only decreased efficiency as we spend infinite amount of time looking for parts, but also an unappealing place to live for our coach and his family.

I have reflected on my failures and am working hard to make sure I don't make similar mistakes in the future. It is also time for the rest of the team to reflect on our negligence. After analyzing our weak points, we are slowly working towards fixing the mistakes. As an example, Kenna was able to clean up our table so we could finally see the wood underneath. Our team is now at the Championship level and we shouldn't make these mistakes simply due to laziness. As we continue on our journey it is important for us to grow from our failures and avoid them to reach maximum efficiency.

Controller Mapping

02 Apr 2018

Controller Mapping By Janavi

Task: Map the controller layout

At this point, we are training the next generation of the drivers on our team, and since we have so many buttons with so many different functions it can often become difficult for the new drivers to determine which button does what, so Karina and I created a map of the controller. By doing this, we not only assist others in determining what button they need to press to do what, but also help the coders in understanding the wants and needs of the drivers. This is because often times when we are coding we will set any function to any available button, just to test if it works. But oftentimes we don't change the button value after that and then there are either far too many buttons for the driver to easily control the robot, or the buttons are too far apart for easy access. Now, after creating this map the drivers were able to sit down together with the coders and map out the most effective controller in their minds together.

Next Steps:

We have planned that now as a part of our post-mortem discussion as well as discussion what could have been done to improve the robots functions as pertaining to code. We will also sit down and take out the controller map and determine if any of the buttons can be switched for easy driver control. This will not only lead to better, more efficient driving but will also lead to better communication between groups.

Elastics Testing

02 Apr 2018

Elastics Testing By Ethan

Task: Test wear and tear on our robot's bungees

This is the fifth or so article in our series on robotics testing. Today's spotlight will be on the constants of our robot's bungees, and how they're affected by various wear and tear. So, we took three bungees from the same set as the ones on our robot, and placed them in various places: stretched outside, stretched inside, and a control sitting in the robot room. The purpose of this is to see whether or not our bungees merit periodic replacements.

Procedure

  1. Cut three identical elastics
  2. Leaving one unstretched inside, place the other two stretched inside and outside
  3. Attach your chosen bungee to a 10 lb weight
  4. Positioning your hand 8 cm from the knot, pull upwards, recording this inital position as xi
  5. When the weight barely moves off of the ground, measure the knot-hand distance and record it as xf
  6. Using these values, calculate the elasticity constant for each bungee

Data

Run x-initial (m) x-final (m) Δx (m)
Normal .08 m .151 m .071 m
Inside .08 m .155 m .075 m
Outside .08 m .162 m .082 m

Calculations

W = 10 lbs = 44.482 N
x1 = .071 m, x2 = .075 m, x3 = .082 m
ΣF = Fsp - W = 0
Fsp = W
kx = W
k = W/x
k = 44.482/x
k1 = 626.51 N/m, k2 = 593.09 N/m, k3 = 542.46 N/m

Calulated Data

Run Elastic Constant (N/m)
Normal 626.51 N/m
Inside 593.09 N/m
Outside 542.46 N/m

Analysis

Assuming a standard deviation of 5%, we can perform a one-sample t-test to see if our results are statistically significant. We will test the inside/outside values against the contol.
Mean = 626.51 N/m
SD = 31.32
N = 3
α = .05
Ho: There is no significant difference between the unstretched band's elasticity and the stretched bands inside or outside Ha: There is a significant difference between either the band left unstretched and the bands left stretched inside or outside

For the elastic left inside, we found a p=.2058. For those not accustomed to statistics, this means that there is a ~20% chance that our results come from chance. This is too high of a probability to say whether or not to say that staying inside affects the elasticity of a band.

For the elastic left outside, we found a probability p=.0433. This means that there is a 4.33% probability that these results come from chance. For most journals, the minimum p-value, or α, is .05 = 5%. Thus, we can safely say that elastics left outside can be damaged and will not work on the same level as the untouched bands.

Conclusion

Given that we only found a statistically significant result for the band left outside, we cannot safely conclude much. That being said, these results suggest that we should replace bands before Worlds, as we leave our robot outside, but covered. As well, even with a 20% probability that there isn't a difference for the inside bands, it is still uncomfortable to say that there is absolutely no correlation. For these reasons, we suggest regular switching of the elastics on the robot.

Importance of Documentation

03 Apr 2018

Importance of Documentation By Abhi and Tycho

Task: Explain commits

As explained in a previous post, we were having many issues with git commits and fixing our errors in it. After a lot of the merging conflicts, we had to fix all the commits without exactly knowing what was being changed in the code. Part of the reason this was so hard was our lack of good naming conventions. Though we always try to make a title and good description for all posts, this doesn't always happen. This is precisely why it is important to check in all changes at every session with good descriptions. Someone had to spend their time mechanically trying to do merge conflicts without understanding the intent behind the code. So it took them longer, they may have made mistakes, an issue fixed by good documentation in the first place.

This post is dedicated to explaining some of the errors and what the commits true intentions were.

Stuff:

That one is mostly about code for the 3rd servo in the gripper open/close methods. It created the servo in pose and added code for it in GlyphSystem2.

4a6b7dbfff573a72bfee2f7e481654cb6c26b6b2:

This was for tuning the field oriented code to work. There were some errors with arrays in the way power was fed to the motors (null pointer exception) so I (Abhi) had to fix that. Also, I made some touch up edits with formatting in the methods. After all this, Tycho made (may have edited existing) a method in Pose for Viewforia demo. Minor changes were made to account for this.

c8ffc8592cd1583e3b71c39ba5106d48da887c66:

First part was all Argos edits at the museum to make it functional and fine tune some measurements. Second part involved the conveyor belt flipper. Tycho made changes to the dpad up and down to return to the home position rather than carry out complete motion (not sure if this carried over in all the commit mess but it was done theoretically). Driver practice will have to confirm changes.

Next Steps

Don't name things badly so this doesn't happen.

Build Kraken 2

07 Apr 2018

Build Kraken 2 By Janavi and Kenna

Task: Build a Pushbot (Kraken 2)

Building. It seems so simple but alas I was wrong, so wrong. During our post mortem, when we discussed our roles on the road to worlds, Kenna and I volunteered for building a pushbot. We both wanted to get more experience in building and thought this would be a perfect way to becoming well-versed in building. Our task was to create a drive base that, when placed on the field, would emulate a real robot on the field allowing our drivers to get more realistic practice. Our design for the pushbot imitates an earlier version of Kraken, just with side shields.

  1. To cut the pieces for the drivetrain, we needed to get trained for using the miter saw. Austin showed us and Abhi how to properly use one.
  2. After cutting the tetrix pieces, we followed an earlier design to create a square upon which we attached the wheels.
  3. We printed 3D custom motor mounts to mount the motor on. Often times the real motor mounts are very expensive, so we decided to used a CAD model. Now unbeknownst to both of us, we attached these lovely lads backwards. We did not realize our mistake until all motors and chains were already on the robot.
  4. The next step was to find the lazer cut side shields, which work as our wheel mounts. On our last robot we created custom 3D mounts for the mecanum wheels but these proved to be large, bulky, and limiting in terms of building space. So this year we designed side-shields that would hold the wheel in place while maximizing the 18 by 18 by 18 space we have. After searching for the shields for about 3 hours, we finally found them and placed them on the robot. Putting the wheels on after that was a breeze.
  5. Kenna and I set out the look for motors, sprockets, and motor collars. Sadly neither of us knew that both axle and motor collars existed and, after searching for so long, we had to go back and begin our search anew for motor collars. Finally, we were able to locate the required supplies and set to attaching the motors to the drive train.
  6. Finally, it was time to put on the chains connecting the wheels and motors. We learned how to find and remove the masterlink, as well as how to put the whole thing back together. For a short period of time, we flew into a panic because we couldn't find the masterlinks we had put aside, but soon we found them and put them onto the robot.

New Skills Learned:
  • Miter Saw
  • Handheld Drills
  • Chain Assembly
  • Trial and error is key

Next Steps: Finish and Code Chassis

Once we put the finishing touches on the chassis physically, we can begin coding it. Expect a new post on how we code it soon! Both of us are relatively new to coding robots so this should be interesting.

Discover Summer PREP U

07 Apr 2018

Discover Summer PREP U By Ethan, Charlotte, Austin, Evan, Kenna, Tycho, and Karina

Task: Volunteer at the DISD Discover Summer PREP event

Today, our sponsor volunteered our RV for DISD's Discover Summer PREP U. This is the week before Worlds, but luckily this event was from 9am-1pm, so it didn't interfere with our normal practice. The event was originally planned to be outside, but it was 39°F, well below the Dallas average April temperature of 57°F. This meant that we didn't get as many visitors as planned because we can't exactly park our RV inside, so we braved it alone. For the first few hours, we didn't realize that, so we sat all lonely inside. Finally, we realized our mistake and sent people in to demo our robots and invite people outside.

Once people heard the gospel of Iron Reign, we were flooded with visitors, and we were completely unprepared. We had a team member who fell asleep under a bench, and the masses of people trapped her underneath, and we had to wait for an oppurtune moment to free her. The RV had its usual two modes, with EV3 Sumo Bot programming in the front, and keychain printing in the back. We recently bought two new filament types, green and translucent blue, both of which produce higher quality prints and easier removal than the usual red filament.

Inside, we had people talking to the passerby, giving them the history of Iron Reign and other FIRST-related information. Austin and Tycho drove Argos and Kraken, drawing many interested visitors of all ages. We even saw the father of one of our former alums. We talked to the most people in there, but we still drew a decent amount of people to the RV.

Overall, we interacted with about 450 (Waiting on BigThought estimate) people. While not exactly as much as we hoped, this was still a decent showing for the weather.

Next Steps

This was our last outreach event before Worlds, and it was an successful one at that.

Upgrading Kraken

09 Apr 2018

Upgrading Kraken By Abhi

Task: Update CAD model

With FIRST Champs right around the corner, we needed to update our CAD model to match our current Kraken. After all, Kraken can't be lackin' any features. I decided to reopen Creo and make some modifications.

One of the most important things I needed to put on was the Relic arm. After planning on it for the whole season, we finally finished it recently. I made a quick CAD model for it in a separate assembly. The servo horn with a custom made circular disk for holding spool was attached via co-incident constraints. The linear slide system was represented with coinciding a set of REV rails to do this job. The elbow joint with actual grabber was done previously in another assembly. Once I finished the Relic arm assembly, I constrained it to the Robot model using coincident and distance constrains. I also made a small modification to the existing Jewel arm to account for the alignment on our actual robot. I used angle offset for this.

Next Steps:

Present this model to anyone who is interested in the specifics of our robot!

Autonomous Updates, Multi-glyph

10 Apr 2018

Autonomous Updates, Multi-glyph By Abhi

Task: Score extra autonomous glyphs

At super regionals, we saw all the good teams having multi glyph autonomi. In fact, Viperbots Hydra, the winning alliance captain, had a 3 glyph autonomous. I believed Iron Reign could get some of this 100 point autonomous action so I sat down to create a 2 glyph autonomous. We now have 3 autonomi, one of which is multiglyph.

I made a new methods called autonomous3(). For the starting settings (like driving off balancing stone and jewel points), I copied code from our existing autonomous program. After that, I realized that 10 seconds of the autonomous period had already been used by the time the robot had driven off the stone. That led me to think about ways to optimize autonomous after that point. I realized that if the gripper deployed as the robot was aligning itself with the balancing stone, it would save a lot of time. I also sped up the drive train speeds to lead to maximum efficiency. I had many runs of the fix though.

First time through, I ran the code and nothing happened. I realized that I forgot to call the actual state machine in the main loop. Dumb mistake, quick fix.

Second run: The robot drove off the balancing stone properly and was ready to pick up extra glyphs. Unfortunately, I flipped the motor directions to the robot rammed into the cryptobox instead of driving into glyph pit. Another quick fix.

Third run: The robot drove off stone and into glyph pit. However, it went almost into the Blue zone (I was testing from red side). Also, the robot would rotate while in the glyph pit, causing glyphs to get under the wiring and pull stuff out. I had to rewire a couple things then I went back to coding.

Fourth run: The robot drove off stone and into pit and collected one more glyph. The issue was that once the glyph was collected, the bot kept driving forward because I forgot to check the speeds again.

Fifth run: All the initial motions worked. However, I realized that the robot didn't strafe off as far as I needed it to reach the glyph pit. I added about .3 meters to the robot distance and tested again.

Sixth run: I don't know if anyone says 6th time is the charm but it was definitely a successful one for me. The robot did everything correctly and placed the glyph in the cryptobox. The only issue I had was that the robot kept backing away and ramming the cryptobox during end of auto. I fixed this easily by adding another autoState++ to the code.

Before I made the fix after the 6th run, I decided to take a wonderful video of the robot moving. It is linked below.

Next Steps:

Everything is ready to go to do a multiglyph autonomous. However, the robot doesn't score by the codex for the correct column. I need to implement that with IMU angles before Champs.

Robot Video Analysis

10 Apr 2018

Robot Video Analysis By Charlotte

Task: Determine the acceleration and max velocity experimentally

To find the acceleration and maximum velocity of our robot we decided to use a method we have learned in our physics class at school: video analysis with Logger Pro. The procedure is like so: Take a video of the robot head on with a still camera. In the video, in the same frame of movement as the robot, hold a known measuring device (ruler/meter stick). Insert the video into Logger Pro, use the ruler tool to set the distance of the measuring device you used to its length and use the point tool to place a point on the same part of the robot (like the front wheel) for every frame. You can see the collection of points in the image below:

Logger Pro automatically makes a displacement and velocity graph for X and Y. We are interested in the X direction unless your robot is flying. To make an acceleration graph, create a new calculated column that takes the derivative of the X velocity graph. Both graphs are shown below:

Finally it is time to analyze our data. To find max velocity: use the stats tool on the point where the velocity is done increasing and has become constant. To find the acceleration: in this case the acceleration is not constant, so we are looking to find the average acceleration in the beginning when the robot is speeding up from rest by using the stats tool again on the portion of the acceleration graph that occurs at the same time as the velocity initially increases, right before it becomes constant. These were our results:

Max Velocity: 1.67 m/s | Average Acceleration: 2.58 m/s^2

We did this video analysis in order to better understand our robot. We will use this information when we are making code changes to the robot in these last days before Worlds.

Next Steps:

We have made determined many aspects of our robot experientially, the coefficient of friction of our internal lift, etc. In the future we will use these skills to find out more abour our robot.

Relic Arm

12 Apr 2018

Relic Arm By Karina and Evan

Task: To have a working relic arm in time for Worlds

For weeks now, Team 6832 has been working hard to have a functional relic arm designed and mounted on the robot. We feel that it is absolutely necessary to be able to complete relic recovery at Worlds if we do not want to be crushed by the competition. Well, fear not, our relic arm is here!

Now, as you probably already know if you have seen our robot, Kraken is big and heavy. There’s not much space left to fit much of anything before different parts of the robot start interfering with each other. There is very little clearance left vertically and from the front to the back of the robot before we exceeded the 18 by 18 inch size limit.

Due to this, there was a bit of hesitance when it came to mounting the darn thing because it had seemed at first as if we would have to cut our beautiful side shields to be able to fit the relic arm onto the robot. However, we found a way around this.

First, I will briefly explain the design. There are two major components to the relic arm: the linear slide system and then the final metal bar that the “hand” of the relic arm is mounted on. The linear slide of the relic arm provides most of the extension length to the robot, and is what gets the “hand” across the walls of the field. A servo on the end of the linear slide system extends the final length of the arm, the part which grasps the relic. We felt that having this part at the end of the arm would give us more control when grabbing the relic, and help make it easier to balance the relic in endgame.

Anyway, because the final extension of the robot attached via a servo, this creates a distance between the two major components of the arm, which allowed us to fit the side shield in between the two. We still had to drill holes in the side shield, sadly, but this was much better than the alternative. We did not mount the arm directly by the slide system, of course. Instead, we attached another REV rail to the bottom of the slide system using double brackets, which created extra space for the side shield to fit in between the two components of the arm. Also, surprisingly enough, when we tested the grabber system, we found that despite the tight fit, the relic arm did not get in its way of the octopuckers when flipping upward or downward.

Where will we go from here?

Just because we finally have a relic arm does not mean we are done working on it. From now until Worlds, we will continue improving our relic recovery and tweaking the design of the arm along the way. We will have to fit time in for completing the challenge, but we have faith in our drive team!

REVolution on Thingiverse

13 Apr 2018

REVolution on Thingiverse By Abhi

Task: Publish REVolution Parts

Tired of slipping set screws? Want a rigid drive shaft as long or tall as your robot? Have a bunch of REV Rail lying around? Have we got a solution for you...

Turn your REV Rail into a beater-bar, a drive shaft or a heavy duty hinge with our Spintastic Axializer System … The REVolution System

Iron reign has developed these parts over the course of this season and they have served as essential pieces of our robot. Now you don't have to worry about snapping axles and those darn set screws. Choose your attachment plate, your internal pieces, and assemble them together! With this system, you robot can be efficient and flashy.

The parts are avaliable at

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2859442

If you need help with part assembly or printing, please contact us and we will be glad to help. Tutorial videos are in the process of being made. Details about the parts are listed below

Autonomous Updates, Multiglyph Part 2

15 Apr 2018

Autonomous Updates, Multiglyph Part 2 By Abhi, Karina, and Tycho

Task: Develop multiglyph for far Stone

We had a functional autonomous for the balacing stone close to the audience. However, chances are that our alliance partner would want that same stone since they could get more glyphs during autonomous. This meant that we needed a multiglyph autonomous for the far balancing stone. We went on an adventure to make this happen.

We programmed the robot to drive off the balancing stone and deploy the grippers as this occurred. To ensure the robot was off the stone before deploy, we utilized the roll sensor in the REV hub to determine whether the angle the robot was at was flat on the ground. This made our autonomous account for the error we could have on the balancing stone in terms of placement in the forward backward direction respective to the field. Next, we used an IMU turn into the glyph pit to increase our chances of picking up a second glyph. Then, we backed away and turned parallel to the cryptobox. The following motion was to travel to the field perimeter for a long period of time so that the robot will be pushing the field perimeter. This was done to correct any wrong angles and make grippers perpendicular to field wall. Then the robot backs up and scores the glyphs. Here is a video of it working:

Next Steps

Now we are speeding auto up and correcting IMU angles.

REV Rail Deformation and Faults of Design

15 Apr 2018

REV Rail Deformation and Faults of Design By Karina, Austin, and Abhi

Task: Analyze Source of Gripper break

As you can see from the video above, the REV rail twisted when the gripper rotated. Due to the high torque caused by intaking glyphs (4.02 Nm), the rails were required to turn very quickly. When we were designing the gripper, we didn't consider the friction among the nylon parts. Before we noticed the rails twisting, we heard squeaking noises (now we know its because of the high friction). The twisting led to the much slower grippers and a twisted frame.

To fix the issue, we needed to create less friction in the REVolution parts. We don't have enough time to remove the grippers and switch out the parts so we just used Teflon powder to lube the REVolution parts. It wasn't necessary to switch out the REV rail because since the twisting occurred uniformly. After testing the grippers again, the grabber moved properly.

Next Steps:

In order to not replicate the same issue, we must switch out the REVolution parts frequently. Even after Championships, we have Texas UIL so we can fix the gripper by then. Next year, we hope to use REVolution for our drive train, so we must be extremely careful with the parts.

Championship Scouting Sheet

16 Apr 2018

Championship Scouting Sheet By Abhi

Task: Publish Scouting Sheet for Houston

It is almost time for Championships and that means scouting time! Thank you everyone for contributing to the scouting sheet. The combined effort of all teams made this job easier for all of us. If you would like to view the sheet, visit tinyurl.com/HWC18

Relic Recovery Reveal Video

16 Apr 2018

Relic Recovery Reveal Video By Abhi and Austin

Task: Publish Robot Reveal

After a season of work, Iron Reign has the final version of Kraken ready for Championships. With it comes a video showing off its features. We filmed it moving in all sorts of ways. We also found pictures from this season of the team's design growth and outreach events, including having fun. You can view it here below!

Purpose:

The purpose of this video is to represent Iron Reign as a whole. FTC is not only about the robot but also about the journey there. We showed our thoughts over the season, including outreach events, scavenging polycarb, or illustrating the engineering process of grippers.

2018 Worlds Day One

18 Apr 2018

2018 Worlds Day One By Ethan, Evan, Kenna, Austin, Charlotte, Abhi, Tycho, Karina, Justin, Janavi, and Shaggy

Task: Present and play first match

It was a dark, surprisingly non-humid, Houston morning. Tarballs blew through the parking lot from dusty, abandoned oil refineries down by the bay. One by one, phones went off in the hotel looming above the lot, waking up their inhabitants. In these rooms, their occupants dusted off their Bucees wrappers and Iron Reign shirts and stumbled to the tournament.

The first day was relatively short, with a lot of waiting. There were two main parts of the day, presentation and first match.

Presentation
Our presentation went well. We were able to get all of our information across effectively and we got in-depth questions from all of the judges (including our first question about coding all season). Throughout questioning, we were able to hand off questions so that no individual member dominated the questioning time.
One problem we had with the presentation was that the rooms were constructed within the competition hall with fabric. This made it so that sound did not carry very well within the rooms, and that sound could carry over from other rooms, so the judges had difficulty hearing us at some points depending on the speaker. Despite this, we're confident that the majority of the information came across.

Game 1
We won this game, 319-152. Both us and KNO3 outdid ourselves in robot game, scoring more in autonomous that our opponents did the entire match. In telop, we lagged behind, but there was already no catching up for our opponents.

2018 Worlds Day Two

19 Apr 2018

2018 Worlds Day Two By Ethan, Evan, Kenna, Austin, Charlotte, Abhi, Tycho, Karina, Justin, Janavi, and Shaggy

Task: Compete in robot game

It was the beginning of Day 2. Our members rolled out of bed, covered in old Fiesta receipts and Chipotle wrappers. One by one, they stumbled onto their charter bus, unprepared for the new day.

Game 26
We lost this match, 213-401. Our robot wasn't working reliably on the field and we were still debugging issues. Because of this, there was only one true competing robot on blue, and it couldn't keep up against two bots.
Game 34
We won this match, 428-172. Both us and our partner had high-scoring autonomii and teleop, and we were able to score the relic while our opponents weren't.
Game 55
We won this match, 484-405. We were about evenly matched, but we were more than pushed over the top with the 180 penalty points from the other team. However, we were partnered with RedNek Robotics, the top team at the tournament, so we should've done better than a slight penalty win.
Game 73
We won this match, 459-441. At this point, we had gotten in the groove and were actually competitive in the robot game for once. We got 200+ points in autonomous *and* teleop, a feat that we'd never done before. While our competition was equally matched, we had a slight initial advantage that was never overcome.

We also entered the block design competition this day. AndyMark released a form on their Twitter a few weeks before to enter, and we requested 64 blocks. We settled on a throne design, using a bread carver to add more details. We had teams from all over gravitate to our pit to sit in our chair and get help in their own designs.

2018 Worlds Day Three

20 Apr 2018

2018 Worlds Day Three By Ethan, Evan, Kenna, Austin, Charlotte, Abhi, Tycho, Karina, Justin, Janavi, and Shaggy

Task: Compete in robot game

It was the beginning of Day 3. We awoke, covered in metal parts and broken servos, took our sleeping-caps off, and went off to the Houston Convention Center.

Game 82
We won this game, 467-442. This was personally, our best game. We went against the BLUE CREW and won, which was no small feat (they went undefeated until this match). On top of that, we completed a full cryptobox, which we had never done before.
Game 99
We lost this game, 254-333. Our autonomous didn't work well, so we lost a good amount of points. As well, we just couldn't keep up with the blue alliance in TeleOp.
Game 116
We lost this game, 431-492. Like the last, we just couldn't keep up with our opponents.
Game 131
We lost this game, 232-408. Our phone fell off our robot at the beginning and disconnected :(.

See awards information here.

Iron Reign earns FTC World Championship Motivate Award

22 Apr 2018

Iron Reign earns FTC World Championship Motivate Award

Last week at the FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) Robotics World Championship in Houston, Team 6832, Iron Reign, from the School of Science and Engineering in Dallas ISD earned the Motivate award which ranks them at the top in the outreach category.


Top Row: Justin Bonsell, Christian Saldana, Charlotte Leakey, Tycho Virani, Evan Daane, Austin Davis
Bottom: Janavi Chadha, Kenna Tanaka, Abhijit Bhattaru, Karina Lara and Ethan Helfman
coached by Karim Virani, Cathy Lux and Calvin Boykin

Each of the 5,200 active robotics teams this year is expected and encouraged to share their passion for robotics and all things Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) with younger students who haven't had the same opportunities. One hundred and twenty eight of these teams from around the world earned spots at this championship, including teams from the USA, Canada, Mexico, South America, the Middle East, the Pacific Rim and China. Iron Reign received this recognition for their work in creating, operating and sustaining the Mobile Tech eXPerience, an RV that they converted to a mobile STEM lab in order to support the work of Big Thought and the Dallas City of Learning Initiative.

On board the vehicle, students can learn to program one of sixteen sumo robots, design 3D objects and print them on one of the four 3D printers, learn to program in Scratch or create virtual worlds in Minecraft. The robotics team converted the vehicle and helped run the pilot program in summer 2016. This school year their goal has been to help Big Thought sustain the vehicle by continuing to support deployments, improve the curriculum and simply "make it loud." And now Big Thought is taking vehicle operations year-round. With this vehicle and accomplished instructors, Big Thought is bringing STEM exposure into under-served neighborhoods to help young students think of themselves as future engineers, scientists or technologists. This year alone the team has contributed 680 hours supporting 15 deployments of the vehicle to neighborhoods and large events. They've taught or spoken with over 3,400 students or parents at these events, and they've shared curriculum and the story of the vehicle nationwide by participating at the National Science Teachers Association STEM Expo.

This video will tell you more about the MXP from the perspective of the team members:

In the robot game the team finished 26 of 64 teams in their division, a good showing for a first-time Worlds team with a new young drive team. And Dr. Woodie Flowers, lead mentor of FIRST and Professor Emeritus at MIT signed and kissed our robot:

The team is fully appreciative of all of the support they've received this year. Special mention goes to Big Thought, Jeff Marx and Joe Schelanko of the Dallas ISD STEM Department, the SEM PTSA, the School of Science and Engineering staff and our advisor Calvin Boykin, Principal Andrew Palacios, Executive Director Tiffany Huitt and the tireless parents of all team members.

Please see the team website for more information. The team will be going to the UIL State Championship in Austin on May 18. Finally, here is our robot reveal:

School of Science and Engineering Freshman Orientation

26 Apr 2018

School of Science and Engineering Freshman Orientation By Austin and Shaggy

Task: Speak to 200 prospective recruits about Iron Reign

Today, we attended the Science and Engineering Magnet's annual freshman orientation. All prospective students are required to attend.

Since more than half of our team are going to graduating next year, we're already thinking about the 2019-2020 season. We want to start members early so we can ensure an effective transfer of knowledge between our rising juniors and new teammates. The best way to learn is through hands-on experience that this coming season could give them. This means that the recruiting season starts here and now.

We drove it through the crowd and spoke to over 20 families about our work in FTC, the robot, competition, and more. There were many kids who were very interested in FTC. We answered much more specific questions with them, like what the time commitment is, why we chose specific parts, etc. It was great to see such enthusiasm for STEM at such a young age! At one point, they started giving us building suggestions like where to add support bars.

Overall, the event was a big success. We made lots of meaningful connections with incoming students and have some prospective members. We look forward to attending next year and maybe welcoming some new teammates.

You can watch a short video of the event here

Finishing the Chassis

29 Apr 2018

Finishing the Chassis By Kenna and Janavi

Task: Build a Chassis

We have been working on this chassis for over 3+. In out last post, we had thought the wheels were ready to go. However, various parts, such as wheel mounts, had been put on backwards or were unusable so we had to do everything over again.
Now that the robot has wheels, we started on attaching the REV expansion hub and battery. The chassis is square, but has an asymmetrical structure of tetrix bars. Attaching the battery was the simple part since previous version of the robot had a 3D-printed battery holder that would be screwed on. There was no way to effectively place the expansion hub on the tetrix rails. Instead, we attached a thin plank of wood to two parallel bars, drilled a couple holes, and screwed the hub on.
Overall, it is a very no-frills chassis. We had to cut most of the side shields off because they were becoming more of an obstruction than an aid.

Next Steps

Though the physical robot has been built, it has no code. Both of us will be learning how to program a basic pushbot.

UIL 2018

18 May 2018

UIL 2018 By Abhi, Karina, Evan, Janavi, Austin, Justin, and Shaggy

Task: Attend the 2018 UIL Robotics Competition

Background

For those who don't know, UIL Robotics is the premier state robotics competition for Texas. Iron Reign has been a beta-testing partner since its inception, and this year was the event's first year as a full-fledged program.

To participate in UIL, a team must win at a Regional level, and have a good overall showing. This year, since we got 2nd Inspire at Regionals and 3rd Inspire at Oklahoma Regionals, we were a shoo-in for an invitation. Being a state event, the DISD STEM Dept. supported us through transportation, food, and lodging along with other DISD teams such as Mechanicats.

The Night Before

As with all Iron Reign tournaments, we stayed up way longer than we should have. But, unlike other times, we had a purpose: to help fellow teams.

We assisted the other DISD team, Mechanicats with programming and driver practice. In particular, they didn't have a working autonomous to begin with. But, with our half-field and glut of programmers, we helped them create a basic autonomous for the next day. As well, we collaborated on their TeleOp to make it more driver-friendly.

The Day Of

We walked into the tournament, tired, but excited for the last tournament of the season, led by our two robots, Kraken and C.A.R.T. BOT. Kraken is our Relic Recovery robot; a tank on wheels with specially cut aluminum sideplates and our proprietary REVolution system. So, it got plenty of looks. Then, we also brought the newest addition to the Iron Reign family: CART BOT. CART BOT is the automated corpse of our robot cart. For the past month, we've been tearing it down, replacing its wheels, motorizing it, adding a power source, and so much more. It tops out at 20 MPH and can carry 300 lbs. without blinking an eye. Naturally, we thought UIL was the perfect place to bring it out.

Since UIL is the last tournament of the season and has no real consequences, we use it as a trial field for next year's changes. First, we had Evan lead our pit crew team as practice for next year. As well, we used the competition to practice driving for next year as well as improve our scouting strategies after worlds.

One of the best things about UIL is the ability to really interact with other Texas-area teams that we normally wouldn't see until Supers. A lot of the teams came over to see our robot, which is kind of understandable because it's probably the best robot we'll ever build. But, we had a surprising number of teams come up to talk to us about our Engineering Journal, including people who had already seen our journal online and wanted to talk about it to us in person (Vitruvian Voltage).

Robot Performance

Even though we enjoy UIL, it's never our best competition of the year. Some of this is due to exhaustion; we tend to run out of steam by then, but it can also be attributed to that UIL is a robot-game intensive event, and Iron Reign tends to focus more on awards. So, we tend to comparatively underperform as compared to a theoretical Iron Reign stand in.

We started off the day in a bad place, as one of the chains on the robot snapped for the first time in the season. However, we still managed to win the match as we were carried by our partner. But, we managed to do decently in the next four matches. This wasn't entirely due to luck, it was just that we had more competition experience than some of the other teams due to Worlds, and were able to perform more effectively.

Luckily, our scouting paid off, and we were chosen as the first pick of the #1 alliance. We won our first final match, but then lost the next two due to unreliability.

The UIL Difference

Unlike FTC, UIL puts much less of an emphasis on judging. First, there aren't any presentations: everything is done at the pit. In addition, UIL judges are FRC first, and FTC second, so they weren't aware of many differences between the two. Finally, the awards mean nothing.

Next Steps

This was the last competition of the season, so now Iron Reign will go into Funding, Outreach, and Recruitment mode for a while for the next season, but keep track of our blog to see what we'll do next. Relic Recovery '17-'18, signing off.

Contacting Mark Cuban

23 May 2018

Contacting Mark Cuban By Abhi

Task: Get Funding from Mark Cuban

At the World Championship this year, Dean Kamen, the founder of FIRST, talked about getting celebrity involvement in the robotics program. Very few celebrities support FIRST (will.i.am being the biggest) and will.i.am. sent a request through Kamen to all teams to reach out to close by celebrities to get them involved in FIRST. As I sat in the crowd at Minute Maid Park, Kamen's words stuck with me on my journey home. I thought about how cool it would be to have celebrities support Iron Reign. However, I had no idea who to contact.

Still on the quest, I sat down to watch TV one day. As I scrolled through the channels, I found Shark Tank (one of my favorite shows). Then it hit me: I wanted Mark Cuban, a Dallas native, to support Iron Reign.

Mark Cuban, investor on Shark Tank and the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, has been very important to Dallas. I decided to reach out to him to see if he would be willing to support us. I asked people at school if anyone knew Cuban or knew people who knew him. Luckily, my friend's father went to the same gym as him! Through my friend (Amanda), I reached out to Cuban. I drafted an email which would be sent through Amanda to Cuban.

Next Steps:

Now all I can do is wait for a reply!

Response from Mark Cuban

24 May 2018

Response from Mark Cuban By Abhi

Task: Reply to Cuban

After sending a small email to Cuban, he replied very soon asking for more details (shown above)! With this, I felt more confident I could make things happen. In my following email, I provided more details explaining the FTC program, from last year's challenge (Relic Recovery) to the work we have done for Dallas. I also asked to present to Cuban about the team since Iron Reign tends to get information across best through presentations.

Next Steps:

Once again, it's time to wait for a reply!

Conversing with Mark Cuban

26 May 2018

Conversing with Mark Cuban By Abhi, Ethan, Janavi, Christian, Kenna, and Charlotte

Task: Explain Iron Reign

Once again, we got a positive response from Cuban! Unfortunately, we couldn't meet in person but I was still pursuing the sponsor path. For the next message, I decided to get some other members of the team on the project. Since this was our one shot to convince him, I drafted a much longer sponsor email, inspired by older emails to our sponsors. In this email, we provided specifics into what we can do with Cuban's support. With a monetary donation, we will either spend money on robot parts or save it to act as a seed donation for kick-starting a non-profit organization for Iron Reign. Since we are somewhat limited in our monetary abilities due to DISD "red tape", we wanted to develop this organization to better fund our team for years to come. Explaining all these details, our email came to a close. However, I still wanted for Cuban to "meet" the members of the team. From this stance, I decided that making a video from our team members would do the job. After some quick script writing, we developed the video shown below!

Next Steps:

Again, we wait for a reply!

Iron Reign sponsored by Mark Cuban

01 Jun 2018

Iron Reign sponsored by Mark Cuban By Abhi

In this post, I would like to thank Mr. Cuban for supporting Iron Reign. Today, we received a message from Mark Cuban's assistant stating that he would be contributing $2500 to Iron Reign. There is no end to how much this helps our team for the following season.

FIRST is an organization dedicated to promoting young minds in STEM. However, to participate in the program (specifically the Tech Challenge), many materials are needed. A successful team often needs funding to sustain itself for years to come. Mr. Cuban has allowed Iron Reign to actualize this through his support. With his help, we hope to continue to influence young children through our outreach and build better robots. Hopefully, we can return to the World Championship and bring Mr. Cuban to the greatness of FIRST.

Swerve Drive Experiment

02 Jun 2018

Swerve Drive Experiment By Abhi

Task: Consider a Swerve Drive base

Last season, we saw many robots that utilized a swerve drive rather than the mecanum drive for omnidirectional movement. To further expand Iron Reign's repertoire of drive bases, I wanted to further investigate this chassis. Swerve was considered as an alternative to swerve because of its increased speed in addition to the maneuverability of the drive base to allow for quick scoring due to its use of traction wheels at pivot angles. Before we could consider making a prototype, we investigated several other examples.

Among the examples considered was the PRINT swerve for FTC by team 9773. After reading their detailed assembly instructions, I moved away from their design for many reasons. First, the final cost of the drive train was very expensive; we did not have a very high budget despite help from our sponsors. If this drive train was not functional or if the chassis didn't make sense to use in Rover Ruckus, we would have almost no money for an alternate drive train. Also, they parts used by 9773 involved X-rail rather than extrusion rail from REV. This would cause problems in the future as we would need to redesign the REVolution system for X-rail.

Another example was from team 9048 which appeared to be more feasible. Because they used REV rail and many 3D printed parts, this was a more feasible prototype. Because they didn't have a parts list, we had the find the rough estimate of cost from the REV and Andymark websites. Upon further analysis, we realized that the cost, though cheaper than the chassis of 9773, would still be a considerable chunk of our budget.

At this point it was evident most swerve drives being used are very expensive. Wary of making this investment, I worked with our sister team 3734 to create a budget swerve with materials around the house. A basic sketch is listed below.

Next Steps

Scavenge for parts in the house and Robodojo to make swerve modules.

Swerve Drive Prototype

09 Jun 2018

Swerve Drive Prototype By Abhi and Christian

Task: Build a Swerve Drive base

Over the past week, I worked with Christian and another member of Imperial to prototype a drive train. Due to the limited resources. we decided to use Tetrix parts since we had an abundance of those. We decided to make the swerve such that a servo would turn a swerve module and the motors would be attached directly to the wheels.

Immediately we noticed it was very feeble. The servos were working very hard to turn the heavy module and the motors had trouble staying aligned. Also, programming the chassis was also a challenge. After experimenting further, the base even broke. This was a moment of realization. Not only was swerve expensive and complicated, we also would need to replace a module really quickly at competition which needed more resources and an immaculate design. With all these considerations, I ultimately decided that swerve wasn't worth it to use as a drive chassis at this time.

Next Steps

Consider and prototype other chassis designs until Rover Ruckus begins.

Big Wheel Ideas

23 Jun 2018

Big Wheel Ideas By Janavi

Task: Create a Unique Chassis

This summer, we're working on creating unique chassis that are outside of our comfort zone. Often we choose safe bases - opting for ones that we have tried in the past and know work. But, taking the opportunity to explore unique bases allows us to see their performance. One of our ideas is for a two-wheeled robot, with two large wheels and one, smaller, non-motorized omniwheel. We think that this 2-wheeled robot would be a good opportunity for Iron Reign, as we know that our robot has to be lighter than the Relic Recovery robot and a non-mecanum drive would be much lighter. Here is a drawing of what we plan the chassis to look like:

To make this chassis the most efficient based on what we currently know about the competition (light weight robot needed) we are planning to do different tests and calculations to determine the proper motor-gear ratio needed and the wheel locations to properly balance the robot. We also need to perform tests to determine the best material to use for the robot. In the past we've used REV rails for the majority of our structure but due to the weight limit on our robot we plan to minimize metal in our design rather opting for materials that are just as functional but weight less.

Next Steps

Perform calculations comparing different motors as well as different wheel ratios to determine the optimal ratios

Turn Up! at Dallas Love Field

23 Jun 2018

Turn Up! at Dallas Love Field By Justin, Ethan, Charlotte, Kenna, Abhi, and Evan

Task: Present at the Dallas Love Field for the DCOL Turn Up! Event

Every year, the Frontiers of Flight Museum hosts Turn Up!, an event where kids can learn about science and math. Once again, we brought the MXP equipped with 3D printers, Lego sumobots, and our world class FTC robot, Kraken. We ran the sumobots on a table outside of the MXP and 3D printing inside. We also demoed Kraken and Argos, which were great attention grabbers to get kids interested in the MXP. The kids enjoyed programming the Lego sumobots and battling them against each other, as well as creating their very own customized 3D printed key chain. The 3D printers were very busy this year so we had to create extra space outside of the MXP for more laptops with the 3D printing software.

We drove Kraken around the exhibition room and talked to many interested parents about the joy of robotics. While we talked to the parents, someone driving the robot would showcase the capabilities of Kraken by bringing kids glyphs and shaking hands with the relic arm. Kraken was great for showing families what FTC is about. We also had Argos for display but the steering was broken so we didn't drive it. Around 1100 people turned up to the event and we talked to most of them about what we do here at Iron Reign. Turn Up was a great opportunity to introduce kids to the world of STEM and robotics and we hope to have more opportunities like this in the future.

2018-19 Connect and Outreach Strategy

30 Jun 2018

2018-19 Connect and Outreach Strategy By Ethan

Task: Discuss Iron Reign's Awards Strategy for the Upcoming Season

FTC is undergoing a series of changes next year that will most likely negatively impact Iron Reign's ability to advance to further levels. Given that there are about 5,400 teams in FTC for the 2017-2018 season and 256 teams advance to worlds, 4.7% of teams advanced to worlds this year. Next year however, the amount of teams will increase, but the amount of domestic teams advancing to worlds will stay the same. Effectively, the percentage of teams advancing to Worlds will decrease, so that some regions may lose advancement spots.

The best plan to advance is still a dual focus on awards and game. So, we need to up our game. Talking about our RV, while still impressive, has lost its luster with Dallas-area judges. We're still using the RV, and doing our normal outreach, but we plan to aggressively pursue business and engineering contacts. We've already received around $5,000 from individual donors, and received a separate $2,500 grant from Mark Cuban. In addition, members of our team are working at companies such as Verizon, ESi, Abbott, Parkland, and more; all the while gaining contacts in those industries.

We have our work cut out for us, this year will be additionally challenging, losing one of our coders and one builder. We're training people in the skillsets that we're losing out over the summer, and we're also seeking FRC teams to mentor (we want to flip the traditional dichotomy of FRC teams training FTC teams on its head). We really want to get to Worlds this year - its the last year that any of the original members are on the team, and we want to go out with a bang.

Next Steps

  • Seek further business and engineering connections
  • Extend assistance for FIRST outreach
  • Continue team training
  • Continue RV outreach
  • Seek continued grants from TWC and other TX sponsors

CNC Machine Rehab 1

01 Jul 2018

CNC Machine Rehab 1 By Ethan and Charlotte

Task: Refurbish an Apple II CNC Mill and Lathe Set

We were helping our school's FRC team clean out their parts closet, which hadn't been cleaned in 10-ish years. Under the layers and layers of FRC junk, we found an Apple II-operated Patterson/Paxton CNC Milling Set. These were meant to run off of a long-since-gone Apple II in a classroom setting. But, it had long been auctioned off, leaving the set useless. But, Iron Reign, as a collective of hoarders, decided to bring these machines over to the house to refurbish.

The first idea we looked at was emulating the Apple II with an Arduino, as seen here. However, this implementation didn't have the response rate needed for an accurate CNC machine, so we scrapped it. Then, we found this post. The problem that people mainly encounter is that, for some strange reason, Paxton\Patterson used a proprietary parallel port pinout, and deviating from that pinout (read: using a standard parallel cord) would fry the optidriver board in the machine. So, we bought a ethernet-to-parallel port jumper box (UC300eth).

We then sliced a parallel cable in half, and rewired the wires to the pins, treating the left column of that of the port numbers on the board and the right as the pin numbers of the cables.



We then made a power supply for the UC300eth. We attempted to use a 10V DC power supply, and use a voltage splitter. Unfortunately, the power spiked, and probably fried the UC300.

Next Steps

We need to buy a new UC300 board and hook it up to a laptop with Mach3 to test the power.

2018-2019 Recruitment

14 Jul 2018

2018-2019 Recruitment By Ethan

Task: Recruit members for the upcoming robotics season

At the end of last season, we had two members graduate, Austin and Tycho. Their upcoming "goodbye" posts will be posted here, the same as last year. So, we wanted to recruit at least one member to replace them. Recruitment methods that we had used in the past, such as posters and Townview recruitment seminars, had failed to gain any meaningful recruitment. So, we fell back on our secondary, having individual team members submit possible recruits, as well as recruiting from our JV team. This year, we already have Justin. Last year, we had Kenna and Abhi as a submitted recruit. The year before, we had Janavi and Austin.

These prospective recruits are required to fill out a Google Form on our website, titled signup. We had this post stickied for the better part of last year. Of all the people who were asked to fill out this form, we had three people respond, with a fourth potential recruit being the younger sibling of our leaving members. Our current step is vetting the current recruits - we have two interested in coding, one in building, and one no-show. We're giving the recruits tasks to weed them out, the ones that are less experienced will be shunted back into our JV team.

Next Steps

We will recruit 1-3 members out of these recruits and teach them the other aspects that they don't have experience in: writing, code, tools, etc.

Central Public Library Outreach Event

14 Jul 2018

Central Public Library Outreach Event By Ethan, Kenna, Charlotte, and Evan

Task: Present at the J. Erik Jonsson Public Library

This Saturday, we drove down to the J. Erik Jonsson library to present at the Dallas City of Learning Discovery Fair. We brought our sumo-bot equipment to the library, as well as a few of our new and old bots, such as cartbot (a mobile air cannon), bigwheel (a new testing robot), and Kraken (our Worlds robot).

We presented for about 4 hours, talking to about 190 kids. We had multiple parents interested in starting FLL teams, and many other children entertained by our new mobile cannon.

Position Tracking

18 Jul 2018

Position Tracking By Abhi

Task: Design a way to track the robot's location

During Relic Recovery season, we had many problems with our autonomous due to slippage in the mecanum wheels and our need to align to the balancing stone, both of which created high error in our encoder feedback. To address this recurring issue, we searched for an alternative way to identify our position on the field. Upon researching online and discussing with other teams, we discovered an alternative tracker sensor with unpowered omni wheels. This tracker may be used during Rover Ruckus or beyond depending on what our chassis will be.

We designed the tracker by building a small right angular REV rail assembly. On this, we attached 2 omni wheels at 90 degrees to one another and added axle encoders. The omni wheels were not driven because we simply wanted them to glide along the floor and read the encoder values of the movements. This method of tracking is commonly referred to as "dead wheel tracking". Since the omnis will always be touching the ground, any movement will be sensed in them and prevents changes in readings due to defense or drive wheel slippage.

To test the concept, we attached the apparatus to ARGOS. With some upgrades to the ARGOS code by using the IMU and omni wheels, we added some basic trigonometry to the code to accurately track the position. The omni setup was relatively accurate and may be used for future projects and robots.

Next Steps

Now that we have a prototype to track position without using too many resources, we need to test it on an actual FTC chassis. Depending on whether or not there is terrain in Rover Ruckus, the use of this system will change. Until then, we can still experiment with this and develop a useful multipurpose sensor.

Moon Day 2018

21 Jul 2018

Moon Day 2018 By Karina, Ethan, Janavi, and Charlotte

Task: Reach out to the community and spread the magic of robotics

Iron Reign had a great time today at the Frontiers of Flight Museum for the 2018 Moon Day. We demoed three of our robots today: Argos, Kraken, and Big Boi. Kids were very interested in watching our robots drive. Big Boi was a fan-favorite because of its speed and the attached can launcher. Kids were also given the opportunity to drive Argos around. We were also able to interest kids in FTC when we explained Kraken, our robot from the previous season and demonstrated how it could pick up glyphs. In total, we spoke to approximately 200 individuals.

Besides driving our finished robots, we made progress on Garchomp, another robot with mecanum drive serving as a replica for Kraken. We explained our design to people and why we like the mecanum drive so much. Many parents were interested in getting their children involved in a robotics team because they could see the build process at its middle stages in Garchomp and as well as the finished product in Kraken.

Next Steps

Here at Iron Reign, we value the community's interest in robotics. We will continue to make ourselves and our robots accessible to the community at future outreach event, and we will also encourage kids to get involved in STEM.

Chassis Flyer

22 Jul 2018

Chassis Flyer By Ethan

Kraken

This is Iron Reign’s world-championship robot from last season. The basic rundown is this:

  • Weight - 42 lbs
  • Size - 18x17.8x17.5 inches
  • Drive - Mecanum
  • Main parts kit - REV

Iron Reign uses two design processes in conjunction with each other to create efficient and reliable parts: iterative, continual improvement and competitive design.

An example of these design processes working in conjunction is the process of designing our cryptobox intake system. One person had the idea to build an arm-style grabber seen on many current competition robots. His design, however, included shorter arms for space’s sake and a more compact lift system than normal. The second person decided to build a unique conveyor-belt system which used friction to hold blocks in space and move them vertically. Through the competition, we determined that the prior design was more efficient and took up less space than the latter, so we settled on his design, adding in a linear slide for lifting at the end of the process. Then, Kaizen comes in. Through firsthand experience in scrimmages, we learned that the grabber system isn’t as reliable as we thought when first testing. So, we have designed a new grabber system that moves like the arms did previously, but also rotate with soft spikes attached to hold blocks with friction better without damaging them.

As this soft-spike system ceased to perform to our expectations, we looked to other mechanisms to pick up and deliver blocks effectively. We created a new grabber that still used the rotating systems of the soft-spike, but instead, we used custom 3D printed “octopuckers” which had a much tighter grip on the glyphs. As well, inside the gripper, we created a custom “lift” made out of NinjaFlex so that the blocks could be moved up and down internally in the gripper, eliminating our need for stacking.

Later, we further improved upon the grabber design, attaching it to a conveyor belt so that we could move glyphs all across our robot in order to score higher, using our REVolution system. This is the most ambitious use of our REVolution system yet, and we strongly encourage the reading judges to view it at the pits.

BigWheel

The main purpose of this robot is to see if larger wheels will give us an advantage in the competition. Right now, we’re guessing that the competition field will have debris, and we hope that the large wheels will perform better in this environment.

  • Size: ~18x18 in
  • Wheels - 8in large, regular omni wheels in front
  • Part System: Custom parts

Garchomp

For skill development we have newer builders replicating the chassis portion of our competition robot (Kraken). This one will not be weighed down by the additional upper structure of the competition robot and so should be a closer comparison in weight class to most of the other chassis designs under consideration here. Garchomp has a simplistic design and is nothing more than mechanums, rev rails, motors, sprockets, wires, and a rev hub. The large mechanums are held together using side plates from the 2017-18 competition season. These are geared up to neverest 40:1 motors.

  • Size: ~18x18 in
  • Wheels: Mechanum
  • Part System: REV
  • Motors: Neverest 40:1

Summer Chassis Project - July Meeting

22 Jul 2018

Summer Chassis Project - July Meeting By Kenna, Ethan, Charlotte, Karina, Shaggy, and Abhi

Task: Compare & Collaborate on Chassis

At Big Thought's offices in downtown Dallas, three teams met. Technicbots (Team 8565), EFFoRT (Team 8114), Schim Robotics (12900), and Iron Reign are all part of the North Texas Chassis Project. The goal is for each team to create any number of chassis and improve their building skills by learning from the other teams.

The meeting began with an overview of all teams' progress. Each team presented their thought process and execution when creating each bot and discussed why/how everything was done. At the end, we all reviewed the rule changes for the 2018-19 season. Once all questions had been asked and answered, testing began.

Austin Lui of Technicbots gets their chassis ready for testing.

Using leftover tiles from last season, we set up a small field in Big Thought's blue room. Technicbots provided a ramp to do enhanced testing with. All teams plan on testing:

  • Forward speed
  • 3 second turn
  • Up/Down ramp
  • Balancing stone
  • Weight-pulling
  • Straight line drift
  • 90/180° turn offset

Connor Mihelic of EFFoRT adds some finishing touches.

We know from Google Analytics that our website has about 200 visitors a month but we rarely meet the people who read and use our blog posts. Today, we got to meet the mentors of Team 12900 from a middle school in Plano, TX. When they and their students were starting out as a team, they utilized our tutorials and journal. Apparently their teams members are avid followers of our team, which was very meaningful to hear. Some non-FTC friends visited as well and were introduced to cartbot.


Terri and Grant Richards of Schim Robotics.

Next Steps

Using what we learned from the other teams, we will begin to improve all of our chassis. Most of them are at varying levels of completion so now we want to concentrate on getting all of them to the same level of functionality. Garchomp is, notably, the most behind so he will be getting the most attention from here on out.

Replay Autonomous

28 Jul 2018

Replay Autonomous By Arjun

Task: Design a program to record and replay a driver run

One of the difficulties in writing an autonomous program is the long development cycle. We have to unplug the robot controller, plug it into a computer, make a few changes to the code, recompile and download the code, and then retest our program. All this must be done over and over again, until the autonomous is perfected. Each autonomous takes ~4 hours to write and tune. Over the entire season, we spend over 40 hours working on autonomous programs.

One possible solution for this is to record a driver running through the autonomous, and then replay it. I used this solution on my previous robotics team. Since we had no access to a field, we had to write our entire autonomous at a competition. After some brainstorming, we decided to write a program to record our driver as he ran through our autonomous routine and then execute it during a match. It worked very well, and got us a few extra points each match.

Using this program, writing an autonomous program is reduced to a matter of minutes. We just need to run through our autonomous routine a few times until we're happy with it, and then take the data from the console and paste it into our program. Then we recompile the program and run it.

There are two parts to our replay program. One part (a Tele-op Opmode) records the driver's motions and outputs it into the Android console. The next part (an Autonomous Opmode) reads in that data, and turns it into a working autonomous program.

Next Steps

Our current replay program requires one recompilation. While it is very quick, one possible next step is to save the autonomous data straight into the phone's internal memory, so that we do not have to recompile the program. This could further reduce the time required to create an autonomous.

One more next step could be a way to easily edit the autonomous. The output data is just a big list of numbers, and it is very difficult to edit it. If we need to tune the autonomous due to wear and tear on the robot, it is difficult to do so without rerecording. If we can figure out a mechanism for editing the generated autonomous, we can further reduce the time we spend creating autonomous programs.

SEM Nest Outreach

02 Aug 2018

SEM Nest Outreach By Arjun

Task: Present about STEM to new freshmen at SEM

Today Iron Reign presented at the New Student Orientation (NEST) camp at our school, SEM. All incoming freshman were there. We had two sessions, one with 3D modeling, and another with sumo-bots. We also drove around two of our robots from last year, Kraken and Argos. We gave the freshmen chances to drive around these robots. Most of the students were very interested in our presentation, and a few even signed up to join Iron Reign because of it. We spoke with around 160 students.

Next Steps

Here at Iron Reign, we value the community's interest in robotics, especially the students at our school. We will continue to make ourselves and our robots accessible to the community at future outreach events, and we will also encourage kids to get involved in STEM. We hope to recruit many of the students who were interested in robotics from our meeting.

C.A.R.T. Bot Summer Project

12 Aug 2018

C.A.R.T. Bot Summer Project By Evan, Abhi, and Janavi

Task: Enhance our robot-building skills

At Iron Reign, we hate to waste the summer since it’s a great time to get all the ridiculous builds out of the way. Thus, we created C.A.R.T. Bot (Carry All our Robotics Tools). Our constant companion these last few seasons has been our trusty Rubbermaid utility cart which has been beaten and abused, competition after competition, as it carried all our tools and robots. Because of all of this, we decided it was time to show the cart a little love, and in typical Iron Reign fashion, we went all out and turned it into a robot.

Our first step was to switch out the back wheels on it to elf-sized bicycle wheels, allowing us to take on the mightiest of curbs and motorize it. To attach the wheels, a four foot or so cylinder of threaded steel was inserted in holes on either side of the cart. Two slots were cut out in the bottom for the wheels and they were eventually slid on, but not after 3D printed mounts for sprockets were attached to the wheels, enabling us to gear them in a one to one ratio with the sprocket attached to the motors, which consisted of two SIM motors commonly found on FRC robots.

Before we used SIM motors, we attempted to power the cart using two Tetrix motors which were geared for speed but, due to load, barely moved at all. Besides a lack of power, they also tended to come out of alignment, causing a terrible noise and causing the cart to come to a stall. This was quickly scrapped. To mount the motors, we used two pieces of aluminum bars and bolted them to the motors, then screwed them to the floor of the cart, aligned with the wheels. We chained them together and got about powering the system. We got two 12-volt batteries and chained them in parallel so as to not overload the system, and hooked them up to a REV hub. Then, we ran them through a switch and breaker combination. We connected the motors to the rev hub and once we had it all powered up, we put some code on it and decided to take it for a spin.

It worked surprisingly well, so we went back in and put the finishing touches on the base of Cart Bot, mainly attaching the top back on so we could put stuff on top of it, and cutting holes for switches and wires to run through, to make it as slick as possible. We added a power distribution station to assist with the charging and distribute current to any device we decided to charge on the cart. We will eventually hook this up to our new and improved battery box we plan on making in the few spare moments we’ll have this season, just a quick quality of life improvement to make future competitions go smoothly.

Next Steps

Our cart box isn’t done yet, as we intend to make a mount for a solar panel, which we will be able to charge the cart during the downtime in competitions (only if there’s a good window we can park it next to). The cart wasn’t just about having a cool new and improved cart that we don’t have to push (which it is), it also was a test of our engineering skills, taking things that never should have been and putting them together to make something that we will utilize every competition. We learned so much during this experience, I for one learned how to wire something with two batteries as not to destroy the system, as for everyone else, I can’t speak for all but I think we learned a very important lesson on the dangers of electricity, mainly from the height of the sparks from an accidental short that happened along the way. Despite this, the cart came out great and moves smoother than I ever could have hoped. The thing is a real blast and has provided a lot of fun for the whole team, because yes, it is ridable. We predict the speed it’s set at is only a fifth of its full potential speed, and since it already goes a tad on the fast end we don't intend to boost it anymore while there’s a rider on it. Overall, the project was a success, and I’m personally very proud of my work as I’m certain everyone else is too. Come to see it at our table, I really think it’s worth it.

Best Buy Grant

14 Aug 2018

Best Buy Grant By Ethan

Task: Receive a grant from Best Buy for continued MXP operation

Last year, we received a $10,000 award to continue our RV operations, cover staffing costs, and pay for additional technology\repairs. This year, we received another grant of $10,000 for the same reason. This is another stepping stone in keeping Iron Reign and BigThought's MXP program sustainable for another year. In addition, any donation amount encourages more donations in a kind-of snowball effect.

Next Steps

We will continue to seek out grants for not only the MXP, but also so that our team can remain sustainable for years to come.

Dallas Back to School Fair

18 Aug 2018

Dallas Back to School Fair By Ethan and Kenna

Task: Present at the Dallas Back to School Fair at O.W. Holmes

Today we brought the MXP over to O.W. Holmes Academy in South Oak Cliff for our usual presentation. We spoke to about 130 children, doing our usual sumobots and 3D printing sessions.

Next Steps

We have a few more outreach events before our season goes into full swing, so we need to get in touch with as many people as possible.

Adjusting Garchomp's Chains

18 Aug 2018

Adjusting Garchomp's Chains By Janavi and Kenna

Task: Build the Chassis

In our last post, we thought that we had finished Garchomp. However, as we came back to the next practice, we realized that Garchomp's chains were incorrectly linked.

So, we started to diagnose the problem. We noticed that the old REV rails we were using had dents in them, which caused the motors to shift, therefore causing the chains to come off the gears.

To amend this problem, we decided to replace the REV rails ensuring that the motors would not shift during movement. To accomplish this we:

  • First, we loosened all of the screws on the current bar, carefully slid it out, and replaced it with new bars
  • Then we fixing all of the chains and confirming that each of them were individually working
  • we re-attached all of the cables to the robot
  • Ran a stress-tester program and hung the robot on a hook to allow us to properly observe the wheels
Due to our tests we discovered that our wheels were running at different speeds, meaning that our robot constantly moved in circles. After checking that the motors were working, we discovered that it was our encoder cables that were plugged in wrong. After that, Garchomp began to run smoothly.

Next Steps

We will run more stress tests on our robot and make sure that it is up to par with our past robots.

My Summer at MIT

19 Aug 2018

My Summer at MIT By Abhi

Task: Spend a Summer at MIT

Hello all! You might have been wondering where I went the entire summer while Iron Reign was busily working on tasks. Well for those of you interested, I was invited to spend a month at MIT as part of the Beaverworks program. I worked in the Medlytics course and analyzed medical data using machine learning methods. This seems distant from the work we do in FTC but I learned some valuable skills we could potentially use this season. But before I discuss that, I want to talk about the work I did while I was away.

Traditionally, machine learning and artificial intelligence were used for enrichment of the technology. We have been seeing development of search engines to learn our searching trends and craft new results or online shopping websites like Amazon learning our shopping to suggest new items to buy. With the help of machine learning, all this has become possible but there are potential healthcare applications to the same technology. The new algorithms and techniques being developed have shown potential to save lives in times where traditional approaches had failed. Even with basic implementations of artificial intelligence, we have seen instances where a doctors provided an improper diagnosis while a machine said otherwise. These scenarios have further inspired research for medical analytics, which has become the focus of my course at MIT. The Medlytics course was dedicated to learn more about these issues and tackle some real world problems.

The work I was doing was very intensive. I applied the algorithms we were being taught to a number of situations. One week, I was analyzing physiological signals to determine the state of sleep. The next week, I was training models to detect breast cancer from mammograms. Within all this work, the underlying structure was just techniques that could be applied to a number of fields. That brought me to think about the potential applications of my work in FTC. The neural networks and similar models I was training learned a number of scenarios of images or signals. I realized that by integrating computer vision, I could come up with something similar in FTC.

To demonstrate an example of where this could potentially leave an impact, I will go with object detection. Right now, Iron Reign captures a series of images of the object of interest (an example is a cryptobox from Relic Recovery) and attempts to manually fine tune the OpenCV parameters to fit the object as accurately as possible. This sort of task could easily be delegated to a Convolution Neural Network (CNN) architecture. What is a CNN you ask? Well here is a brief description.

In essence, the model is able to determine a pattern in an image based on edges and details. The image is processed through a series of layers to determine the shapes in the image. Then the model attempts to label the image as seen above with the car. If this was brought into context of FTC, we could train model to learn the shapes of an object (for example a wiffle ball) and then feed the information to the robot. The bot could then navigate to the object and pick it up. There are a vast number of applications to this, with this just being one. I hope that my knowledge can be of use for Rover Ruckus.

Next Steps

Wait for Rover Ruckus reveal to see if I can combine my expertise with new code.

Hey New Members!

20 Aug 2018

Hey New Members! By Kenna

Hopefully, you're here because you heard our announcement or saw our flyers. Even if not, welcome! We are team 6832 Iron Reign Robotics. We've been a FIRST team since 2010 and currently compete in FIRST Tech Challenge. Some have been on the team for a few months, others over half their lives. We design, build, and code robots, but we also spend a lot of our time on the MXP. We won the Motivate Award at the World Championships for the creation and sustainment of the MXP. On our team you will learn practical skills, like how to solder programming wires, and soft skills, like how to present to a panel of judges.

If you are interested, please fill out our form for potential members. We are also having an interest meeting at Townview Magnet Center on August 30th in room 363. Feel free to explore our blog or learn more about us.

BigWheel CAD

21 Aug 2018

BigWheel CAD By Ethan

Task: Create a mockup for BigWheel

We've been working on a design for the chassis workshop for quite a while now. We already presented it at the first meeting, and now we need to work on the other components of our presentation: the weight testing, torque calculations, speed testing, and finally, a chassis model. To do the last one, we made a simple model in PTC Creo.

Mentor Involvement from MIT

25 Aug 2018

Mentor Involvement from MIT By Abhi

Task: Discuss potential support from MIT

In a previous post, I mentioned how the knowledge I gained in machine learning at MIT could help the team. But another way our team could be helped is with mentor involvement from MIT. I couldn't have done the research I did at MIT without the help of my amazing instructors. I wanted to bring them on board the Iron Reign way so they could also teach the rest of the team how to be awesome and help us grow. Currently, Iron Reign is speaking with two of my instructors.

Lyle Lalunio (leftmost in image) is a freshman at the University of California at Berkley. He was an intern this past summer at MIT as part of the Laboratory of Computational Physiology and also the Medlytics program. He is proficient in numerous programming languages including Java and Python. He is pursuing computer science in college but is also interested in the medical applications of the science. Lyle has been an incredible mentor for myself and my teams during my month, inspiring me to invite him to the team.

Dr. Danelle Shah (2nd from left in image) is a Technical Staff member in Lincoln Laboratory’s Intelligence and Decision Technologies group. Her most recent research has focused on the detection, representation and characterization of human networks by leveraging natural language processing and graph analytics. Dr. Shah earned her Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University, where she developed algorithms to facilitate natural and robust human-robot interaction. Dr. Shah has also left a great impact on my life and has a background in robotic algorithms, inspiring me to invite her to the team.

Next Steps

Continue discussion with mentors about potentially joining Iron Reign.

Organization!

25 Aug 2018

Organization! August 25, 2018 By Charlotte

Iron Reign Clutter

One of Iron Reign's greatest weaknesses is the organization of our physical space. It is rare that our workspace is free of clutter, and it is always difficult to find tools or parts that we need. We often joke that when we put an item down it goes in a "black hole," and you won't be able to find it again. This summer, however, we have made a system to tackle this problem and this season we hope to maintain it. We cleared out the front room and set up some shelves and got to organizing. For anyone looking for certain tools or who doesn't know where to put a tool they just found or used, use the article for reference.


This is subject to change, but as we begin the season, here is the current shelf organization:


In the tall black set of drawers, you can find these tools and parts:


  • Top half:
  • Omni Wheels (on the very top)
  • Drill Bits
  • Dremel & Exacto knives
  • Wrenches
  • Screwdrivers
  • Allen Wrenches

  • Bottom half:
  • Servos
  • Torque wrench
  • Bolt cutters
  • Tap & Dice set
  • Extension Cords

  • In the silver drawers on the right side, you can find these tools and parts:


  • On the very top, you can find miscellaneous electronics.
  • Left Side:
  • Pliers
  • Sprockets
  • Motors
  • More motors

  • Right side:
  • Measurement tools & testers
  • USB Adapters (OTG cables)
  • Hardware (screws, bolts, nuts)
  • Wire
  • Zip-Ties

  • In the colorful drawers on the left, you can find these tools and parts:

  • Left side:
  • Mini USB cables
  • Old motor/servo controllers
  • Nuts
  • More mini & micro USB cables
  • Shaft collars
  • Servo cables

  • Middle:
  • Motor mounts
  • Chains
  • Bevel gears
  • Tubing
  • Fabric paint
  • Adhesives
  • Grease
  • REV hardware

  • Right side:
  • Brackets
  • Springs
  • Files
  • Measurement Devices
  • Sandpaper
  • Hand Drills
  • Dremel Kits
  • Rubber Bands

  • We have a long way to go, and we need to put organize these drawers even more and maybe soon label them. If anyone has any questions ask Evan or me (or Tycho if he's home), and make sure you put things back after you use them!

    2018-19 Recruitment

    30 Aug 2018

    2018-19 Recruitment By Ethan, Kenna, Charlotte, Janavi, Abhi, and Arjun

    Task: Recruit new members for the 2018-19 season

    Last year, Iron Reign lost two members, so we're only looking for 2-3 members to replace them and their particular skillsets. However, our sister team, Imperial Robotics (3734) lost nine members. So, we decided to host a recruitment session at our school to find interested freshmen.

    We put up posters around the school, and got a healthy crowd - 30 people. We talked about Iron Reign's history, needed levels of commitment for various teams, and what the average person will do on the team. We also answered questions about the team from the crowd. Of those people who attended, 17 signed up for a testing session next week, including two former members of Iron Reign, Alisa and Trace.

    Next Steps

    We will hold training sessions to assess each potential members skills, then divy them up with Imperial Robotics.

    Bigwheel Presentation

    03 Sep 2018

    Bigwheel Presentation By Arjun and Karina

    Task: Present about Garchomp

    As a new freshman on Iron Reign, I took on the responsibility of a robot we called Bigwheel. Karina and I worked on getting the robot into something that could be put through load tests, meaning tightening the chain, fixing misaligned sprockets, and getting the wiring together. We participated in the Chassis Presentation workshop hosted by technicbots for teams all around the North Texas region to work on one or more chassis, perform various tests with them and then present their findings. We presented our chassis Bigwheel, which is driven by 2 large 8-inch wheels, with a pair of 2 free-spinning Omni wheels in the back. This can be seen in the presentation below:

    To create our chassis we used 2 8-inch wheels, each driven by 2 Neverrest 60 motors. There are also two free-spinning omni wheels in the back. The robot uses REV rails and plexiglass for it's main body.

    Our first test is the 5-second distance test. Our robot had a lot of torque due to the Neverrest 60 motors, so it moved slower than other robots, but was unaffected by the additional 30lbs weight.

    Our second test is the 3-second turn test. Again, some other robots could turn better faster than us. However, due to having no proper mechanism for restraining our weights, along with other mysterious problems such as battery disconnections that only happened during this test, we were unable to try this test with load, however we presume that due to the torque, the results should be similar to those without load. Our center of rotation is also off due to only the front two wheels being powered. As such, the back of the robot makes a wide arc as it turns.

    Our next few test results are unremarkable.

    Our robot had a lot of sideways drift, mostly due to bad build quality. If we intend to use it during the season, we will try to fix this.

    Overall, our chassis performed well under load, but could use a little speed boost. If we want to further develop it, we plan to use Neverrest 20s with more torque on our external gear ratio, so we can get more speed out of it.

    Garchomp Presentation

    03 Sep 2018

    Garchomp Presentation By Janavi and Kenna

    Task: Present in the Inviational Presentation Series

    Today, we participated in the Chassis Presentation workshop for teams all around the North Texas region; the project was to design robots and perform various tests with them, then present findings. We presented our chassis, Garchomp, a mechanum wheel chassis as can be seen in the slide photos below.

    Presentation

    To create our chassis we used 4 never rest 40 motors one for each wheel and the structure of the chassis was created by using tetrix rails. We connected the wheels to the motors by using a 1:1 gear ratio. While there are many benefits to using a gear ratio for your wheels be forewarned that if your wheels are not perfectly aligned attaching your chains to mechanum wheels will become a living nightmare as can be seen in our previous posts.

    One of the reasons that attaching the chains was so difficult for us was because we discovered that because we had used wooden sides instead of the aluminum sides that Kraken used our wheels became misaligned to the two different types of wood used for the sides.

    While our robot is not able to do a 360 degree turn as fast as some other robots presented today it is able to hold a considerable amount of speed while moving at a constant speed.

    Since this chassis was designed for last years competition it is able to consistently drive onto the balancing stone

    North Texas Invitational Presentation Series - Worlds

    03 Sep 2018

    North Texas Invitational Presentation Series - Worlds By Ethan, Abhi, Janavi, Kenna, Charlotte, Evan, Karina, and Justin

    Task: Present about Worlds to new teams

    This was our last presentation in a series of presentations in conjunction with teams from around Texas for new and returning teams in the North Texas region. This particular presentation was about strategies in awards and the game, as well as general thoughts about FTC and Worlds.

    Presentation

    Post Kickoff Meeting

    08 Sep 2018

    Post Kickoff Meeting September 08, 2018 By Karina, Charlotte, Ethan, Evan, Kenna, and Abhi

    Meeting Log September 08, 2018

    Today Iron Reign attended the FTC 2018-2019 season kickoff at Williams High School. After the event, we gathered back at our coach's house to talk about how we might approach this season's challenge. We welcomed prospect team members as well. They joined us in reviewing the reveal video and the games manuals.

    Today's Meet Objectives

    We wanted to have an understanding of the game design so that we could start going over robot designs. To do this we:

    • Watched the reveal video
    • Skimmed through game manual 1 and the preview of game manual 2

    Until we receive the field elements, we will have to plan and strategize using the resources listed above.

    Because we also had new possible team members over, we set expectations for this year. Actively recording our progress and blogging for the engineering journal was heavily stressed. We recognize the importance of having a good engineering journal and how it can help us advance. Our coach's house, the place where we have our meetings, is also cleaner than it has been in a long time after an intense cleaning session. Having an organized space maximizes efficiency, especially with the a larger team. Therefore, we expect for all team members to clean up after themselves and maintain the organization.

    Before we could discuss robot build ideas, we talked strategy. Parking in the crater and the landing zones will undoubtedly be easy to do. Since we know that designing a way for our robot to be able to lift itself onto the lander will be a more interesting challenge and will score us the most points, we will prioritize working on prototypes mechanisms for this task. Finding a way to gently lower down form the lander may be difficult. We will have to consider ways to not damage the robot, wiring, etc. We also agreed that it would make the most sense to have one mechanism that latches onto the hook on the lander, grabs gold and silver elements from the crater, and places these elements into the columns.

    Other topics we talked about include drive trains, problems with trying to create a mechanism that grab both the silver balls and gold blocks, as well as how we would be able to grab them out of the crater without going over the edge of the crater and getting stuck.

    Also, in previous seasons, we have had strong autonomous game, and so we decided to make the tasks in autonomous another top priority. We had our coders start discussing the field path for autonomous. Unfortunately, we will not be able to launch our team marker into the team depot.

    After the end of last season, a storm passed through and turned over shelves, trashing the robo-dojo. Some of our team members cleaned up the tent this afternoon. While it may not seem very important at the moment, this will be very helpful later in the season once we get our field elements for this year's challenge and want to set the field up. While cleaning, they also uncovered old, rusted metal tools and and pieces, which we will now be able to repair and save for future use.

    Besides helping with cleaning the tent, the new members showed a lot of interest in the game as well. They were eager to start building, and actually started creating prototype mechanisms for picking up the silver and gold elements.

    Today's Work Log

    Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
    KarinaWorking on blog2:004 hrs
    AbhiAutonomous planning2:004 hrs
    EvanRobot brainstorming2:004 hrs
    CharlotteRobot brainstorming2:004 hrs
    EthanWorking on blog2:004 hrs
    KennaCleaning tent2:004 hrs

    Rover Ruckus Brainstorming & Initial Thoughts

    08 Sep 2018

    Rover Ruckus Brainstorming & Initial Thoughts By Ethan, Charlotte, Kenna, Evan, Abhi, Arjun, Karina, and Justin

    Task: Come up with ideas for the 2018-19 season

    So, today was the first meeting in the Rover Ruckus season! On top of that, we had our first round of new recruits (20!). So, it was an extremely hectic session, but we came up with a lot of new ideas.

    Building

    • A One-way Intake System

    • This suggestion uses a plastic flap to "trap" game elements inside it, similar to the lid of a soda cup. You can put marbles through the straw-hole, but you can't easily get them back out.
    • Crater Bracing
    • In the past, we've had center-of-balance issues with our robot. To counteract this, we plan to attach shaped braces to our robot such that it can hold on to the walls and not tip over.
    • Extendable Arm + Silicone Grip

    • This one is simple - a linear slide arm attached to a motor so that it can pick up game elements and rotate. We fear, however, that many teams will adopt this strategy, so we probably won't do it. One unique part of our design would be the silicone grips, so that the "claws" can firmly grasp the silver and gold.
    • Binder-ring Hanger

    • When we did Res-Q, we dropped our robot more times than we'd like to admit. To prevent that, we're designing an interlocking mechanism that the robot can use to hang. It'll have an indent and a corresponding recess that resists lateral force by nature of the indent, but can be opened easily.
    • Passive Intake
    • Inspired by a few FRC Stronghold intake systems, we designed a passive intake. Attached to a weak spring, it would have the ability to move over game elements before falling back down to capture them. The benefit of this design is that we wouldn't have to use an extra motor for intake, but we risk controlling more than two elements at the same time.
    • Mechanum
    • Mechanum is our Ol' Faithful. We've used it for the past three years, so we're loath to abandon it for this year. It's still a good idea for this year, but strafing isn't as important, and we may need to emphasize speed instead. Plus, we're not exactly sure how to get over the crater walls with Mechanum.
    • Tape Measure
    • In Res-Q, we used a tape-measure system to pull our robot up, and we believe that we could do the same again this year. One issue is that our tape measure system is ridiculously heavy (~5 lbs) and with the new weight limits, this may not be ideal.
    • Mining
    • We're currently thinking of a "mining mechanism" that can score two glyphs at a time extremely quickly in exchange for not being able to climb. It'll involve a conveyor belt and a set of linear slides such that the objects in the crater can automatically be transferred to either the low-scoring zone or the higher one.

    Journal

    This year, we may switch to weekly summaries instead of meeting logs so that our journal is more reasonable for judges to read. In particular, we were inspired by team Nonstandard Deviation, which has an amazing engineering journal that we recommend the readers to check out.

    Programming

    Luckily, this year seems to have a more-easily programmed autonomous. We're working on some autonomous diagrams that we'll release in the next couple weeks. Aside from that, we have such a developed code base that we don't really need to update it any further.

    Next Steps

    We're going to prototype these ideas in the coming weeks and develop our thoughts more thoroughly.

    2018 Kickoff

    08 Sep 2018

    2018 Kickoff By Ethan, Evan, Kenna, Charlotte, Abhi, Justin, Karina, and Arjun

    Task: Attend the North Texas FTC Kickoff

    Today, we went to the Rover Ruckus kickoff! This year's main challenge is getting blocks (gold) and balls (silver) into the main lander. The other side challenges, in order of hardness, are hanging, parking, and placing the team marker. The main upside of all of this means that it is theoretically possible to perform every single function on the field with the same mechanism.

    The main non-robot game changes are the elimination of Supers, the standardization of awards, and Worlds spot changes. The one that particularly piqued our interest was the award standardization. Historically, there have been huge disparities between the awards in North Texas and the awards at Worlds. For example, in North Texas, we continually won the Connect Award for our outreach (while in the rubric, it was the award for connecting with engineers). But, at Worlds, we won the Motivate Award instead.

    Next Steps

    We will do a brainstorming session to figure out are design paths for the next few weeks. In addition, we need to complete sorting of the new members.

    Testing Intakes

    09 Sep 2018

    Testing Intakes By Ethan and Evan

    Task: Design a prototype intake system

    In our first practice, we brainstormed some intake and other robot ideas. To begin testing, we created a simple prototype of a one-way intake system. First, we attached two rubber bands to a length of wide PVC pipe. This worked pretty well, but the bands gave way a little too easily.

    For our next prototype, we attached a piece of cardboard with slits to a cup approximately the size of a cube or block. It operates similarly to a soda cup lid with a straw hole. An object can go in, but the corners of the hole spring back so that it can't escape.

    Next Steps

    We probably won't go with this design - we'd have issues separating the different kinds of game elements, and it may be too slow to feasibly use. But, its a first step and we'll see what happens.

    Rover Ruckus Strategy

    10 Sep 2018

    Rover Ruckus Strategy By Ethan, Kenna, Charlotte, Evan, Abhi, Justin, Karina, and Aaron

    Task: Determine the best Rover Ruckus strategies

    Challenge Game Timing Points Level of Difficulty (1 - 3 [hard]) Priority Idea
    Landing Autonomous 30 2 Medium Latch attached to linear slides that allows us to descend rapidly
    Claiming Autonomous 15 1 High Autonomous, easy as bumping into wall
    Parking Autonomous 10 1 High Autonomous, just need to move
    Sampling Autonomous 25 2 Medium Autonomous, OpenCV solution as in similar years
    Latching End Game 50 3 High 3D-printed latch attached to linear slide strong enough to lift robot
    Robot in Crater End Game 15/25 1 High Driving
    Mining [Depot] Tele-Op 2 per item 1 High Rolling intake into box, then conveyor belt into the depot
    Mining [Cargo] Tele-Op 5 per item 2 High Long linear-slide arm that reaches the two feet into the lander with an intake/deposit on the end

    Choosing Drive Train

    12 Sep 2018

    Choosing Drive Train By Janavi

    Task: Analyze the game

    In our last post, we created a chart where we listed each task asked based on point value and the level of difficulty, separated by autonomous and teleop. Our goal is to find a drive train that will allow us to build a robot to accomplish all of these tasks efficiently and consistently, but this matrix will allow us to determine what to focus on first.

    Drivetrain Comparison

    This summer we created a variety of drivetrains for a summer chassis project hosted in coordination with other teams from the North Texas region. We have compiled a list of the drivetrains and the criteria we need to consider for Rover Ruckus.

    What do we need to look at in a Drivetrain?

    • Light
    • Sturdy
    • Easily Maneuverable
    • Fast
    • Low center of mass to avoid tipping
    • Reliability

    Comparison

    Eliminated? Reason for Elimination Pros Cons
    Miniature Mechanum Drive NO N/A
    • Omni-Directional
    • Fast turning
    • Easy to design
    • Experience with
    • Driving/Building
    • light
    Uneven power
    Big Wheel NO N/A Unique Design We have less experience
    Larger Mechanum Drive YES Need light robot; may use mini mechanum chassis instead Familiar Design Too heavy for this years competition
    Swerve YES Difficult design, Many motors and servos, we have less experience Easier to maintain at high speed Unfamiliar and difficult to design and maintain
    8-wheel Drive YES Many wheels, Difficult of maneuver, no omni directional movement 100% power forward Difficult to maneuver
    Holonomic Drive YES Less push power in all directions; hard to integrate into robot Easy to turn and maneuver Hard to design; hard to integrate into base; Only 50% power in all directions

    Selecting Wheels

    12 Sep 2018

    Selecting Wheels By Janavi

    Objective: Determine the type of wheel that best suits the chassis

    In the Choosing Drive Train E-16 we decided that we will use the chassis BigWheel. We know that our wheels need to be light weight but we need to determine the size of the wheel that will keep our robot far away enough from the ground for us to provide enough clearance to allow us to climb over the crater rim. But, if we choose wheels with a large radius we risk raising the center of mass.

    Pros Cons
    Ironton 12in. Solid Rubber Spoked Poly Wheel
    • light
    • durable
    • Large Turns
    • Extremely Large
    Ironton 16in. Solid Rubber Spoked Poly Wheel
    • light
    • durable
    • Raise center of mass
    • Extremely Large
    • To prevent tipping we now have a much shorter distance to correct imbalance
    Ironton 8in. Solid Rubber Spoked Poly Wheel
    • light
    • durable
    • Not large enough to significantly move the center of mass

    Brainstorming Two

    15 Sep 2018

    Brainstorming Two By Evan, Abhi, and Janavi

    Task: Have a 2nd brainstorming session

    We had another brainstorming session today, which allowed us to break down into some new building tasks.

    Intake System 3 - TSA Bag Scanner

    This part of our robot is inspired by the bag-scanning machine in TSA lines, more specifically the part at the end with the spinning tubes. The basic design would be like a section of that track that flips over the top of the robot into the crater to intake field elements.

    Intake System 4 - Big Clamp

    This one is self-explanatory. Its a clamp, that when forced over a block or a cube, picks it up. It's not that accurate, but it's a good practice idea.

    Lift 2 - Thruster

    We want to make lifting our robot easy, and we're thinking of a slightly different way to do it. For our new lift idea, we're installing a vertical linear slide that forces the robot upwards so that we can reach the lander.

    Next Steps

    We're working on building these prototypes, and will create blog posts in the future detailing them.

    Meeting Log

    15 Sep 2018

    Meeting Log September 15, 2018 By Charlotte, Karina, Kenna, Janavi, Evan, Abhi, Justin, and Ethan

    Meeting Log September 15, 2018

    Today Austin, an Iron Reign alumni, visited us from A&M! :)

    Today's Meet Objectives

    As our brainstorming and discussion continues, we are putting our ideas into action and making various prototypes and designs. We will continue to work with our new recruits and let them participate in a meaningful way with our building and in getting ready for competition.

    Today's Meet Log

    • Further brainstorming and discussion
    • Taking some inspiration from 30 hr robot reveal videos, we have continued the brainstorming for this year's robot. Our main subjects of discussion are our intake and lift, and some ideas that were thrown around were a conveyor belt-like intake and a lift that utilizes a linear slide which lifts the robot chassis. The details of our brainstorming session can be found at (E-19, Brainstorming Two - Enter the Void).
    • Prototyping and linear slides
    • Today, Abhi worked on a hook for hanging off the rover at first with Styrofoam, and then began a 3D model. Evan started working with our new linear slides (see the picture below); we expect to use linear slides a lot this year, with reaching into the craters and hooking onto the rover. We pre-drilled some holes into these new slides using an optical punch and a drill. Janavi worked with a different linear slide kit, this kit is lighter than our new kit, which is helpful, but it is very delicate and requires precision to put together.
      Evan looking through an optical punch
      Evan with a linear slide
    • Field setup
    • Many of our new recruits returned today and have continued to be active. During the week, we received the field parts, so we had them help us put it together so that they can be familiar with the field design and with certain power tools. They also helped with various devices we worked on, like the linear slides, etc.
      Field assembly progress from our new recruits.
    • Chassis testing
    • We plan to use the chassis we built this summer for preliminary autonomous testing. Janavi and Kenna got Garchomp up and running today and added a better and more secure phone holder so we can run autonomous.
    • Vision and autonomous
    • We began exploring in Open CV so that we can have a visual tool to find the minerals; the algorithms we are exploring can be used for both autonomous and tele-op. We had a discussion on our goals for vision this year, which can be found at (E-20, Vision Discussion). We also began mapping our autonomous paths to act as guides to our coders.
      Open CV progress

    Today's Member Work Log

    Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
    KarinaRobot build and team marker design2:004 hrs
    AbhiOpen CV2:004 hrs
    EvanPrototyping2:004 hrs
    CharlotteBlog and brainstorming2:004 hrs
    EthanWorking on blog2:004 hrs
    KennaRobot build2:004 hrs
    JustinField assembly2:004 hrs
    JanaviPrototyping2:004 hrs

    Vision Discussion

    15 Sep 2018

    Vision Discussion By Arjun and Abhi

    Task: Consider potential vision approaches for sampling

    Part of this year’s game requires us to be able to detect the location of minerals on the field. The main use for this is in sampling. During autonomous, we need to move only the gold mineral, without touching the silver minerals in order to earn points for sampling. There are a few ways we could be able to detect the location of the gold mineral.

    First, we could possibly use OpenCV to run transformations on the image that the camera sees. We would have to design an OpenCV pipeline which identifies yellow blobs, filters out those that aren’t minerals, and finds the centers of the blobs which are minerals. This is most likely the approach that many teams will use. The benefit of this approach is that it will be easy enough to write. However, it may not work in different lighting conditions that were not tested during the designing of the OpenCV pipeline.

    Another approach is to use Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) to identify the location of the gold mineral. Convolutional Neural Networks are a class of machine learning algorithms that “learn” to find patterns in images by looking at large amounts of samples. In order to develop a CNN to identify minerals, we must take lots of photos of the sampling arrangement in different arrangements (and lighting conditions), and then manually label them. Then, the algorithm will “learn” how to differentiate gold minerals from other objects on the field. A CNN should be able to work in many different lighting conditions, however, it is also more difficult to write.

    Next Steps

    As of now, Iron Reign is going to attempt both methods of classification and compare their performance.

    CNN Training

    22 Sep 2018

    CNN Training By Arjun and Abhi

    Task: Capture training data for a Convolutional Neural Network

    In order to train a Convolutional Neural Network, we need a whole bunch of training images. So we got out into the field, and took 125 photos of the sampling setup in different positions and angles. Our next step is to label the gold minerals in all of these photos, so that we can train a Convolutional Neural Network to label the gold minerals by learning from the patterns of the training data.

    Next Steps

    Next, we will go through and designate gold minerals. In addition, we must create a program to process these.

    Chassis Brainstorming

    22 Sep 2018

    Chassis Brainstorming By Ethan and Evan

    Task: Brainstorm chassis designs

    At the moment, we've used the same chassis base for three years, a basic mechanum base with large wheels. However, we don't really want to do the same this year. At the time, it was impressive, and not many teams used mechanum wheels, but now, its a little overdone.

    Thus, we have BigWheel. We used this as a practice design, but we ended up really liking it. It starts off with two large rubber wheels, approx. eight inches in diameter, mounted at the back and sides of the robot. Then, we have two geared-up motors attached to the motors for extra torque and power. In the front, we have a single omniwheel that allows our robot to turn well.

    Proposed Additions

    First, we need to add an intake system. For this, we're considering a tension-loaded carwash that can spring out over the crater wall. It'll pull elements in and sort them through our intake using our separator, which we will detail in a later post. Then, the robot will drive over to the lander and lift itself up. Since the main segment of the robot is based off of two wheels, we're attaching a telescoping slide that pushes off of the ground at the opposite end and pivots the front of the robot upwards. Then, the intake will launch upwards, depositing the elements in the launcher.

    Next Steps

    We need to create a proof-of-concept for this idea, and we'd like to create a 3D model before we go further.

    Meeting Log

    22 Sep 2018

    Meeting Log September 22, 2018 By Charlotte, Janavi, Evan, Abhi, Justin, Ethan, Arjun, Karina, and Kenna

    Meeting Log September 22, 2018

    Home Depot Trip!

    Today's Meet Objectives

    As we are starting to make more serious strides in our robot and strategy, we wish to start passing down knowledge to our new recruits. Today, we are going to continue prototyping with grabbers and various linear slide kits and we need to discuss strategy and organization for this season.

    Today's Meet Log

    • Robot strategy discussion
    • Today we have discussed more about what we want our strategy to look like. An option we are heavily considering is having a non-moving robot, in the sense that our robot is stationary and all game actions are performed using extensions from the robot, using linear slides, etc. We have discussed what game rules we need to consider, like what "parking" consists of during autonomous. For further information, see (E-34, Another Design Bites the Dust).
    • Chassis brainstorming
    • We discussed the chassis design we plan to use this season, and we decided experiment with the BigWheel chassis we build this summer. For more details on this discussion, see (E-23, Chassis Brainstorming).
    • Sorter prototyping
    • We have continued prototyping various grabbing mechanisms with sorting ability, one passive and one active sorter. The passive version we modeled in Creo and printed before practice, and the active was modeled using Legos! Our new recruits have been helping us prototype also, as we have been making a version 2 for the active model.
      Passive model
      Active model
    • New chop saw!
    • Some of the materials we are working with require power tools that we don't have or were damaged by rain. One of the linear slide kits we are working with is stainless steel, which requires a chop saw which we didn't have. We made a trip to Home Depot and bought one.
      Chopsaw in action

    • Finishing field assembly
    • Our new recruits finished up the field today. They ran into some problems along the way, including difficulty with putting on the top part of the lander, improper placement of the wing nuts, alignment of the lander in the foam tiles, and more but were able to overcome these difficulties and yielding a field for practice.
      Our freshman recruits!
    • Linear slide assembly
    • Evan and Janavi finished assembling the linear slides they were working on last week. As we build a chassis (or a wheel-less chassis) we are going to try both types to see how the weight, strength, friction, string tension, and other factors affect our gameplay. A side-by-side comparison of our linear slides cam be found at (E-61, Selecting Linear Slides)

      Battle of the Slides
    • Team marker
    • Karina narrowed down the ideas for a marker and she, with Kenna, has began building it. More about our marker can be found at (E-33, Team Marker Fun).
    • Open CV and our CNN
    • While we are waiting to begin code, we are testing many algorithms in Open CV, so we can accurately and consistently detect field minerals. These algorithms consider shape and color to map points to predict the location of the minerals. While developing Open CV, we have begun the development of a Convolutional Neural Network. Detail of our CNN training can be found at (E-22, CNN Training).
    • Location sensor
    • Today, Justin worked on making the location sensor (our fail-safe in case our encoders fail) smaller and more lightweight to help us meet with this year's size requirements (something we have had trouble with in the past).
    • Chassis testing
    • We tested the different chassis we build this summer on the field to see how they interact with the terrain (aka the crater). We found that Big Wheel was too long and didn't go over the crater at all unless it was backwards and got a running start. Garchomp (with Mechanums) went over the craters fine.

    Today's Member Work Log

    Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
    KarinaRobot build and team marker design2:004 hrs
    AbhiOpen CV and build2:004 hrs
    EvanBuild2:004 hrs
    CharlotteBlog and brainstorming2:004 hrs
    EthanWorking on blog2:004 hrs
    KennaRobot build2:004 hrs
    JustinBuild and field assembly2:004 hrs
    JanaviBuild2:004 hrs
    ArjunCode and blog2:004 hrs

    Autonomous Path Planning

    26 Sep 2018

    Autonomous Path Planning By Abhi

    Task: Map Autonomous paths

    With the high point potential available in this year's autonomous it is essential to create autonomous paths right now. This year's auto is more complicated due to potential collisions with alliance partners in addition to an unknown period of time spend delatching from the lander. To address both these concerns, I developed 4 autonomous paths we will investigate with to use during competition.

    When making auto paths, there are some things to consider. One, the field is the exact same for both red and blue alliance, meaning we don't need to rewrite the code to act on the other side of the field. Second, we have to account for our alliance partner's autonomous if they have one and need to adapt to their path so we don't crash them. Third, we have to avoid the other alliance's bots to avoid penalties. There are no explicit boundaries this year for auto but if we somehow interrupt the opponent's auto we get heavily penalized. Now, with these in mind, lets look at these paths.

    This path plan is the simplest of all autonomi. I assume that our alliance partner has an autonomous and our robot only takes care of half the functions. It starts with a simple detaching from the lander, sampling the proper mineral, deploying the team marker, and parking in the crater. The reason I chose the opposite crater instead of the one on our nearside was that it was shorter distance and less chance to mess with our alliance partner. The issue with this plan is that it may interfere with the opponent's autonomous but if we drive strategically hugging the wall, we shouldn't have issues.

    This path is also a "simple" path but is obviously complicated. The issue is that the team marker depot is not on the same side as the lander, forcing us to drive all the way down and back to park in the crater. I could also change this one to go to the opposite crater but that may interfere with our alliance partner's code.

    This is one of the autonomi that assumes our alliance partners don't have an autonomous and is built for multi-functionality. The time restriction makes this autonomous unlikely but it is still nice to plan out a path for it.

    This is also one of the autonomi that assumes our alliance partners don't have an autonomous. This is the simpler one of the methods but still has the same restrictions

    Next Steps

    Although its great to think these paths will actually work out in the end, we might need to change them a lot. With potential collisions with alliance partners and opponents, we might need a drop down menu of sorts on the driver station that can let us put together a lot of different pieces so we can pick and choose the auto plan. Maybe we could even draw out the path in init. All this is only at the speculation stage right now.

    Hanging Hook Prototype

    26 Sep 2018

    Hanging Hook Prototype By Abhi, Ethan, Justin, and Janavi

    Task: Design a hook for pulling the robot on the lander

    To get a head-start on latching and delatching from the lander during autonomous, we got a head start and made some hook prototypes. If your robot can just do these two things, you can score 80 points. When making this hook, it needs to be modular enough to not require much accuracy but also needs to be strong enough to hold 42 pounds. This hook works just that way.

    We designed this hook to have a slanted top to glide the robot into position if we aren't in the right place, making it very modular. In addition, we 3D printed this hook with ~80% infill in nylon after designing in PTC Creo. First, we tested it by hanging ~20 lbs of material off of it for one minute. This worked, but a little too well. While the nylon piece remained undamaged, the metal bracket it was supported by bent at a ninety degree angle. So, we had to pursue further testing.

    For our next test, we plan to hang a mass outside for a week. Dallas weather has been extreme lately, with a lot of rain, humidity, and heat. This will be the ultimate stress test; if one of our pieces can survive the outdoors, it can survive just about anything.

    Next Steps

    We're probably going to have to reprint this to be a bit more fitting for our robot, but its a good start and it works great so far.

    Meeting Log

    28 Sep 2018

    Meeting Log September 28, 2018 By Charlotte, Karina, Kenna, Janavi, Evan, Abhi, Justin, Ethan, and Arjun

    Meeting Log September 28, 2018

    Coding lessons with new recruits

    Today's Meet Objectives

    Since our overflow of new recruits, we have opened up two other teams 15373 and 15375, which Iron Reign will mentor and lead along with our mentorship of 3732 Imperial Robotics, who has also received new recruits. Today we plan to continue integrating them into FTC; we will begin teaching them the different expectations of an FTC team, including hard and soft skills such as coding and presenting to a panel of judges. In Iron Reign, we are going to continue prototyping various mechanisms we have designed. Also, we are going to get started with coding and autonomous.

    Today's Meet Log

    • Mentoring
    • This week, we had even more recruits join us today, so we decided to run through our Worlds presentation from last year to teach them about the judging process and our engineering process. We set their expectations for what competition day looks like, and what they need to focus on and maintain throughout the season, such as the engineering journal and outreach. We had a long discussion about subteams and we are going to let the recruits explore these subteams and decide for themselves what parts of FTC they wish to pursue.
      Presentation to recruits.
    • Linear slides
    • Janavi continued working with linear slides, which we installed on a bare chassis as well as the hook Abhi designed and printed. Near the end of practice we tested the slide and we found that it worked pretty well but we need additional tests before we can determine whether it will ba a viable option for our robot. To see more information on our linear slides, see (E-,).
    • Secret project
    • Evan worked on a secret project, details will be written about in future blog posts. See (E-34, Another Design Bites the Dust).
    • Team marker
    • Karina continued to work on our team marker. Last time we decided on the design we want to use, and she had put the idea into reality today.
      Ducky incarcerated
    • Modeling
    • Justin 3D modeled and printed wheel mounts for churros and hex shafts.
      Justin modeling
    • Replay autonomous and code mentoring
    • Over the summer, we worked on a new replay autonomous system where rather than coding an autonomous, testing it, then fixing it, we drive the robot in our intended path and that path is automatically recorded in the code. This year, we don't think that system will work, with the heavy emphasis on computer vision and the unreliable positioning of the robot after it drops off the hook on the rover. Also, today we worked with the recruits that demonstrated interest in coding. Abhi gave them a lesson and let them create their very first autonomous program by themselves (but with his guidance of course).

      Today's Member Work Log

      Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
      KarinaTeam marker build2:004 hrs
      AbhiCoding and teaching2:004 hrs
      EvanRobot build2:004 hrs
      CharlotteBlog and organization2:004 hrs
      EthanWorking on blog2:004 hrs
      KennaRobot build2:004 hrs
      Justin3D Modeling2:004 hrs
      JanaviRobot build2:004 hrs

    BigWheel Chassis

    29 Sep 2018

    BigWheel Chassis By Evan

    Task: Work on a possible chassis

    We've been toying around with the idea of using BigWheel, our Summer Chassis Research Project bot, in this year's competition with a few modifications. The idea for this robot is that it has a collection system that extends into the crater, and folds up on top of the robot. It reaches in with the collection arm, and grabs the blocks/glyphs, drives backwards and flips vertically using the drive wheels as a point of rotation. Here’s a basic sketch of what that looks like.

    The way this will be achieved is with a spring loaded lever connected to the omni wheel that makes up the holy trinity of wheels. So far I have pieced together the arm that reaches into the pit, which is powered by two NeverRest 60s and geared in a two to one ratio to significantly increase the torque. Between the two arm I plan for a horizontal beater bar to intake blocks and a slide attached to a servo to separate blocks and balls based on their size. The idea is to have a way of sorting based off of the physical shape rather than by digital sensing means. The more that can be done purely off the shape of the elements, the better.

    Next Steps

    Next week, the team will have to make some serious progress since there will be more hands to build. My hope is that the lever will come about soon, even if in its most infant stage, and that some semblance of a functioning robot can be game tested in the next few weeks, just in time for a scrimmage and potentially an early qualifier.

    CNN Training Program

    29 Sep 2018

    CNN Training Program By Arjun and Abhi

    Task: Designing a program to label training data for our Convolutional Neural Network

    In order to use the captured training data, we need to label it by identifying the location of the gold mineral in it. We also need to normalize it by resizing the training images to a constant size, (320x240 pixels). While we could do this by hand, it would be a pain to do so. We would have to resize each individual picture, and then identify the coordinates of the center of the gold mineral, then create a file to store the resized image and coordinates.

    Instead of doing this, we decided to write a program to do this for us. That way, we could just click on the gold mineral on the screen, and the program would do the resizing and coordinate-finding for us. Thus, the process of labeling the images will be much easier.

    Throughout the weekend, I worked on this program. The end result is shown above.

    Next Steps

    Now that the program has been developed, we need to actually use it to label the training images we have. Then, we can train the Convolutional Neural Network.

    Intake Sorter

    29 Sep 2018

    Intake Sorter By Abhi

    Task: Design a sorter for the balls and blocks

    To increase the efficiency of our robot, we looked into ways to passively sort minerals during intake and deposit. It is important to sort because it requires less precision under driver control allowing a faster and more efficient robot. Though bulky, we designed an initial design to sort the minerals.

    When this piece is mounted and both blocks and balls are run over it, the balls run down the top and don't fall in the collector, but the blocks fall in the holes. We modeled this design in PTC Creo, then printed it in ABS.

    Next Steps

    This design works but is large so we're going to have to find a smaller and simpler way to sort game pieces. In the future, we're going to minimize this and probably move to a smaller sorting mechanism.

    Designing Wheel Mounts

    29 Sep 2018

    Designing Wheel Mounts By Justin

    Task: Create wheel mounts for our Mini-Mecanum chassis

    Today, we modeled two possible designs for mini-mecanum wheel mounts. The purpose of the mounts is to hold a churro or hex shaft in place to mount mecanum wheels to. The first design was a 6cm by 6cm square with rounded edges that was 5mm thick. A hexagon was removed from the center to hold the churro that supports the mecanum wheel. This design, when printed on low infill, allowed the churro to rotate when enough force was applied. We modeled this design off of the wheel mounts on Kraken and Garchomp; the only differences are the size and material. Because we will be 3D printing these mounts, material efficiency is very important. This mount design used a lot of material to make a prototype, meaning a finished stable mount would need even more material to prevent the churro or hex shaft from slipping.

    Taking these problems into account, we designed a different way to mount the wheels. The new version can mount underneath a REV Rail and hold the shaft or churro perpendicular to the rail. This design uses much less infill than the previous one because of how small the mount is, and because the REV Rail also acts as support to prevent the churro or shaft from spinning. The mount also allows the mini-mecanum wheels to be mounted as close to the frame as possible, which can help make the robot more compact. This design will allow us to easily mount mini-mecanums to our frame, while using minimal filament and taking up very little space.


    Next Steps

    We need to build the full mini-mecanum robot to judge whether these designs will fully work.

    Iron Reign Grants!

    30 Sep 2018

    Iron Reign Grants! By Ethan

    Task: Detail the grant awards that Iron Reign and its associated teams received ($11k)

    So, Iron Reign is currently training an influx of new members - so much that we've started two new teams: Iron Star Robotics and Iron Core. Of course, with this programmatic growth comes plenty of growing pains. A major part of that is finding funding for new teams. In that regard, Iron Reign applied for grants for itself as well as for its other 3 feeder teams. Namely, we applied for the TWC grant(s) and the FIRST in Texas Rookie Grant (sponsored by DEKA) for the new teams.

    Today we reaped our results: we received $525 in funding for Iron Reign and Imperial and $1,525 for Iron Star and Iron Core from the Texas Workforce Commission, as well as $1,000 for Iron Star and Iron Core from DEKA. In addition, we've currently received $4,000 from the DISD STEM Department and $2,500 from Mark Cuban, for a cumulative total of $11,400 raised this season.

    Next Steps

    Even though this is a hefty amount of money - one of the largest hauls made by Iron Reign - it still isn't satisfactory. We now have two more teams, increasing Iron Reign's expenses and stretching simple resources such as 8mm M3s thin. So, we will always be seeking more funding.

    Designing the Corn Cob Aligner

    05 Oct 2018

    Designing the Corn Cob Aligner By Ethan and Abhi

    Task: Design an aligner for the beater bar intake

    The ice cube tray is 9 holes wide and each hole is 16.50mm wide and long. Using these measurements, we created an aligner that would cause the ice cube tray to roll into a cylinder.

    We're designing an intake that will allow the robot to intake particles, and this is a major portion. This will allow us to increase the amount of friction put on the particles, allowing for a more secure grip.

    However, this system has issues. First, we wanted the edges to still be mildly compliant, and this wheel filled out the edge rows to full depth, making them a little too tough. Plus, they made the silicone height too variable, so that we couldn't solely pick up the balls. So, we designed a second aligner with shorter spokes so that the edges would be fully compliant while still being held securely.

    Next Steps

    We need to finish up the corn-cob beater bar, but after that we'll be able to start testing.

    Corn-Cob Intake

    06 Oct 2018

    Corn-Cob Intake By Ethan and Abhi

    Task: Design an intake system unique for balls

    Right now, we're working on a static-deposit system. The first part of this system is having an intake mechanism that passively differentiates the balls and cubes, reducing complexity of other parts of the design. Thus, we created the corn-cob intake.

    First, we bought ice-cube trays. We wanted a compliant material that would grip the particles and be able to send them into a larger delivery mechanism.

    Then, we designed a wheel which' spokes would fit into the holes on an ice cube tray, allowing the tray to stay static while still being compliant in a cylindrical shape. Then, we can put axle hubs through the center of the wheel, allowing us to mount the wheels on a hexagonal shaft. Then, we can mount a sprocket on that, allowing the bar to be rotated for intake. This bar is mounted at the height of the balls, not blocks, so we can passively sort the minerals in-action.

    Next Steps

    We need to mount this on our robot and design a way to deliver the field elements. We're also going to go into more detail on the ice cube mounts in a later blog post.

    Team Marker Fun

    06 Oct 2018

    Team Marker Fun By Karina

    Task: Create the Team Marker

    Last week, we decided to take up the task of creating the team marker, a simple project that would surely be overlooked, but can score a significant amount of points. We wanted the marker to be meaningful to the Iron Reign, but also follow the team marker rules. To start, we made a list of ideas:

    Last season, Ducky (as seen in idea #4) brought Iron Reign good luck whenever the drivers squeezed them, and so we knew that we wanted to incorporate Ducky into whatever the final product would be. Some team members suggested fusing together multiple rubber duckies to fit the dimensions in the rule book. I had a better idea. I thought, "Why not put Ducky in a box?" However, trapping Ducky in a box would prevent us from ever squishing Ducky again (as long as they are trapped in the box). But then an even better idea came up: "Why not put Ducky in a cage?" And so we got to work making a cage for Ducky, one that we could release them from or reach in to whenever we need a squish for good luck.

    We cut two pieces of 3.5 inch x 3.5 inch polycarb to serve as the ceiling and floor of the cage. Then we used 8 standoffs, in pairs of two at each corner of the cage, to serve as the bars. To not waste anymore standoffs, we used zipties as the cage bars. Additionally, the flexibility of the zipties allow us to squeeze Ducky out of the cage from in between the bars. In the end, Ducky looked like the most happy prisoner we've ever seen:

    Next Steps

    With the team marker built, we need to test how well it does its job (staying in one piece for the duration of a match hopefully). It's survived many nights now in the our coach's house, which is no small feat, with all the children running about and constantly misplacing things. Once we have an intake system working for the minerals, we will need to test how compatible it is with Ducky in a Cage. Lastly, we need to decorate Ducky's cage, including our team's number (6832).

    Another Design Bites the Dust

    06 Oct 2018

    Another Design Bites the Dust By Ethan

    Task: Discuss a new rule change

    At one point, we were thinking about creating a "mining facility" robot that stays static within the crater and delivers the blocks into the mining depot. In our eyes, it was legal as it would hold as many blocks as possible inside the crater but only deliver two at a time outside. It would be super-efficient as we would be able to stay within the crater, and not need to move.

    However, fate has struck. Earlier this week, we received this message:

    The rule limiting control/possession limits of minerals has been updated to indicate that robots may _temporarily_ hold more than 2 minerals in the crater, but must shed any excess over prior to performing any other gameplay activities (which would include scoring).
    says that "Robots In a Crater are not eligible to Score Minerals". Per the definitions of "In" and "Crater", if _any_ portion of a Robot is in the vertical area above the crater (extending from the field walls to the outside edge of the Crater Rim), then scoring a Mineral results in a Major Penalty.
    says that Robots may not obstruct another Robot's path of travel in the area between the Lander and a Crater for more than 5 seconds.

    This means that we couldn't do a static mining facility as we cannot score within the crater. Since we'd have a portion of the robot always in the crater, the existence of our robot would be a major penalty.

    Next Steps

    So, we need to rethink our robot. We still want to create a semi-static robot, but we need to redesign the intake portion.

    Labelling Minerals - CNN

    06 Oct 2018

    Labelling Minerals - CNN By Arjun and Abhi

    Task: Label training images to train a Neural Network

    Now that we have software to make labeling the training data easier, we have to actually use it to label the training images. Abhi and I split up our training data into two halves, and we each labeled one half. Then, when we had completed the labeling, we recombined the images. The images we labeled are publicly available at https://github.com/arjvik/RoverRuckusTrainingData.

    Next Steps

    We need to actually write a Convolutional Neural Network using the training data we collected.

    Meeting Log

    06 Oct 2018

    Meeting Log October 06, 2018 By Charlotte, Kenna, Janavi, Ethan, and Arjun

    Meeting Log October 06, 2018

    Code Testing with Arjun

    Today's Meet Objectives

    We set up some tables with FTC Starter Kits for our new recruits so we can give them an introduction to building with REV parts. We want to continue research & design and build for Iron Reign. There is a scrimmage coming up in a few weeks, so we want to have a working chassis by then.

    Today's Meet Log

    • Chassis build
    • Kenna and Janavi worked on a chassis. We hope to mount the linear slides we completed last time onto this chassis and hopefully use it for our first scrimmage. We had a frame for the chassis done last time, and this time we added motors and one of four wheels. Hopefully, the chassis will be complete by next week and then we can run some test to determine whether or not it will be a viable chassis for competition use. If we deem that it is worthy, there are a few problems we need to fix before competition day. Notably, the chassis doesn't fit within the sizing cube, as it measures 17 in x 18 and 1/16th in. Our chassis decision process can be found at (E-16, Choosing Drive Train).

      Kenna with the chassis frame (pre-motored)

      Kenna and Janavi installing the motors
    • Engineering journal discussion
    • We discussed what we want to improve in our engineering notebook this year. In previous years, one of our greatest weaknesses has been the lack of mathematical analysis in our blog posts, so this year we are going to focus on doing more parts testing and incorporate statistics and physics from those tests into our blog posts.
    • Intake prototyping and design
    • Ethan has been working on prototyping with grabbers. Abhi designed and printed parts to mount our "corn on the cob" material, and Ethan put it together and made a small frame to put it on so we can test it. To see more about the intake aligner, see (E-31, Designing the Corn Cob Aligner). To see more about "corn on the cob," see (E-32, Corn-Cob Intake).

      Ethan working on the blog

      Ethan with the "corn on the cob"
    • Gantt Chart
    • Today, I made some real progress on our team "Gantt" chart. We hope to utilize such a chart in order to improve team organization and structure. Hopefully, this will prevent certain subteams from falling behind and we will not be rushed right before competitions as that has happened a lot historically.
    • Code testing and CNN training
    • Once he updated the FTC app, Arjun he tested our code with the new update on Kraken, our robot from last year. He also took 72 pictures of the minerals for training of a convolutional neural network. He began compiling those images and will work on the neural network in the coming weeks. See more about our CNN training process in (E-21, CNN Training)

    Today's Member Work Log

    Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
    CharlotteBlog and organization2:004 hrs
    EthanWorking on blog2:004 hrs
    KennaRobot build2:004 hrs
    JanaviRobot build2:004 hrs
    ArjunCode updates2:004 hrs

    Upgrading to FTC SDK version 4.0

    06 Oct 2018

    Upgrading to FTC SDK version 4.0 By Arjun

    Task: Upgrade our code to the latest version of the FTC SDK

    FTC recently released version 4.0 of their SDK, with initial support for external cameras, better PIDF motor control, improved wireless connectivity, new sensors, and other general improvements. Our code was based on last year's SDK version 3.7, so we needed to merge the new SDK with our repository.

    The merge was slightly difficult, as there were some issues with the Gradle build system. However, after a little fiddling with the configuration, as well as fixing some errors in the internal code we changed, we were able to successfully merge the new SDK.

    After the merge, we tested that our code still worked on Kraken, last year's competition robot. It ran with no problems.

    Mining Base 2.0

    07 Oct 2018

    Mining Base 2.0 By Ethan

    Task: Rethink our static robot idea

    So, our dream this year is to create a static robot. Last week, we found out about a rule change that would prevent our mining robot from staying within the crater. Naturally, we found a way around this, leading us to the Mining Base 2.0.

    The robot will be fixed under the lander's hooks, and have a horizontal and vertical linear slide attached to it. The horizontal linear slide would reach over the crater walls and pick up the silver balls, and shoot them up towards the lander. On the lander, our vertical linear slide would create a backboard that would allow the balls to fall into the lander. This wouldn't violate the rules as we wouldn't be in the crater. And, it would give us the benefit of having an extremely high-scoring robot.

    Next Steps

    We need to start on the designs of this robot, but to do this, we first need to create a working chassis.

    Project Management

    10 Oct 2018

    Project Management By Charlotte

    Task: Improve Iron Reign's team organization and time management

    Iron Reign sometimes struggles with our team organization and time management. There have been many instances where we have fallen behind in different subteams due to this lack of organization. This year, in order to tackle this downfall, we are going to put an emphasis on project management.

    We started a project in a program called Team Gantt. We learned how to use this program from watching the many tutorials in the program and by trial and error. In our project, we have made task groups that represent our subteams, such as build, code, etc. You can see this in the image above, but I did not include the whole chart to not expose any team secrets. A project manager will be in charge of keeping these subteams on track with the chart, and will update it accordingly along with periodic meetings regarding the chart and our progress. Hopefully, this will really help us in our team organization so that we don't fall behind this season.

    Next Steps

    Continue the use of our Gantt chart in order to improve our organization and give us a big-picture view of our progress for the rest of the season.

    BigWheel+

    13 Oct 2018

    BigWheel+ By Evan

    Task: Continue work on BigWheel

    BigWheel has gone through a few major changes. First and foremost, it now has a flipper arm, AKA Superman. Since the robot itself is the lift mechanism, we had to put a lot of work into Superman's design. Right now it is a 10 inch REV rail attached to two 125-tooth gears for redundancy, with a custom 3D printed mount housing an pair of omniwheels on the other end. On the motors, we have two 15-tooth gears, resulting in a 3:25 gear ratio. This gives us a ridiculous amount of torque that lifts the robot up smoothly. On top of the flipper, we’ve added extra supports on the arm mounts, as when we went to the Hendricks scrimmage, we found that the two sides were out of alignment, and one was bending more forward than the other, making the arm bend unevenly to one side and throwing the whole robot out of alignment.

    The next step is to strengthen the arm itself, as the two sides have a tendency to want to do their own things, mainly the side with the intake motor mounted to it. Since the supports have been put in though, Bigwheel has been functioning much better, and the arm no longer flops to one side. General wire management has also taken place, as we'd dealt with wires getting stuck in the gears.

    Next Steps

    Bigwheel was built on a bit of a shabby base, mostly being made of a piece of polycarb and some aluminum bars, and not giving much in terms of change. We’ve cut here and there, drilled a few holes, unattached and re-attached a couple of things, but in all it’s a very stiff robot, and doesn’t lend itself to fluidity of design. That’s why we plan on making a second version of this base, hopefully with thinner polycarb and more secure sides that have been welded together but can be removed more easily. The exact design is still being modeled, but we have a direction to jump off from, and I believe we can make that leap to a better robot.

    Developing a CNN

    13 Oct 2018

    Developing a CNN By Arjun and Abhi

    Task: Begin developing a Convolutional Neural Network using TensorFlow and Python

    Now that we have gathered and labeled our training data, we began writing our Convolutional Neural Network. Since Abhi had used Python and TensorFlow to write a neural network in the past during his visit to MIT over the summer, we decided to do the same now.

    After running our model, however, we noticed that it was not very accurate. Though we knew that was due to a bad choice of layer structure or hyperparameters, we were not able to determine the exact cause. (Hyperparameters are special parameters that need to be just right for the neural network to do well. If they are off, the neural network will not work well.) We fiddled with many of the hyperparameters and layer structure options, but were unable to fix the inaccuracy levels.

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    model = Sequential()
    model.add(Conv2D(64, activation="relu", input_shape=(n_rows, n_cols, 1), kernel_size=(3,3)))
    model.add(Conv2D(32, activation="relu", kernel_size=(3,3)))
    model.add(MaxPooling2D(pool_size=(8, 8), padding="same"))
    model.add(Conv2D(8, activation="tanh", kernel_size=(3,3)))
    model.add(MaxPooling2D(pool_size=(8, 8), padding="same"))
    model.add(Conv2D(4, activation="relu", kernel_size=(3,3)))
    model.add(Conv2D(4, activation="tanh", kernel_size=(1,1)))
    model.add(Flatten())
    model.add(Dense(2, activation="linear"))
    model.summary()
    

    Next Steps

    We have not fully given up, though. We plan to keep attempting to improve the accuracy of our neural network model.

    Meeting Log

    13 Oct 2018

    Meeting Log October 13, 2018 By Charlotte, Janavi, Ethan, Arjun, Abhi, Justin, and Karina

    Meeting Log October 13, 2018

    Sumo bots at SEM STEM Spark

    Today's Meet Objectives

    Today we are taking part in a massive outreach event to teach STEM to girls all over North Dallas: SEM STEM Spark. However, we do have competitions/scrimmages coming up really soon, so we wish to get some substantial building done. See more about the event at (T-22, SEM STEM Spark).

    Today's Meet Log

  • Chassis build
  • We scrapped the chassis we worked on last meeting because of it lack of mounting points and poor assembly. Janavi started with just some extrusion rails and mounted some motors and wheels for a new new chassis. Hopefully we will have a working chassis by the time of the scrimmage.
  • CNN Training
  • Arjun continued to work on a convolution neural network, which, once the network is complete, we will compare with Open CV. We have used Open CV for our computer vision algorithms for a couple of years, but we are now looking into other options to see if CNN will be a more accurate method of differentiating between field elements. A summary of our vision decisions can be found at (E-81, Vision Summary)
  • SEM STEM Spark outreach
  • Besides working on the chassis and a CNN, most of us taught and shared our passion for STEM at the event. The event was 10 hours long, so it was a long haul, but we had a really great time and the girls did too.

    Today's Member Work Log

    Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
    CharlotteOutreach8:0010 hrs
    EthanOutreach8:0010 hrs
    JanaviBuild8:0010 hrs
    ArjunConvolution Neural Network8:0010 hrs
    AbhiOutreach8:0010 hrs
    KarinaOutreach8:0010 hrs
    JustinOutreach8:0010 hrs

    Recruitment Update

    13 Oct 2018

    Recruitment Update By Ethan

    Task: Plan for 30+ influx of team members

    So, as we've stated in prior posts, this year has been a successful year for recruitment. We have had 30 total signups, up from -5 last year. This wave of new recruits means that the Iron Reign family must grow. So, in addition to Iron Reign and Imperial Robotics, we are introducing TWO new teams to North Texas and the Iron Reign family.

    To accommodate this influx, we are changing the organizational structure of SEM Robotics a tad. Iron Reign will remain the varsity team, and as such, will be responsible for tutoring and assisting the other teams, as well as other organizational decisions. Then, Imperial will now be the JV team, and be the intermediate training ground. You can see their efforts over at https://imperialrobotics.github.io/. Finally, we have the two new additions: Iron Star Robotics and Iron Core. Iron Star Robotics is a self-formed, co-op team of motivated freshmen; the other is a more lax training team.

    We'll deliver tutoring updates and joint outreach events on this blog, as well as our usual content. Everything claimed in this engineering notebook will be Iron Reign (6832) only, and we will hold the same standard of separation to the other teams.

    Next Steps

    We will tutor the new teams and identify the promising recruits. For ongoing tournaments and eliminations, we will recompose new teams of the most promising members.

    SEM STEM Spark Preparation

    13 Oct 2018

    SEM STEM Spark Preparation By Charlotte, Ethan, Janavi, Abhi, Karina, and Justin

    Task: Prepare for and set up SEM STEM Spark

    The National Honor Society at our home school, the Science and Engineering Magnet, has been working hard to prepare for the upcoming SEM STEM Spark event for middle school girls in North Dallas that they have been planning for since last May. A few of our very own members are members and leadership in NHS and have been working to include our robotics outreach as a featured activity as well as working with other activities we are passionate about, such as chemistry and environmental science.

    In the past few weeks, we have confirmed a spot for our outreach in the event and have been trying to recruit middle schools girls to attend the event. A few members even visited the middle schools they attended and spoke to their old science teachers to share information about the event and hand out fliers. Due to some complications, we weren't able to get registration for the event up until a week before, so recruitment has been a struggle and is very time sensitive. Our numbers are increasing quickly though, so we have hope that the event is going to be a success.

    The event is tomorrow, and today we spent a few hours setting up. On our day off, we went to our school and organized all of the materials we collected as donations along with those we bought with our own funds. We ran through each activity to ensure that they would fit in the allotted time frames. Everything seems to be running smoothly and we are ready for the event tomorrow. Fingers crossed! :)

    Next Steps

    We are very excited to run this event and have learned a lot from the work we have put into organizing it.

    SEM STEM Spark

    13 Oct 2018

    SEM STEM Spark By Ethan, Charlotte, Janavi, Abhi, Karina, Justin, Bhanaviya, and Alisa

    Task: Volunteer at SEM STEM Spark, a girls-in-STEM event

    For the past year, members of Iron Reign have been planning this event and getting approval. For those not-in-the-know, this event is a women-only STEM event with a guest panel and four different stations: environmental science, chemistry, engineering, and robotics. Iron Reign members had a hand in planning and assisting with 3/4 of these, as well as general logistics. However, most of this is detailed in prior posts - this post is for the actual event.

    Today, we talked to 140 girls in groups of 12-18, allowing us to be able to focus more intensely in our sessions and get more done. We taught them the 3D-printing program and sumobots. Finally, we had a member present as a panel member as a woman in STEM.

    Next Steps

    This event was a great success, and we plan to do more like these in the future. At the moment, we have a date set in March for a second event with entirely new activities.

    Travis High School Night

    16 Oct 2018

    Travis High School Night By Ethan, Evan, Kenna, Charlotte, and Karina

    Task: Present about Iron Reign to 120 prospective members

    Today, we went to the Travis H.S. Night to talk to prospective freshmen about our robotics team. The format of the night was this: four twenty-five minute periods, with twenty minutes about SEM and five minutes about robotics. To fit this time schedule, we condensed our usual recruitment presentation down to five minutes while also demoing our former Worlds robot, Kraken. We mainly talked about the main points of FTC: being well rounded, the emphasis on writing, business, and the like. Then, we answered questions from the audience for the rest of the time. Overall, we presented to about 120 parents and students.

    Next Steps

    We plan to hold more presentations and outreach events in the future. We've already stepped our recruitment game up, so events like these are crucial.

    Mini Mecanum Chassis

    19 Oct 2018

    Mini Mecanum Chassis By Janavi and Justin

    Task:

    Over the summer, we designed many robots for the North Texas Chassis Project, including one based off of last year's Worlds robot, Kraken. The robot chassis had 6" mechanums. But, based on what we know about this years challenge we have decided that this chassis does not utilize the 18-inch cube effectively.

    We have chosen to design a chassis that is similar in function to Kraken, but smaller in size with 4" mecanum wheels.

    Our plan is to design a low-lying 6" x 6" robot, a marked difference from the usual 18". However, this new design means that many of our 3D printed parts are unusable on this robot; for example, our former wheel mounts are much too large for the new robot and wheels, as well as their corresponding axles.

    These bearings are hexagonal, requiring a new wheel mount design.

    Justin first designed the axle plate below to solve this, but it raised the robot off the ground quite a bit, risking debris becoming stuck under the bot. As well, it was flimsy - it was mounted too far from the robot. We went back to the drawing board and brainstormed various methods we could use to attach the axle the frame in a more secure way; we found that we use a pillow block design would save space, while also having a lower-lying robot. This design worked out beautifully, leading to the design we are currently using.

    The axles and wheels aren’t the only new thing about our robot: we've switched to NeverRest 20s in lieu of our normal 40s and 60s. This is another reason that we wanted to create such a minute robot. The gear ratio combined with the size will make this robot a speed demon on the field and allows us to dart between the minerals and the depositing location quickly.

    Next Steps

    In the upcoming weeks we will continue to tinker with this chassis design by adding a linear side and our gathering mechanism, and hopefully, we will be able to demonstrate it at the scrimmage next week.

    MXP Expansion - $150,000 Grant

    20 Oct 2018

    MXP Expansion - $150,000 Grant By Ethan

    Task: Plan for major grant to fund replacement of MXP ($150k)

    First, for a brief backstory: Iron Reign built the MXP - or Mobile Learning Lab - two seasons ago so that we could do outreach to underserved areas within our community. To do this, we partnered with BigThought, who received grants for laptops and technology aboard the vehicle. We spent that entire summer renovating an old 90's RV so that it could become the Mobile Learning Lab. Then, last season, we presented at the National Science Teachers' Association in Kississimee, Florida, where we talked to educators in five other cities to start their own similar programs.

    Now, let's return to the present season. As of today, BigThought is receiving $150k in funding to create a second Mobile Learning Lab. This funding is all-inclusive: the RV and technology aboard. As far as we know, this is the single largest fundraising haul any FTC team has ever received. Now, let me be clear, this is not funding to team costs such as registration and parts, but rather a larger-scale programmatic fund to continue and increase Iron Reign's outreach frequency. Luckily for us, we've secured a lot of funding this season already through Mark Cuban, individual donors, and FIRST in Texas grants.

    Now, here comes the less-so-good news. Even though $150k is a monumental sum of money, it still falls short of the cost of a new MXP, by about $100k. However, the guarantee of over half of the necessary funding makes it much more likely that the additional funds will be secured to purchase the brand-new vehicle.

    Next Steps

    So the next steps are obviously to work with BigThought to find the additional $100k, but this is still huge - we may have broken a fundraising record. And besides that, this is what Iron Reign has always worked for: the platonic ideal of outreach. We have the ability to expand our program, make it more comprehensive, and make it sustainable on it's own merit.

    Rewriting CNN

    20 Oct 2018

    Rewriting CNN By Arjun and Abhi

    Task: Begin rewriting the Convolutional Neural Network using Java and DL4J

    While we were using Python and TensorFlow to train our convolutional neural network, we decided to attempt writing this in Java, as the code for our robot is entirely in Java, and before we can use our neural network, it must be written in Java.

    We also decided to try using DL4J, a competing library to TensorFlow, to write our neural network, to determine if it was easier to write a neural network using DL4J or TensorFlow. We found that both DL4J and TensorFlow were similarly easy to use, and while each had a different style, code written using both were equally easy to read and maintain.

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    java
    		//Download dataset
    		DataDownloader downloader = new DataDownloader();
    		File rootDir = downloader.downloadFilesFromGit("https://github.com/arjvik/RoverRuckusTrainingData.git", "data/RoverRuckusTrainingData", "TrainingData");
    		
    		//Read in dataset
    		DataSetIterator iterator = new CustomDataSetIterator(rootDir, 1);
    		
    		//Normalization
    		DataNormalization scaler = new ImagePreProcessingScaler(0, 1);
    		scaler.fit(iterator);
    		iterator.setPreProcessor(scaler);
    		
    		//Read in test dataset
    		DataSetIterator testIterator = new CustomDataSetIterator(new File(rootDir, "Test"), 1);
    			
    		//Test Normalization
    		DataNormalization testScaler = new ImagePreProcessingScaler(0, 1);
    		testScaler.fit(testIterator);
    		testIterator.setPreProcessor(testScaler);
    		
    		//Layer Configuration
    		MultiLayerConfiguration conf = new NeuralNetConfiguration.Builder()
    				.seed(SEED)
    				.l2(0.005)
    				.weightInit(WeightInit.XAVIER)
    				.list()
    				.layer(0, new ConvolutionLayer.Builder()
    						.nIn(1)
    						.kernelSize(3, 3)
    						.stride(1, 1)
    						.activation(Activation.RELU)
    						.build())
    				.layer(1, new ConvolutionLayer.Builder()
    						.nIn(1)
    						.kernelSize(3, 3)
    						.stride(1, 1)
    						.activation(Activation.RELU)
    						.build())
    				/* ...more layer code... */
    				.build();
    

    Next Steps

    We still need to attempt to to fix the inaccuracy in the predictions made by our neural network.

    Intake Update

    20 Oct 2018

    Intake Update By Ethan, Abhi, Justin, and Kenna

    Task: Update the intake for the new robot size

    We created the corn-cob intake a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, it was a little too big for the Minichassis, so we had to downsize. So, we designed Intake Two. Continuing our history of using kitchen materials to create robot parts, we attached two silicone oven mitts to a beater bar equipped with Iron Reign's REVolution system. Then, we attached a REV Core Hex Motor to the design, then added a 2:1 gear ratio to increase the speed, as the motor wasn't exactly what we wanted.

    Then, we attached our new passive sorting system. Instead of being the old, bulky sorting system, the new system is just three side-by-side bars spaces 68mm apart with tilted wings to move blocks upwards. The 68mm number is important - the size of a gold block. This allows the balls to be struck and fly upwards into the intake while sliding the blocks through the system.

    Next Steps

    We need to attach this to the robot to test intake. The most likely way this'll be done is through a pivot over the walls of the crater from the top of the robot.

    Meeting Log

    20 Oct 2018

    Meeting Log October 20, 2018 By Charlotte, Kenna, Janavi, Ethan, Arjun, Justin, and Abhi

    Meeting Log October 20, 2018

    Juggling the minerals

    Today's Meet Objectives

    Our first scrimmage is next weekend, so we need to complete our chassis and some sort of intake system. Every member needs to take on their own portion of the robot so we can divide and conquer to end today's meeting with a working robot.

    Today's Meet Log

  • Mini-Mech chassis build
  • Finally, we have a chassis. We used small mechanum wheels and a small rectangular frame which is very unusual for Iron Reign with our history of 18 in x 18 in robots. The chassis that Janavi build last weekend during the outreach event was a square, but we needed to make it rectangular to make room for motors. See more on mini-mech at (E-42, Mini Mechanum Chassis).
  • Linear slide build
  • Janavi and Justin worked on the linear slides that Janavi has been working on for a few weeks. Before, we had tested and mounted the slide to an existing chassis, but there were some improvements to be made. They changed the length of the linear slide from using 18 in rails to 12 in rails and added stops so that the slide don't slide out of each other. They also strung the slides so that they can extend and retract depending on the direction of rotation of the wheels.

    Janavi, Justin, and some slides
  • Code mentorship
  • Arjun worked with a few members from Iron Star and Iron Core so that they could start programs for the robots they have been working on. A few weeks ago, Abhi gave them an introduction to coding, but Arjun helped them from the very beginning of making a new project and writing their first lines of code. Iron Reign has been utilizing GitHub for many years and we have found it very helpful, so we helped the other teams set up their own GitHub repositories and taught them how to use it.

    Arjun and the phone mount

    Teaching freshmen GitHub
  • Intake system build
  • Ethan and Abhi worked on our intake system. We are using silicone mats for kitchen counters to launch field elements into our intake system. The minerals then are filtered through 3 bars, each space by 68 mm so that balls roll over and cubes fall in. They completed the intake mechanism, but their greatest challenge is fine tuning the sorting bars and finding a way to mount it onto the chassis. Eventually, we wish to make the system pivotable, but for now we mounted it to the chassis so that it is stationary. Details about this intake system can be found at (E-44, Intake Update).

    Intake mechanism with red silicon mats

    Today's Member Work Log

    Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
    CharlotteBlog and organization2:004 hrs
    EthanWorking on blog and intake build2:004 hrs
    KennaRobot build2:004 hrs
    JanaviLinear slide and chassis build2:004 hrs
    ArjunBuild and mentoring2:004 hrs
    KarinaRobot Build2:004 hrs
    AbhiIntake Build2:004 hrs

    Off-Schedule Meeting Log

    23 Oct 2018

    Off-Schedule Meeting Log October-2 23-2, 2018-2 to October 23, 2018 By Ethan, Karina, Charlotte, Kenna, Arjun, and Evan

    Meeting Log October 21 to October 23, 2018

    Iron Reign will be attending a scrimmage on Saturday, but to attend a scrimmage, you usually have to have a working robot. As of Saturday, we did not. So, a few of our members elected to come in on Saturday to do some last minute robot additions.

    Sunday Tasks

    • Attached lift
    • We've had a linear slide that we've been meaning to hook up to the robot for awhile, and we finally did it Saturday. We mounted it to the front of the robot, as it was the easiest access point, then mounted a motor and pulley on the side to extend it. It worked - and then it didn't - as it tangled itself inside the motor, necessitating a redesign.
      Then we realized a more pressing issue. Since torque is equal to force * arm length (T=FR), and the force on our robot is only the force due to gravity (F=mg), we had a torque on the lift equal to T=mgR. Then, as the lift was mounted at the very end, the torque on the arm was at its absolute maximum. And, while we're confident in our building ability, we're not that confident. So, we realized that we'd have to move the lift closer to the middle to minimize torque.
    • Finished intake
    • On Saturday, we worked on the red-silicone intake system, but there were still issues. We used too-long screws to mount the motor that cut into the sprocket, we mounted the fins a little to far out so that the silicone was running into them and losing energy, and we didn't have a way to mount it. First, we replaced the 15mm M3 screws with 8mm ones, ensuring that there would be no further collision. Then, we removed the beams the fins were mounted on and replaced them with a simple crossbar the we directly mounted the fins to. That way, we could adjust all of the fins at once instead of individually cutting each beam.
    • Second stage
    • Our robot is a little on the small side for Iron Reign. To mitigate that, we planned to add a second stage to the robot for support and to hold components like the second REV hub. So, we started on that, cutting the standoffs, and attaching one side completely so that we could use it as a proto-phone-mount.

    Monday Tasks

    • Moved lift
    • To minimize torque, we moved the lift to the center of the robot. Now, this won't eliminate the torque - one side of the robot is much heavier than the other, but it makes it much more manageable.
    • Mounted intake
    • To have a functional robot, we have to have an intake *on the robot*. We had an intake, but it certainly wasn't anywhere close to being on the robot. So, we mounted a Core Hex Motor to the inside of our robot, attached a gear to our robot then bolted a second gear to our intake. Then, we attached the gear to a churro rail mounted on the robot and moved the motor to where the gears coincided. Originally, we planned to use a 30->90 gear system for a 1:3 gear ratio for a calculated 9.6 Newton-meters of torque, but this systed wouldn't fit within the size constraints, so we had to settle for a 1:1 ratio at 3.2 N*m.
    • Mounted 2nd arm
    • On our other robot, Bigwheel, we mounted the 2nd arm for a future beater bar. Unlike most of our robots, this one is mostly off-the-shelf, with some additional Textrix parts and a REV hub.

    Tuesday Tasks

    • Finished 2nd stage
    • To be able to support our additional motors, we had to add a second REV hub. And, to do that, we had to finish the 2nd stage. This wasn't that difficult, all we had to do was attach a standard piece of REV extrusion to the remaining standoffs, then add a REV hub mount, then mount the actual hub.
    • Reinforced lift
    • Our lift is a little bit wobbly laterally, so we took steps to fix this. We attached a small piece of REV rail to the second stage from the lift to minimize wobbling. This still needs to be worked on, as the rail isn't mounted well, but we'll burn that bridge when we get to it.
    • Strung lift
    • Since our lift needs to extend and retract reliably, we have to use a double-pulley system. So, we strung upwards normally, but then attached another string to a higher up pulley that could pull the whole system back down.
    • Replaced lift motor
    • Our old pulley-motor was an AndyMark Neverrest 60. Now, we have nothing against these motors, but we wanted something that would be easier to connect to the REV hub. So, we replaced it with a HD Hex Motor with a 40:1 gearbox. This actually increased the torque by a negligible amount (from 4.186 N*m to 4.2 N*m), and was a more convenient change.
    • Added scoring box
    • Originally, we cut a box template out of polycarb that was the exact size of two silver particles. Unfortunately, we couldn't find a heat gun, so we had to go back to cardboard.
    • Added intake bar
    • We added the corn-cob intake from a few weeks ago onto this robot so that it can get both blocks and balls from over the crater wall.

    Now, in theory, we have a competition-ready robot.

    Before

    After

    Next Steps

    We still need to program our robot and fix any gremlins that pop up; this will happen at the Friday meet.

    DISD Scrimmage at Hedrick MS

    27 Oct 2018

    DISD Scrimmage at Hedrick MS By Charlotte, Janavi, Ethan, Evan, Justin, Karina, and Abhi

    Task: Compete at the Hedrick MS DISD Scrimmage

    Today, Iron Reign competed in the DISD scrimmage at Hedrick Middle School. This was the first scrimmage of the year, so experienced teams and rookie teams alike struggled to get a working robot on the field. We go to this scrimmage every year, and it helps us gage just how much needs to be done to have a qualifier-ready robot. This year, that is a lot. We actually had two robots relatively pieced together, a main chassis and a backup, but we didn't account for many different problems that rendered them inoperable. In the case of the backup robot, the linear slide fell apart easily and was threaded so that it could only extend, and not retract. In the case of the actual robot, most of our problems stemmed from the intake system. Since we built it so recently, we were never able to write any code until in the final few days of preparation. We weren't able to debug the code and it has caused many complications in our robot. Our drive train also had many issues which we have been trying to fix and fine tune.

    Due to these many issues, we did not compete for most of our matches. We spent a lot of time working on our bots and talking to other teams about their progress and plans for the season, as well as see all of the interesting ideas they have put together in fruition in a game setting. In the match we did compete in, we did very badly due to driver error and mechanical errors in the drive train.

    Dallas Chamber Leadership Council

    30 Oct 2018

    Dallas Chamber Leadership Council By Kenna, Janavi, Abhi, and Ethan

    Presenting to Leadership Dallas Class of 2019

    Today, we presented to the Leadership Dallas program, run by the Dallas Chamber of Commerce, to fundraise for Iron Reign and BigThought's Mobile Learning Lab program to cover the remaining $100k gap as well as our school programs.

    There were 2 groups of about 10 people who learned about Iron Reign & FTC and toured SEM (Science Engineering Magnet) & its classes. There were employees from Big Thought, Uber, Turner Construction, Ernst & Young, and Channel 8 News. We'd especially like to name Stephanie from Channel 8 and Ryan Dyer for helping us get a website visit from Antartica. We'd been working on having a visit from all 7 continents for all of last year, and it finally came true!

    After that, they got a tour of a deployment-ready MXP, full of laptops, 3D printers, EV3's, and teaching monitors. They were very interested in our SEM education and how it ties into what we are able to do as a part of Iron Reign and FTC. We discussed using our physics experience to conduct experiments for the materials we use on our robot, and SEM's freshmen Java class to do IMU coding.

    We all loved how enthusiastic they were about improving Dallas and learning more about robotics in a high school education. It was a huge opportunity for us to spread STEM and FIRST to the Dallas community, and we hope to do so again in the future.

    Next Steps

    We were lucky enough to talk to Leandre Johns of Uber about what the opportunities they could offer our team and our community in helping underserved communities learn about STEM.

    BigWheel Arm

    02 Nov 2018

    BigWheel Arm By Evan

    Task: Design an arm for BigWheel

    Bigwheel’s intake arm is one of the most important parts of the robot. Since our scrimmage, we have learned how to make this arm much more efficient, starting with some supports. The original intake arm was made of two scrap Tetrix rails. The result of this was that the two sides of the arm would be out of sync, creating a twist in the arm that caused it to move oddly. Thus, it has been stabilized with cross beam REV rails.

    The next upgrade on the arm is going to be the box to hold the minerals. Right now it’s just a cardboard prototype and we need to move to the next version. After a bit of debate, we decided to craft it out of polycarb. The reason polycarb was not our immediate solution is because it’s unfortunately quite heavy, and instead the first thing we came to think of was thin plywood and duct tape. Thin slices of plywood would be taped together to create a fabric like box that still had form. This idea still lent itself to breakage, and we next went to a design using a thin plastic sheet, the same kind of plastic that is used inside milk cartons. The only issue is that it’s super weak and doesn’t form well, so we would have to build a frame for it, much like the plywood and tape.

    Next Steps

    Right now we’re toying around with the idea of an arm that not only flips out but also extends using a gear and tooth track made from Tetrix parts of days gone by. The reason for this is to gain a little extra height that we were lacking before in the robot and a little more flexibility when we grab minerals from the crater. To do this I had to take apart the arm from our first ever FTC robot, and use the toothed track and gear plus the extra long tetrix bars to create the slides. So far the slides are surprisingly smooth and we have high hopes for the future of the arm.

    Full Circle

    02 Nov 2018

    Full Circle By Evan

    A reflection on my time at Iron Reign

    In 2012 I began competing in FTC. That year our team built a robot with a giant central arm on top of a six wheeled drivetrain that sported a ring bucket that the rings would slot into one or two at a time. The idea was that we would go bit by bit, slowly moving the rings onto the rack in the middle. This was a mediocre idea in theory, but an even worse one in practice. I think in that entire season, we only were able to score one ring, and it was when I was by myself on a practice field before a match. The whole season had led up until that moment. It was the year I learned how to wire things, how to solder wires, how to use a bandsaw, a table saw, a miter saw, and how to really think about the real world applications of what I was doing. When I scored that ring, I was so happy. I told the whole team because this is what we had been trying to do for three months without success. We never scored another ring that season, despite being in first or second place at our qualifier (which is really just a testament to how heavily you can be carried in FTC). Since then i’ve worked on, designed, and built numerous competition robots, making a smooth transition from FLL to FTC, and i’ve been there for basically every major moment in our team’s history, from the very first meeting at the Virani household to our trip to the World championship competition in Houston where we won the Motivate award. I felt the same walking up on that stage and accepting the motivate with my team as I did back in 2012 scoring that one ring. That feeling of success and pride in my work. That’s why I keep doing FTC.

    I say all of this because today I had to take apart the arm of the first robot I ever built, and I thought it was a little poetic how I was using the robot I helped build in the my first season of FTC as part of the robot in my last season of FTC. It was weird. I don’t know. It was one of those rare full circle moments that you only ever get a few of and half the time you don’t even recognize them when they’re happening and never really get to appreciate them. It really just made me think back on all my years of robotics.

    Meeting Log

    03 Nov 2018

    Meeting Log November 03, 2018 By Ethan, Charlotte, Evan, Janavi, Kenna, Karina, Justin, Arjun, Abhi, and Bhanaviya

    Meeting Log November 03, 2018

    Today's Meet Objectives

    So, we have one week before our first tournament. This isn't great. As you can see on our last blog post, we didn't do amazingly at the scrimmage. So, we have a lot of work to do.

    Today's Meet Log

    First and foremost, we have to work on our presentation. So, we did an hour-long presentation runthrough to ensure all team members had the content down.

    Also necessary for a good tournament is the journal. We've had a consistent 10-20 post backlog since the season started, and we've finally started cutting into it. At my current count, we're down to 7 posts left. So, we're making considerable progress on this front. Ethan already finished our strategic plan earlier this week, so all we have left is to write the blurbs and retag our posts, something we'll do on Monday.

    Finally, in order to compete, we have to have a robot. Now, we have a robot, but it isn't really working. So, Evan and Karina worked on mounting an intake system, as well as reinforcing the center lever. This will ensure that the robot can actually score by the tournament.

    On the code side, Abhi found the coefficients for PID so that he can start autonomous. As well, he started merging SDK 4.2 with our 15k-line base of legacy code so that we can take advantage of TensorFlow. On that note, we discovered that SDK 4.2 comes with mineral detection out of the box with TensorFlow - something that we've been working on since kickoff.

    Finally, we have some good news. Iron Reign has official adopted its first new member of the season: Bhanaviya Venkat. Stay tuned for her first blog post later this week.

    Today's Work Log

    Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
    EthanPresentation\Journal2:004 hrs
    CharlotteBlog Backlog2:004 hrs
    KennaBlog Backlog2:004 hrs
    JanaviBigWheel Arm2:004 hrs
    ArjunBlog Backlog2:004 hrs
    KarinaBigWheel2:004 hrs
    AbhiAutonomous2:004 hrs
    EvanBlog Backlog2:004 hrs
    Justin3D Modelling2:004 hrs
    BhanviyaOnboarding2:004 hrs

    Pose BigWheel

    03 Nov 2018

    Pose BigWheel By Abhi

    Task: New Pose for Big Wheel robot

    Historically, Iron Reign has used a class called "Pose" to control all the hardware mapping of our robot instead of putting it directly into our opmodes. This has created cleaner code and smoother integration with our crazy functions. However, we used the same Pose for the past two years since both had an almost identical drive base. Since there wasn't a viable differential drive Pose in the past, I made a new one using inspiration from the mecanum one. Pose will be used from this point onwards in our code to setup.

    We start with initializing everything including PID constants and all our motors/sensors. I will skip all this for this post since this is repetitive in all team code.

    In the init, I made the hardware mapping for the motors we have on BigWheel right now. Other functions will come in later.

    Here is where a lot of the work happens. This is what allows our robot to move accurately using IMU and encoder values.

    There are a lot of other methods beyond these but there is just a lot of technical math behind them with trigonometry. I won't bore you with the details but our code is open source so you can find the necessary help if you just look at our github!

    Torque Calculations

    03 Nov 2018

    Torque Calculations By Karina

    Task: Calculate the torque needed to lift chassis

    After seeing how well the robots that could latch onto the lander performed at the scrimmage, Iron Reign knew that we had to be able to score these points. We originally tried lifting with a linear slide system on MiniMech, but it was not strong or sturdy enough for the small chassis, and would definitely not be a functional system on BigWheel in time for competition. And so we thought why not use this opportunity to *flex* on the other teams with an alternative design? An idea was born.

    We decided we would latch onto the lander using the same arm used for intake, and then pivot the main body of BigWheel up off of the ground about an "elbow joint", much like how humans do bicep curls. To do so, our motors would need to have enough torque to be able to lift the loaded chassis off the ground once the arm hooked onto the latch. First, we measured the mass of BigWheel. Then we found where the center of mass was located. The distance from the pivot point to the center of mass became our lever arm, also known as the radius.

    Calculating torque required knowing the forces acting on BigWheel at its center of mass. In this case, there was only the force due to gravity (F = mg). Before we could plug BigWheel's mass into the equation, we converted to units of kilograms (kg), and then used the value to find the newtons of force that would oppose the upward motion:

    Finally, we plugged the force and radius into the torque equation:

    Next Steps

    The next step is to test which gear train will output this torque value based on the motors used and the gear ratio.

    Linear Slide Lift

    04 Nov 2018

    Linear Slide Lift By Janavi

    Task: Design a lift for MiniChassis

    For extension both into the crater and lifting our robot up to the crater we have decided test a linear slide system. We plan to utilize linear slide system for both vertical and horizontal extension on MiniMech.

    Horizontal Extension Goals

    • Long Enough to reach Crater from distance
    • We need to determine how many stages we need

    Vertical Extension Goals

    • Long Enough to reach lander
    • Strong enough to support robot weight

    When designing a lift we need to determine the optimal gear ratio to allow our lift system to lift the robot but still do it relatively fast. Realistically looking at the aluminum parts we are using we plan for the robot to be around 35 lbs. We also know that the lander is 22 inches above the ground and we plan for the linear slide to extend to 14 inches off the ground This would mean that the point of rotation for our hook mechanism would be 22 inches - 14 inches = 7 inches below the latch on the lander.

    We plan to use REV 40:1 motors that have 594.7 oz*in. Now using these calculations we can determine our needed gear ratio.

    This gear ratio of 6.6 means that for our robot we need a motor to gear ratio that needs around seven rotations of the motor to provide one rotation of the hook.

    We knew the max weight of the robot would be around 20 pounds since the total weight of all the parts in the kit is less than 20 pounds. The point of rotation for the hook would be around 5.5 inches below the lander latch. This is because the bottom of the hook is around 22 inches above the ground and the point of rotation will be around 16.5 inches off the ground so that we can account for space for a gear while staying within the 18 inch box. Below is the torque calculation.

    Next Steps

    RIP CNN

    04 Nov 2018

    RIP CNN By Abhi

    Task: Farewell Iron Reign's CNN

    FTC released new code to support Tensorflow and automatically detect minerals with the model they trained. Unfortunately, all of our CNN work was undercut by this update. The silver lining is that we have done enough research into how CNN's work and it will allow us to understand the mind of the FTC app better. In addition, we may retrain this model if we feel it doesn't work well. But now, it is time to bid farewell to our CNN.

    Next Steps

    From this point, we will further analyze the CNN to determine its ability to detect the minerals. At the same time, we will also look into OpenCV detection.

    BigWheel Upgrades

    05 Nov 2018

    BigWheel Upgrades By Evan

    Task: Get BigWheel ready for the tournament

    Today, we built mounts to attach both types of intake to the rack; the rack-and-pinion corncob intake and the red-flapped intake. We also created a new way of mounting the arm to the chassis. The idea is that since it’s attached to the rack and pinion track, it reaches high enough for the robot to put the minerals in the lander. We made the arm with a 12-86 gear ratio. Our next plan is to create the mount, minimizing the size of the arm.

    The final addition is a tail for the robot to be able to stop itself from flipping backwards, something that is a very real danger of the design. It will probably be made of polycarb with aluminum or steel support on either side, just in case the polycarb is not enough to support the push of the robot. Part of this process will involve some code tuning so that the robot stops itself, but the tail is necessary as a preventative measure.

    Next Steps

    There’s still a lot of stuff we will have to do to prepare the robot physically for the competition this Saturday, but I believe it will get done.

    SEM Robotics Tournament

    07 Nov 2018

    SEM Robotics Tournament By Coach and Ethan

    Our deepest thanks to all volunteers!

    Iron Reign (team 6832), The School of Science and Engineering and the Dallas ISD STEM Department are happy to announce that we are hosting our second annual FIRST Tech Challenge qualifying tournament at our Townview campus on December 15th. Thirty North Texas robotics teams will compete for awards and approximately 5 or 6 advancements to the Regional Championship to be held in February.

    Calling All Volunteers

    This is the second time our school has hosted an official qualifying tournament and we will need your help to make it a first-rate experience. This is a full day event on Saturday, December 15. There are also options to help with setup Friday afternoon December 14. Please feel free to circulate this message to everyone in the SEM community who can contribute their time and expertise. And if you can suggest a business that might want to sponsor the event, we'll be happy to talk with them.

    Our deepest thanks to all volunteers!

    One group of volunteers that support the running of robot matches include referees, score keepers, inspectors, field managers. Some of these roles require training and certification and we will generally draw from mentors already involved in FTC. Other roles supporting match play do not require training and include field management, pit management and queue management.

    Another group of volunteers will support judging of teams for awards. Judges can be drawn from industry or academia and can have an engineering background or a general business backround in a technology industry. Judges assess the merits of teams' robots, their engineering process and journal, their strategic decisions, team dynamics and outreach. Judges will be led by a Judge Advisor, but will need to understand the awards criteria ahead of time.

    Another group of volunteers will support the event overall. This includes team registration, crowd control, DJ, videography and photography, A/V support, floaters, runners, concessions, load-in/load-out crew, etc.

    This is just a summary of the most common roles, but there are many specialty roles. Full volunteer info can be found here.

    For some roles it helps to understand the run-of-show for the day.

    How to sign up as a volunteer

    FIRST is the governing body of these competitions and they have a volunteer sign up system so that we can assure that all roles are filled by vetted volunteers. We are trying to get all volunteers processed through this system. It does involve creating a FIRST account if you have not previously done so. If you have any issues or are finding the process burdensome, please use our contact form for assistance.

    Please sign up for as many roles as you feel comfortable fulfilling. We may need to be flexible with assignments depending on who is available and which roles can be fulfilled by our regional managing partner. Students may volunteer for certain roles and as event hosts, Iron Reign team members will be supporting the event throughout the day.

    To begin, go to the volunteer signup page for our event: https://my.firstinspires.org/Volunteers/Wizard/Search/2?EventId=39812

    If you have not previously registered with FIRST, you'll need to sign up / register and activate your account first. Then you can go back to the link above and indicate your preferences. We truly need your help and look forward to working with you to create a great tournament for our students. We hope this event will showcase SEM as the premiere home for future scientists and engineers.

    All our Thanks,

    Karim Virani and Cathy Lux

    Tournament day is very involved for the teams and volunteers. Here is a typical schedule of the day:

    • 7:30-8:30 Teams arrive, register and load their robots and gear into the pit areas
    • 9:00 - 10:30 Teams present their robots to Judges for the awards competition. They also get their robots inspected and approved for the robot game
    • 10:30 Opening ceremonies and then qualifying matches of the robot game begin. Judges are observing teams in their pits and on the competition field
    • Noon - Lunch will be provided for the teams and volunteers. Judges share information with each other about the teams they interviewed.
    • Afternoon - qualifying matches continue until each team has competed 5 times. There are 4 robots per match and we'll have two alternating competition fields to speed things up.
    • Mid-to-late afternoon is Alliance Selection, top teams from qualifying rounds will build alliances to compete in the elimination / playoff rounds. Judges continue deliberating.
    • Playoff rounds usually take a bit over an hour
    • Closing Ceremonies and Awards
    • Pack up fields and equipment

    We plan to end the tournament by 5pm, but events can run long. All volunteers are encouraged to stay until the end of the tournament, but it's not required if your role is completed earlier in the day.

    Conrad Qualifier

    10 Nov 2018

    Conrad Qualifier By Ethan, Charlotte, Karina, Janavi, Bhanaviya, Abhi, Arjun, Evan, and Justin

    Task: Compete at the N. TX Conrad Qualifier

    Right off of a mortifying experience at the Hendricks MS Scrimmage, in which we got the worst score at the tournament (and in the one match we did participate in, our robot broke) we walked in on shaky ground. In the week leading up to the tournament, Iron Reign worked hard, with 35 commits to the blog, and countless changes to our robot.

    Inspection

    Our robot fit well inside the sizing cube. However, we were warned for our rats' nest of wiring at the base of our robot, as well as the fact that our metal-frame base had sharp corners.

    Presentation

    We walked in, and started off out strong. Half of a good presentation is the energy, and we had more energy than some of our other presentations last year. Unfortunately, that energy petered out as we stuttered and tripped over ourselves. We got our information across, but not as well as we should have, and we didn't have enough time for questioning.

    Robot Game

    We didn't really have a working robot, but we tried our best. Unfortunately, our best wasn't great.

    Match 1

    We lost, 33-135. We deployed the wrong autonomous and couldn't drive - a total wash.

    Match 6

    We lost, 15-70. Our robot's linear slide seized up, bringing our robot outside of sizing limits, so we had to sit out the match as we hacksawed through our intake.

    Match 11

    We lost, 47-122. Our autonomous worked! (but our team marker didn't deploy).

    Match 13

    We lost, 65-196. Our robot didn't work, we just drove ourselves around aimlessly.

    Match 15

    We lost, 10-167. This time, none of our robots worked!

    In summary, a disappointing result.

    After-Judging and Awards Ceremony

    While we thought we hadn't done well in judging, we were quickly rebuffed. A good measure of judging success is if the judges come back to talk to you, and this was no exception. We had five separate groups of judges come up to us and ask us about *every* component of our team, from business, to volunteering, to code, to design. While we thought we hadn't done well in judging, we were quickly rebuffed. A good measure of judging success is if the judges come back to talk to you, and this was no exception. We had five separate groups of judges come up to us and ask us about *every* component of our team, from business, to volunteering, to code, to design.

    In the ceremony, every single member of SEM Robotics waited. Iron Star had been the 4th alliance captain; Iron Core had demonstrated gracious professionalism; Iron Reign had multiple in-depth discussions with judges; Imperial had an exceptional journal. We watched each team get nominated for awards, but only that, and fall short. In particular, Iron Reign was nominated for every award but Innovate. Then came Inspire. We heard two names echo off as nominations; neither of them SEM Robotics teams. Finally, a speech flew across the arena as Iron Reign stood for their Inspire Award.

    Next Steps

    Even though we won Inspire, we have a long way to go. We are going to compete at at least one more tournament, and don't want to completely embarrass ourselves.

    Inspire at Conrad Qualifier

    10 Nov 2018

    Inspire at Conrad Qualifier By Ethan

    This weekend, SEM sent four teams to the first qualifying tournament of the FTC Robotics Rover Ruckus 2018-2019 season. Iron Reign won the top award (Inspire) and advanced. For reference, Iron Reign is last year's FTC World Championship Motivate Award winner and is the "varsity" team of the SEM Robotics organization.

    Left to right: Janavi Chadha, Bhanaviya Venkat, Justin Bonsell, Abhijit Bhattaru, Charlotte Leakey, Karina Lara, Ethan Helfman, Evan Daane, Karim Virani. Not shown: Kenna Tanaka, Arjun Vikram and mentors Catherine Lux and Calvin Boykin.

    Imperial Robotics was a finalist for the Think Award due to the excellence of their engineering journal.

    Hudson Shields, Alisa Lin, Blaine Wells, Christian Saldana, Rohit Shankar. Not shown: Thu Le, Jonathan Hamada.

    Our two new rookie teams beat back tough odds from a field of seasoned teams. Iron Star became the 4th alliance captain in the playoff rounds.

    Left to right: Katelyn Cumplido, Shawn Halimman, Henry Le, Evan Branson, Paul Lea, Aaron Daane. Not shown: Beau Aveton, Cooper Clem, Harish Jai Ganesh, Benjamin Oommen.

    Iron Core was publicly invited to join the 3rd alliance in the playoffs, but graciously declined because they had a new fault in their robot and didn't want to drag the alliance down just to get into the playoffs. This was a highly laudable moment at the tournament and demonstrates the highest level of sportsmanship. FTC is about so much more than the robot, and no team emphasized that more then Iron Core.

    Left to right: Mahesh Natamai, Jose Lomeli, Ben Bruick, Samuel Adler, Ephraim Sun.

    Code Post-Mortem after Conrad Qualifier

    10 Nov 2018

    Code Post-Mortem after Conrad Qualifier By Arjun and Abhi

    Task: Analyze code failure at Conrad Qualifier

    Iron Reign has been working hard on our robot, but despite that, we did not perform well owing to our autonomous performance.

    Our autonomous plan was fairly simple: perform sampling, deploy the team marker, then drive to the crater to park. We planned to use the built-in TensorFlow object detection for our sampling, and thus assumed that our autonomous would be fairly easy.

    On Thursday, I worked on writing a class to help us detect the location of the gold mineral using the built-in TensorFlow object detection. While testing this class, I noticed that it produced an error rather than outputting the location of the gold mineral. This error was not diagnosed until the morning of the competition.

    On Friday, Abhi worked on writing code for the driving part of the autonomous. He wrote three different autonomous routines, one for each position of the gold mineral. His code did not select the routine to use yet, leaving it open for us to connect to the TensorFlow class to determine which position the gold mineral was.

    On Saturday, the morning of the competition, we debugged the TensorFlow class that was written earlier and determined the cause of the error. We had misused the API for the TensorFlow object detection, and after we corrected that, our code didn't spit out an error anymore. Then, we realized that TensorFlow only worked at certain camera positions and angles. We then had to adjust the position of our robot on the field, so that we could.

    Our code failure was mostly due to the fact that we only started working on our autonomous two days before the competition. Next time, we plan to make our autonomous an integral part of our robot, and focus on it much earlier.

    Next Steps:

    We spend more time focusing on code and autonomous, to ensure that we enter our next competition with a fully working autonomous.

    Materials Testing Planning

    16 Nov 2018

    Materials Testing Planning By Ethan

    Task: Design a lab to test nylon properties

    So, Iron Reign is used to using off-the-shelf materials on our robot: silicone oven gloves, ice cube trays, nylon 3D-printed parts, and more. But, we've never actually done a thorough investigation on the durability and efficacy of these parts. Because of this, we've had some high-profile failures: our silicone blocks breaking on contact with beacons in RES-Q, our nylon sprockets wearing down in Relic Recovery, our gears grinding down in Rover Ruckus. So, we're going to do an investigation of various materials to find their on-robot properties.

    Nylon Testing

    A majority of the 3D-printed parts on BigWheel are nylon - we find it to be stronger than any other material save ABS, but much less prone to shattering. Still, we still deal with a substantial amount of wear, and we want to find the conditions under which damage happens.

    So, to start, we are printing a 4.5" x 1.5" block with a thickness of 4mm with an infill of 60% out of nylon. We chose these values as our average part is about 4mm thick, and our high-strength nylon pieces are about 60% infill. Then, we are going to test it under a variety on conditions meant to simulate stressful operation. As well, we're going to measure other values such as coefficient of friction using angle calculations.

    Silicone Testing

    Similarly, we use the silicone oven mitts on our intake; we find that they grip the particles pretty well. The main thing that we want to test is the amount of energy they have while rotating and then the amount of energy they lose upon collision. We plan to test this through video-analysis. In addition, we wish to test the coefficient of friction of the mitts to see if a better material can be found.

    Next Steps

    We are going to perform these labs so that we can compare the constants we receive to commonly accepted constants to test our accuracy.

    Conrad Qualifier Post Mortem - Short Term

    17 Nov 2018

    Conrad Qualifier Post Mortem - Short Term By Ethan, Bhanaviya, Janavi, Charlotte, Kenna, Arjun, Justin, Janavi, Karina, and Abhi

    Task: Analyze what went wrong at Conrad

    Iron Reign didn't necessarily have the best time at Conrad. As shown in last week's tournament post, the day had its ups and downs. Even though it was a successful tournament overall, there's much that we could do better.

    Problems:

    The Robot

    First, the robot didn't perform well. So, we're beginning our analysis from the mindset that everything must be changed.

    • The Intake
    • The intake itself had a multitude of problems. First and foremost, we actually didn't have a way to contain the particles from the intake. Being that Rover Ruckus' primary way of scoring is by depositing the particles into the lander, this was a pretty big oversight. To solve this, we plan to add a catcher at the bottom of the intake using this template.

      As well, our linear slide locked up in the middle of the tournament, preventing our intake from extending. Now, we have latches that keep the intake from retracting without human assistance.

    • Superman Arm
    • This impressed the judges a lot and was one of the more reliable parts of our robot. However, there were still issues. First and foremost, the arm became misaligned so that the gears began to grind during the judging presentation. This was an easy fix - we just adjusted a set screw - but we need a more rigorous solution. Right now, we're considering metal gears instead.

    The Presentation\Judging

    We didn't have much practice with our presentation. Some of the more major issues were slide order (~5 second gaps between people talking, stuttering due to unfamiliarity with content, and energy (a majority of the members present had held an all-nighter so we weren't really awake).

    We plan to revamp our presentation, adding to the story of BigWheel's development. Plus, we'll have all of our members in the next presentation, which'll be a major help. We need to do more practice, but that's a given.

    Another thing that we fell short on was the Innovate Award (the only award that we weren't mentioned for). A good portion of this is that the Innovate Award rubric emphasizes that the robot needs to work; ours really didn't. However, we need to take a retrospective look at our mechanism insofar that we need to show our difference between us and other robots.

    Programming

    Despite our all-nighter and prior large codebase, we were pretty short on workable code. So, while our driving worked, not much else did. We had an theoretical autonomous, but it remained only that.

    Next, we need to work on our Pose class (the one that determines the position of the robot on the field). From there, we need to add autonomous enhancements, allowing us to drive a little better. The most efficient use of our time could be put toward raising our robot to score and latch, as well as TensorFlow recognition of the minerals.

    Meeting Log

    17 Nov 2018

    Meeting Log November 17, 2018 By Charlotte, Karina, Kenna, Janavi, Evan, Justin, Ethan, Arjun, Bhanaviya, and Abhi

    Meeting Log November 17, 2018

    Evan working on the robot!

    Today's Meet Objectives

    We are going to discuss multiple facets of our team (presentation, engineering journal, organization, etc) with alumni Jayesh and Lin. What we hope to gain out of our conversation is an outside perspective. In addition to this conversation we wish to continue in our reflection of the tournament last weekend and preparation for our next tournament.

    Today's Meet Log

    • Organization
    • Karina and Janavi spent a large portion of practice organizing all of our parts and tools. They organized our drawers, carts, and tent. Organization has historically been a weak spot for Iron Reign, so this year we really want to crack down on that problem, as discussed in (T-13, Organization!).
    • Superman arm and wire organization
    • Evan, Kenna, Janavi, and Karina were all making improvements on our robot, notably working on problems we found at the tournament last week. These problems mostly dealt with wire organization and our superman arm. Analysis on why the superman arm broke can be found at (E-63, Code Issues Break the Superman Arm). More about how we fixed these issues can be found at (E-65, Arm Repairs).
    • Blogging mentoring
    • Also, Bhanaviya is learning to make blog posts. We showed her our blog post guides and answered any questions she had. Expect to hear from her soon.
    • Alumni Meeting and Feedback
    • The main focus of today's meeting was speaking to our alumni Jayesh and Lin who are both in their sophomore of college. They were both founding members of Iron Reign, they were in their senior year the first time we went to supers. More details on this meeting and our post-mortem can be found at (T-27, Conrad Qualifier Post Mortem - Short Term).
    • Presentation feedback
    • First we discussed our presentation lacked energy and enthusiasm, which is a common problem in our presentations. We have great enthusiasm for our work and progress, but we have trouble expressing it on early morning competition days. This could also be improved by lots and lots of practice, so we don't ever have to focus on our memorization, rather focusing on the expression of our passion for robotics.
    • Engineering journal feedback
    • Also, they provided insight on our engineering journal, which they said needs more cohesiveness between posts. This takes the form of adding links to older blog posts that reference future ones after we have written them.
    • Mentorship feedback
    • Finally, we discussed the new teams we have started, Iron Core and Iron Star, and asked for their advice on how to approach mentoring the new recruits. They told us that rather than waiting for them to seek us out, we need to seek them out, as many of the recruits don't have the confidence to approach us, since many of our team members are upperclassmen. We want to let them know that Iron Reign is here to help them in any way possible and to make our workspace one of collaboration and the transfer of ideas through the teams and grade levels.

    Today's Member Work Log

    Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
    KarinaOrganization and Build2:004 hrs
    AbhiConversation2:004 hrs
    EvanRobot build2:004 hrs
    CharlotteBlog and organization2:004 hrs
    EthanWorking on blog2:004 hrs
    KennaRobot build2:004 hrs
    Justin3D Modeling2:004 hrs
    JanaviOrganization and build2:004 hrs
    BhanaviyaLearning to Blog2:004 hrs

    Mentoring SchimRobots at Rice MS Tournament

    17 Nov 2018

    Mentoring SchimRobots at Rice MS Tournament By Bhanaviya

    Task: Mentor a middle school team at the RMS Qualifier

    Earlier today, I attended the Rice Middle School Qualifier in order to mentor my middle school team, SchimRobots, as an alumnus. Last year, when I was a member of SchimRobots, we had qualified to regionals by attaining 3rd Place Inspire Award in a qualifier. Since the Inspire Award had a heavy focus on a team’s engineering notebook, I decided to help out by looking through their journal. The way 12900 operates is through units; there is a unit specifically dedicated to the engineering notebook, and the members in that unit are the ones who work on the notebook. However, as I’ve learned thus far, because different members are equipped with different skill sets, it is more effective for each member to record their personal experiences within the team, rather than for a smaller group to carry the entire load.

    SchimRobots Team Overview

    That was the first takeaway that I decided to pass on. The second was that all ideas, regardless of potential, must be recorded. The purpose of the journal is to document all ideas, despite their success rate. This documentation showcases how iterative a team’s thinking can be when attempting to solve a problem. Because an iterative process helps portray a team’s “journey” in overcoming a challenge, dedicating a portion of an entry to any idea a team considered implementing is an effective strategy in making one’s journal as thorough as possible.

    At the end of the day, we discussed the possibility of another meet-up, this one with more experienced members of Iron Reign to mentor the middle-school team, prior to their second qualifier.

    Next Steps

    The next step is to consider, with the rest of Iron Reign, the feasibility of organizing another mentoring session, taking into account where and how much help SchimRobots needs, and where and how much Iron Reign can offer.

    Chassis Mark Two Planning

    20 Nov 2018

    Chassis Mark Two Planning By Ethan

    Task: Plan a new BigWheel chassis

    Our next tournament is a while away, in about two months. So, we have a little bit of time to redesign. And, our current chassis has plenty of faults.

    Our original BigWheel base.

    First and foremost, our chassis was built for a testing competition, not to be a full fledged competition robot. As such, it's a little lacking in features that would be normal on such a robot such as mounting points for other components, durability, and free space. So, we need a redesign that allows for greater modularity and functionality.

    We're starting from the ground up; our current base is a square metal frame with a polycarb bottom. While this is a good start, it has some issues: the base seems to be a little wobbly due to the polycarb, there's only one level of construction, so our motor mounts, REV hubs, and supports compete for space, and we have to add all the counting points ourselves.

    The main way to prevent the wobbliness is by replacing the polycarb with something sturdier, as well as not having everything simply bolted together. Thus, we're going to dive headfirst into the next step - welding. We plan to cut a base out of aluminum as well as four side plates to create a dish-like shape. Then, we plan to TIG weld these plates together (TIG welding uses a tungsten electrode in contact with two separate metal plates in combination with a filler metal that melts and joins the two plates together).

    Basic design for the newest version of BigWheel.

    Next Steps

    We plan to cut the aluminium next week, and TIG weld the pieces together the week after that. We're beginning to train a few of our members on TIG welding and we already have some of the safety equipment to do so.

    Conrad Qualifier Post Mortem - Long Term

    20 Nov 2018

    Conrad Qualifier Post Mortem - Long Term By Ethan

    What could have gone better?

    This is a document for analyzing what we can do better, not just what went wrong at the Conrad qualifier. The format of this will be in issue > solution format.

    Prep

    • Lack of tools and parts
      • Pack tools the week before - involves better organization overall
      • Bring failsafes & extra parts - prevents costly errors
    • Little presentation practice
      • Cut down powerpoint - optimally 8 minutes
      • More practice - seamless transition
      • Order - we need to tell a story
    • Journal prep
      • Same issue - we need to organize the journal to tell a story
      • Lack of images - backdate images in blog posts
      • Lack of diagrams - explanatory
      • Lack of continuity - link posts together to show how components of team have changed
      • Need to write real control award

    Programming

    • Autonomous
      • No autonomous - need to have functional autonomous
    • TeleOp
      • Robot easily breaks - need to create presets to prevent

    Build

    • Lift
      • Lift linear slide broke - need to redesign with new linear slides
    • Intake
      • Intake did not actually move - need to reattach motors

    Other

    • Presentation
      • Map slides to articles in journal
      • Review judging rubrics

    C.A.R.T. Bot Side Shields

    01 Dec 2018

    C.A.R.T. Bot Side Shields By Ethan

    Task: Design sideshields for the Townview Tournament

    Iron Reign takes pride in the Townview Tournament; we really enjoy making it a great experience for everyone. One small way we plan to improve the tournament is to turn our MXP into a robot repair shop for broken robots. In addition to this, we're turning CART Bot into an ambulance to carry broken bots that need repair. To do so, we're wiring a flashing light to the cart, as well as printing giant sideshields on either side. The shields are above.

    Agenda for Dallas Personal Robotics Group

    01 Dec 2018

    Agenda for Dallas Personal Robotics Group By Bhanaviya, Karina, Kenna, Ethan, Abhi, Evan, and Charlotte

    Task: Set up an outline as to how the DPRG Presentation will operate

    Next Saturday, December 8th, Iron Reign will be giving its judging presentation to members from the Dallas Personal Robotics Group. Our primary purpose from this visit is to gain feedback from engineers in the community on our presentation. The presentation is anticipated to go beyond 15 minutes, so that we can introduce our potential ideas for the near-future, and so that DPRG can ask us more technical questions, that may not have arose from our presentation. Here's our anticipated agenda:

    1. Before the presentation begins, we will play the challenge reveal for this year, so that DPRG gets a basic idea as to what mechanical and technical challenges we must overcome in this season.
    2. Members who were with the team during Worlds will give an overview of what the Worlds championship is like.
    3. We give our judging presentation. (Approximately 15 minutes)
    4. We provide a demo of our robot. This demo will be similar to what we provided to the judges during pit-visits.
    5. We discuss some of our more ambitious build ideas thus far, such as the Superman Subsystem, and potential ways to improve upon these ideas.
    6. Provide an introduction of our Android Studio Control System and discuss the operation of how Big Wheel performs autonomous, and other low-level behaviors based on remote control and telemetry.
    7. We will wrap-up by discussing our expectations for the rest of the season, and answer any other questions DPRG has for us.

    Next Steps

    We will present on Saturday before returning to the house for our regular practice.

    Friction Coefficient and Energy

    01 Dec 2018

    Friction Coefficient and Energy By Ethan

    Task: Measure the coefficient of friction of our oven mitt intake

    We want to measure various constants of materials on our robot. Earlier this season, we found that a nylon-mitt collision on our intake sapped the rotational energy of our intake. But, that was just a build error, easily fixable. But now, we plan to measure the energy lost from particle-mitt collisions, and the first part of this is to find the coefficient of friction of the silicone mitts.

    To measure the coefficient of friction, we first had to simplify an equation to determine what values to measure.

    From these calculations, we determined that the only factor to measure to determine the coefficient of friction between blocks and the mitts is the angle of incline. Therefore, we created a simple device to measure the angle at which slippage begins to occur.

    The angle was about 27 degrees, so the coefficient of friction is equal to arctan(27)=0.44. This is a pretty good coefficient of friction, meaning that the intake is very efficient in bringing the particles in, but it also means that the intake loses more energy on collision.

    Next Steps

    We need to measure further constants such as stretch and wear of nylon. To do so, we're printing a simple testing nylon block.

    Meeting Log

    01 Dec 2018

    Meeting Log December 01, 2018 By Charlotte, Ethan, Kenna, Evan, Abhi, Justin, and Bhanaviya

    Meeting Log December 01, 2018

    Today's Meet Objectives

    We plan to prepare for a few events coming up, the tournament we are going to host at Townview and our presentation to the Dallas Personal Robotics Group. As well, we plan to continue building our robot and improve on the superman arm in preparation for our next competition in January.

    Today's Meet Log

    • Hosting a qualifier
    • The Townview qualifier is coming up in just a few weeks, and we are starting to make preparations. Ethan is making a wrap for Cart Bot that emulates an ambulance, so we can stock the cart with tools and drive it around to help teams during the competition.

      Ethan designing
    • Robot materials testing
    • This year, we want to continue our materials testing in order to ensure our robot is efficient. Here is Ethan performing one of these tests, measuring the friction of different materials we might use for an intake system. Further information on the tests can be found at (E-59, Friction Coefficient and Energy).

      Materials friction testing

    • Model updates
    • Justin kept working on the 3D model, which is essential to complete as we are trying to improve the various systems on our robot, especially the Superman arm and other complicated mechanisms.
    • Blog training
    • A universal responsibility for Iron Reign members is writing blog posts. We taught Bhanaviya how to use GitHub and Notepad ++ so that she can write her own blog posts and post them to the blog.
    • DPRG prep
    • Abhi is preparing a demo in preparation for our meeting with the Dallas Personal Robotics Group (DPRG). We are going to show off our robot's computer vision capabilities and the strides we have made to train our own neural network. We expect to receive a lot of specific questions about this. Our presentation will be an hour long. To see how our presentation went, read (T-31, Presenting to the DPRG).

      Today's Work Log

      Team MembersTaskStart TimeDuration
      AbhiCode2:004
      EthanBlog & Testing2:004
      EvanBuild2:004
      CharlotteBlog2:004
      BhanaviyaBlog2:004
      KarinaBuild2:004
      JustinModelling2:004
      KennaSocial Media2:004

    Selecting Lift System

    01 Dec 2018

    Selecting Lift System By Janavi

    Objective: Determine the type of lift system will allow us to delatch and reach the lander

    In our past post Choosing Drive Train we decided that we will use the chassis BigWheel. After deciding the base we need to now think about the lift system that we want to use to allow us to both deposit into the lander and latch onto it. Evan and I have been experimenting with linear slides to use for our lift. I have been working on a REV linear slide lift system as referenced in the post "Linear Slide Lift". Evan has been working on a separate ball bearing linear slide. As well as these two options we are looking into past linear slides and ones that we have seen teams use in past challenges. We need to determine which of the linear slides works best based on the game requirements this season

    Linear slides needs according to game
    • Lift and lower robot from latch on lander
    • Extend out to Crater from distance to collect minerals
    • Extend out vertically to lander to deposit minerals

    What we want our linear slide to have
    • Light Weight
    • Bidirectional (Able to collect from crater and deposit)
    • Speed
    • Sturdy
    • Easy to fix and maintain in case of emergency
    • Small in size
    • Extend out to around 5 ft in height

    Linear Slide Options
    • Ball Bearing Lift
      • Heavy
      • Smooth
      • Reliable
      • Never used the before
    • Drawer Slides
      • Heavy
      • Low cost
      • Unwieldy
      • Familiar as we used them last year
    • REV Linear Slides
      • Light Weight
      • Not very reliable
      • Familiar

    Next Steps

    We need to select the best linear lift system for our chassis based on the requirements we set above.

    Linear Nylon Strength Test

    02 Dec 2018

    Linear Nylon Strength Test By Ethan

    Task: Measure linear nylon wear

    We've had some issues with our nylon sprockets, mainly through excessive wear and tear. So, we want to test what circumstances cause what deformation.

    Linear Deformation

    This one was simple. We printed this block with 60% infill (the highest infill we tend to use), measured its length (3.75") and hung one end from our deck. On the other end, we inserted a bar and attached 180 lbs of mass to it, then we measured its new length (3.8"). Thus, the constant of deformation is [weight]/[change in length] = 650 kg/cm. This demonstrates that linear transformation isn't Iron Reign's issue, as the highest possible weight put on any nylon piece on our robot is ~27 lbs/12.25kg.

    However, there is other damage. After testing, we found internal damage in the nylon from where it was hanging.

    Next Steps

    Next, we need to test the rotational damage that nylon incurs through friction. We plan to design a simple rotational sprocket and run it on a motor for a set amount of time and measure the wear to determine wear per unit time.

    Code Issues Break the Superman Arm

    02 Dec 2018

    Code Issues Break the Superman Arm By Abhi

    Task: Analyze the code issues that led to our robot breaking

    After constant use, our robot's Superman arm broke. At this point, it is important to analyze our failures. This error was not because of a build issue but rather a code and driver control issue.

    When testing, we always heard the gears grinding some times and we thought it wasn't an issue. There were instances like once when we accidentally made the robot stand up under a table. Other times, the robot would press the arm down into the foam and keep pushing when it couldn't really keep going, leading to grinding.

    Not only did the arm break but also the Superman mechanism. This broke mainly because we didn't set proper ranges of motion of the arm and the gears would grind when there was interference. Because of the damage, we can't use the existing gears.

    Next Steps

    We intend to gang up the gears and make the mesh stronger to fix the build side of things. In the code, I already added the software limits to motion so we don't have those problems anymore.

    Arm Repairs

    06 Dec 2018

    Arm Repairs By Evan and Abhi

    Task: Fix elbow and Superman

    This is a follow up to Post E-64, Code Issues Break the Superman Arm. We made some hustles and got them fixed. We reinforced Superman by ganging up multiple gears (as seen above) and repeated a similar process with the elbow arms. Hopefully this will make BigWheel more secure, especially with software limits in the code.

    Rotational Nylon Wear Test

    07 Dec 2018

    Rotational Nylon Wear Test By Ethan

    Task: Test the amount of wear on a moving nylon part over time

    After our last tournament, we noticed several 3D-printed sprockets that had worn down significantly. So, we wanted to measure how much wear one of our nylon sprockets takes per second.

    First, we printed out a model of one of the REV sprockets, using the STEP file here. We printed it with ~45% infill, our average for sprockets and other parts. Then, we attached a REV Core motor to an extrusion, then mounted the nylon sprocket on the other side. Then, we measured the length on one of the teeth. We ran the motor for 1:05:45, and then measured the length afterwards.

    So, the tooth length before was 5.3mm, and after, it was 5.23mm, for a difference of 0.07mm. Then, we ran the system for 1:05:45. This results in a wear rate of 1.77*10^5 mm/sec. So, given that we use our robot for about an hour, cumulatively, in a tournament, 0.0638mm, or 1.2% of the sprocket. This is enough to be noticeable under loose-chain conditions and indicates that we should keep extra sprockets at tournaments so that we can do a quick replacement if needed.

    Next Steps

    We plan to perform more materials testing in the future; in particular, we'd like to determine the wear rate of the regular REV sprockets as well, but this requires a more rigorous experiment.

    Presenting to the DPRG

    08 Dec 2018

    Presenting to the DPRG By Ethan, Janavi, Charlotte, Arjun, Karina, Abhi, Evan, Bhanaviya, and Kenna

    Task: Present to the Dallas Personal Robotics Group about robot vision and Iron Reign

    We reached out to the Dallas Personal Robotics Group to present - we've presented to them in the past about gyros - this was actually our biggest numerical outreach of the season back in the day. This year, we wanted to present again on computer vision, as this is something that they were very interested in, but we also wanted to give our actual presentation as practice for our next tournament. However, after we reached out to them, other Dallas-area groups joined in, such as Computer Visionaries. So, our presentation was advertised all over Dallas Meetup groups, but the main one was here.

    The initial agenda is hosted on our website, but a quick summary is: a rundown of Worlds, our usual presentation, and our vision presentation. Our presentation went well - it was our usual tournament one for judges - we just took more time for the presentation, went on diatribes, told stories, and the like, and generally made it more entertaining. We answered questions on everything: code, building, outreach, and more. We're going to upload the video here soon. We also asked for feedback from the listeners.

    The main feedback we received for the presentation was to make our awards points more clear. For vision, we were told that we should take a look at Google's foray into computer vision.

    Then, we moved on to the vision presentation, the reason why everyone was there. Again, we'll upload a video of the presentation, and attach the presentation slides below. But, a quick summary of the presentation is that we covered OpenCV and VuForia first, then moved on to TensorFlow and CNN. This is where everyone became really became interested and asked questions. We also got a lot of advice, mainly on training the neural network. The presentation is here.

    DPRG Vision Presentation

    08 Dec 2018

    DPRG Vision Presentation By Arjun and Abhi

    Task: Present to the Dallas Personal Robotics Group about computer vision

    We presented to the DPRG about our computer vision, touching on subjects including OpenCV, Vuforia, TensorFlow, and training our own Convolutional Neural Network. Everyone we presented to was very interested in our work, and they asked us many questions. We also received quite a few suggestions on ways we could improve the performance of our vision solutions. The presentation can be seen below.

    Next Steps

    We plan to research what they suggested, such as retraining our neural networks and reusing our old training images.

    Townview Qualifier 2018 - Setting Up

    14 Dec 2018

    Townview Qualifier 2018 - Setting Up By Bhanaviya, Ben, Karina, Kenna, Ethan, Evan, Charlotte, Justin, Janavi, Austin, and Jayesh
    Task: Prepare Townview for SEM's qualifier on December 15th

    On December 15th, Iron Reign is hosting an FTC qualifier at Townview Magnet Center with around 30 teams competing. For the past 2 weeks, robotics alums, current members of Iron Reign, Iron Star, Iron Core and Imperial Robotics have been signing up to be volunteers for the very event. By Friday, the day before the qualifier, all our positions were confirmed for the tournament. In addition to getting assigned for the qualifier, we also helped with field set-up. Two fields were set up on each side of the cafeteria, to accommodate for the influx of teams competing. A field was set up behind the cafeteria to act as a practice field for queuing teams. Speaking of queuing teams, 8 tables were set up behind each field for teams to queue in. A monitor was brought in from Mr Boykin's room to display the teams' scores over the course of the match. We helped ensure that enough chairs were set up for the audience members, and that each team had a table of its own to operate their last-minute-panicked-robot-surgery on. In order to delineate the difference between teams competing on the two different fields, we put red and blue tapes on each table, after putting up a plaque card representing the competing teams' numbers.

    After ensuring that the actual competition area was set-up, we worked on setting up the judging rooms for judging presentations. We cleared out chairs in 5 rooms on the first floor, and set up two tables at the end of each room for the judges. Each room was marked with a piece of paper to represent the judging room number.

    Once we were finished setting up, we left to the Virani house, to set up the MXP. The purpose of the MXP being present at the qualifier was to provide the competing teams an area to work with Iron Reign on their robots, in the event they needed assistance. After ensuring that the vehicle was in driveable state, we worked on setting up laptops in the MXP. Then, we stocked it with tools that competing teams could use when needed. Next Steps Be prepared to carry out our respective roles as volunteers the next day, and lead competing teams through judging, queuing, and matches.

    Helping PiGuardians with Code

    15 Dec 2018

    Helping PiGuardians with Code By Arjun

    Task: Help teams at the Townview Tournament

    On Saturday, December 15, Iron Reign hosted 30 teams at the Townview Qualifier tournament. As a part of hosting the tournament, we wanted to ensure that all teams were able to compete at the best of their ability. As such, we made sure that we helped teams who needed our assistance.

    One such team was PiGuardians, team 14787. They had no code (except for the example teleop), and their programmer was unable to make the tournament due to a conflict. Without our help, they would not have been able to do anything more than be a pushbot. Iron Reign wanted to make sure that they were not excluded, so we assigned a programmer to help them out.

    We helped them write a teleop program so that they could participate in matches. We also helped them write an autonomous, using the replay program we designed over the summer to make developing an autonomous easier. With our help, they went from being a pushbot to having a full-blown autonomous.

    PiGuardians was extremely grateful for our help to them. They promised to reach out to us if they ever needed any help in the future.

    Townview Qualifier 2018 - The Day Of

    15 Dec 2018

    Townview Qualifier 2018 - The Day Of By Ethan, Janavi, Evan, Abhi, Charlotte, Karina, Kenna, Arjun, Jayesh, and Bhanaviya

    Task: Run the Townview Tournament

    On Saturday, December 15, Iron Reign hosted 30 teams at the Townview Magnet Center, our home school's campus. This entry serves more as a description as to how we got to the point of hosting the qualifier and what to consider when hosting one.

    First, for a tournament, you need a lot of volunteers of varied ages. Frankly, you need a good amount of younger kids for jobs such as queuing and judge assistance - this makes the tournament run much more smoothly. We had about 10 queuers throughout the day, and while this may seem excessive, we started out the day with a +10 minute surplus and kept every single match on schedule.

    There still needs to be adult volunteers. We had 2 judges per room with five rooms, as well as 6 referees. All of these must be adults. And, we had to recruit from a diverse set of groups to cover our bases - we recruited people from the Dallas Chamber of Commerce meeting, the Dallas Personal Robotics Group, prior FTC tournaments, alumni, teachers from our school, and even our own families. It's hard to get enough judges for a large tournament, so this process had to start early.

    The second item that we'd like to emphasize is the need to make everything accessible by teams. Being an FTC team ourselves, we wanted to make this tournament easier for others. So, we kept a spreadsheet with inspection results on a screen in the pits so that teams could be updated, made pit maps so teams could find one another, and built a practice field a decent distance away from the others for practice. In this, we hoped to take some stress off of teams.

    On the same topic of helping teams, we had volunteers assigned to help fix robots and to assist with code, as well as putting the Mobile Learning Lab in workshop mode for teams who needed it. Iron Reign has been stuck in bad situations countless times, and we wanted to return the favor to those who helped us.

    Finally, we'd like to thank all of our volunteers for being there. It was a hard, long day, but it was worth it, and we'd just like to extend our gratitude. We'd like to thank DISD STEM for providing food for volunteers and Townview Magnet Center for letting us host the qualifier here. Finally, we'd like to give a huge shout-out to our coach, Karim Virani, for doing the logistics of this tournament.

    Next Steps

    We're going to write up a few other posts about interacting with judges, supporting teams, and a postmortem on the tournament. We've got a lot to do over the break, and this was just the kickoff for it.

    Selecting Intake System

    20 Dec 2018

    Selecting Intake System By Janavi

    Objective: Determine the type of intake system that will allow us to efficiently obtain and deposit minerals within the lander

    In our post "Selecting Lift System" we decided that the linear slide system that we will use is the MGN12H rails also referenced to as the Ball-Bearing slides. These slides while heavy provide the smoothest option. now that we have chosen the Lift system we need to determine the intake system that will allow us to take in two minerals and deposit them in the most efficient way possible. Throughout this season already we have been experimenting with different types of intake systems as seen in posts like "Pool noodle intake" and "Selective Intake" and "Scoring Mechanism"

    Intake System needs according to game
    • Collect only two minerals
    • Sort between silver and gold minerals

    What we want our linear slide to have
    • Light Weight
    • Speed of intake mechanism
    • Sturdy
    • Easy to fix and maintain in case of emergency
    • Small in size

    Passive Deposit vs Passive Intake

    Pros Cons
    Passive Deposit Faster intake Could be unreliable if not positioned correctly
    Passive Intake More accurate Harder to intake and therefore we score less

    Intake Mechanism Material / Shape

    Pros Cons
    Ice Cube Tray Compliant and smooth Not a far reach
    Surgical Tubing Farther reach Possibility of missing minerals due to sporadic behavior of surgical tubing
    Pot holder Brings in minerals Not far reach and too compliant
    Octopuckers ( from last year's season ) Experience with using material Too stiff and not far enough reach

    REV Headquarters Visit

    21 Dec 2018

    REV Headquarters Visit By Ethan, Charlotte, Abhi, Bhanaviya, Evan, Karina, and Arjun

    Task: Visit REV headquarters and learn more about the engineering process

    Today, a group of Iron Reign, Core, and Star members ventured down to the REV headquarters in Dallas. REV is a Dallas-based FTC+FRC parts company that produces their items at an accessible cost for all teams. All the SEM Robotics teams use REV, their parts are easy to use while still giving the ability to create technically impressive mechanisms. So, we were elated when we had the opportunity to visit them.

    We started out with a tour, seeing the workshop in which they host their FRC teams - with RoboGreg inviting some of our members to apply to the new FRC team. Then, we saw the rest of the warehouse. Stretching infinitely towards the ceiling were rows and rows of REV parts in every variety imaginable with a center island of organized bins of parts. The last thing we were able to see on the first floor was the recording studio that REV's working on so that they can record tutorial videos.

    We can't talk about everything we saw on the second floor, as some of it may not actually be released yet, but we can tell you of the Wonderland-like nature of it. As we walked in, we were met by a room dedicated to testing electronics. Iron Reign is accustomed to soldering on the floor or a hastily improvised bench or whatever clear space there is on the kitchen table, so this alone was enough for us to long to use it. And then, we were met by the 3D-printing room. You see, REV has two normal nylon printers that Iron Reign has plenty of experience with - been there, done that - but they also had a resin printer. We've never had the luck to see a resin printer in real life, only in far away youtube videos and whispers of whispers. In this alone, we were extremely jealous. Finally, we got to meet the engineers and have a general discussion with RoboGreg and David.

    First, we got to learn about REV's design process. First, we learned about their revision process. They begin with a general idea, a goal that they want to achieve. Then, they create a small prototype with the tools they have at their home base if they can - after all, they have a reflow over, laser cutter, resin printers, and more we probably didn't get to see. From there, they send out their design for a small batch from a given manufacturer, just enough for testing. From there, they identify faults, fix them, and send for the next iteration, and so on. They end up with a finished product that, at the very least, has no physical/hardware faults; this is important as their philosophy is to give affordable parts to academic programs, and if they release faulty parts, they harm their customers. We learned a lot about the importance of a central design philosophy - something Iron Reign lacks. REV's is twofold: to make their parts affordable for those who normally wouldn't have access and to make their parts accessible for teams of all skill levels.

    Finally, we got to the part in which we presented to RoboGreg and the rest of the engineers. Last year for Kraken, we designed a system called REVolution, which, when printed, allowed any team to turn REV extrusions into shafts. We felt that it made robots easier to build, so we presented it and asked for feedback. They were impressed by Kraken and liked the way in which it was implemented. Then, we learned some things about high-level design. First, an idea doesn't mean anything as long as it's just that, an idea. What differentiates those who do from those who don't is their vision and process to realize their ideas. In REVolution, we had done this. But, then we learned about a little system called Cost-Benefit analysis. As macroeconomics states, if a person chooses to make one choice, they inherently lose out on another, even if it isn't realized. In our case, it was this: if REV chose to produce the REVolution system, naturally, there would be other products that go neglected. And, one has to consider how a new parts system fits with the other parts; if REvolution were made real, one would have to create a whole extra parts library while still maintaining other similar rotation systems, increasing the work. It's not that REVolution is a bad system, its just that it could present too much of a tradeoff. In RoboGreg's words, this is "reality-based creativity."

    We also asked some questions about things that Iron Reign wants to use; for example, where we could get access to a metal-3D-printer. We were informed that a local company down the road from REV, MLC CAD, was likely to provide this service for Iron Reign if requested. We asked for criticism of the REVolution system, learning that under normal operating speeds and temperatures, that nylon has the tendency to fuse with itself and that if possible, we should switch to a material such as Amphora.

    We also presented BigWheel, this year's robot. We had some difficulties setting it up, but overall, they were impressed. The one point that we heard was that, when extended, BigWheel has a very high center of gravity, making it prone to tipping. We've considered it in the past, but really noticed it when it nearly hit someone rising up.

    Next Steps

    We learned so much here, and we'd like to give a huge thanks to RoboGreg and REV for giving us a tour. We want to implement the changes to our engineering process that we learned, and we're going to fix up BigWheel to solve its current in-presentation issues.

    End of TIG Welding

    21 Dec 2018

    End of TIG Welding By Evan

    Task: Detail TIG welding plans and why they failed

    At the beginning of the season, we saw that our robot base was not as well crafted as we originally thought it to be. While we have worked to correct it over the season, it’s still not what we wish to see in a functional robot, and we came up with the idea of making the frame from light aluminum instead of the polycarb, and fix it with TIG welding.

    It seemed like a good idea at the time, but there were many other problems on the robot more important than a new base. So we pushed the TIG plan to the side, in lieu of correcting other issues like the lift and the intake. While we won’t completely throw the idea out, it will be a while before we begin to start the project. Also hindering us is the amperage output of the home, which is too low to run the TIG welder off of. Until we get additional amperage to the house, our plans will be on hold but not forgotten.

    The Return of BatteryBox

    22 Dec 2018

    The Return of BatteryBox By Ethan

    Task: Create a charging station for our phones and batteries

    A long time ago, in a land far, far away, Iron Reign once had a battery box. This was a fabled land, where all batteries remained charged and phones roamed the land, happy and content with their engorged batteries. But, this land was neglected, with the meadows of electricity growing dim, the plastic of the land cracking and scattering to the four corners of the Earth, and those who found their home there lost to the void.

    We have a problem keeping our phones charged at tournaments and in practice. So, we made a simple battery box to fix it. We used an old REV container and cut some spare wood to create dividers, cut a hole for a surge protector, and we were a go.

    Next Steps

    Iron Reign really needs to work on its organization in general, and this was just one way to stem the tide of entropy. We need to revitalize our tournament kits of tools next.

    BigWheel Arm Locks

    22 Dec 2018

    BigWheel Arm Locks By Evan

    Task: Create locks to keep BigWheel's intake arms in an extended position

    An important part of this year's challenge is scoring minerals in the lander. Additionally, our upright elbow cannot raise the scoring mechanism to the lip of the lander alone. Thus, we had to create a way to get those additional inches to score.

    First, we tried a REV linear slide design. This worked, but barely. It repeatedly got stuck, at one point even needing to be sawed apart at a tournament due to its inoperability. So, we switched to a new brand of linear slides, the MGN12H with 12mm steel rails. But, since we were no longer using REV, we needed a new design to keep the arms in the extended position.

    The new design relies on gravity. When the robot is on the lander in the hanging position, it will stay within the sizing cube. However, as it descends, the linear slides will glide upward, staying attached to the lander until the robot contacts the mat. And, as the slide finishes moving, it will move over a triangular piece of polycarb such that it is easy for the slide to move up, but near impossible to reverse its direction. This will ensure that the robot's arm stays extended.

    Next Steps

    We need to reattach the mounting point for hanging in order for this system to work.

    Scoring Mechanism

    22 Dec 2018

    Scoring Mechanism By Janavi and Abhi

    Task: Create a way to hold minerals

    We now have a lift and an intake system, but we're missing a way to hold onto and deposit the minerals after intake. To achieve this, we created a prototype.

    We wanted to create a box-like shape that can be attached to a moving axle to hold the minerals when lowered. When the lift is up in the air, the axle can rotate to lower the box and let the minerals fall into the depot. We tested out multiple designs but we ended up having to nix that as there was no way to get the minerals out of the box once they were in.

    Our second design was a sloped shape: just steep enough to hold onto the balls but not so steep that the balls couldn’t escape. To create this shape, we decided to have a rectangle attached to an axle able to hold the minerals when down and deposit the minerals when spun. We created multiple variations with different sizes as can be seen in the drawing below. We eventually settled on was design B, a square that was 155 cm by 155 cm.

    We decided to not use design A as it was simply too large and continuously hit against the edge of the rail. We progressed to a smaller size of 155 mm by 155 mm (design B) that worked well. We attempted another design of two separate backs as two separate channels for the minerals (Design C). However, we decided this wasn't a very good design because there was an increased chance of the ball getting stuck in between the channels, causing either a penalty or a decrease in the number of balls we can control.

    After creating the back of our holder, we realized that we needed to elevate it off the back of the rails at an angle. It was the only way to hold the balls and allow them to come down a ramp when the axle is spun. We decided that the best way to achieve this was through two wing-like triangles on the side that we could bend to ensure the minerals couldn’t escape out the side. We went through multiple designs as can be seen below

    At first, we attempted to attach two right angle triangles with 155mm acting as a leg of the triangle. We varied this design by increasing the angle of the slope so that the balls would be held at an angle that allows them to not slip. But, after creating this design out of cardboard and attaching it to the axle, we saw that the sharp angle interfered with the beater bar. To amend this, we changed the triangle attached to the end of the rectangle to have the 155 mm side be the hypotenuse of the triangle. Again, we varied the design in the steepness of the triangle. Through this, we determined that a slope of around 30 degrees was the best design.

    After finalizing our design, creating it out of cardboard, and attaching it to our robot, we cut the piece out of polycarb. We bent the side triangle using heat and drilled in the holes to attach the axle with.

    Next Steps

    Although this design works well, we want to continue to change and improve upon it. For example, the next way we can improve the design is by changing the way that the polycarb is attached to the axle through a 3-D printed