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Notes from the FTC Futures Forum Moderated by Team Unlimited as part of the FIRST Robotics Conference at the 2008-9 FTC World Championship, Thursday April16th from 6-8:00 pm in the Georgia World Congress Center. The Forum was loosely directed, and the order of topics was dictated mostly by the participants. 1. Software a. RobotC i. Using pre-specified Macros often did not work 1. Guide that we were given at beginning had bugs and the functions had several compiling issues 2. Nsynctime does not work ii. Some problems arose 1. Expose the inner workings of the code a. So community can edit the code b. Open Sources the code a little, so we can work out issues that arose (such as the PID) iii. Software help on the FIRST Site was good 1. Teams used the software support of the FIRST forum 2. Community support for each other was very high this season a. Made a “level” playing field as teams helped each others b. Updates i. Try to minimize the updates, especially before tournaments 1. Made bugs arise as the transition was hard when mandatory updates were released the night before for programming languages c. 5 teams present use RobotC 2. FIRST General a. Expand the award list i. Software award for programming skill 1. Portion of the competition that the software is never recognized a. Part of the notebook judging 2. Have some sort award for programming skill and innovative code/functions a. Based off of function b. Innovative codes c. Documentations d. More…. 3. Have sponsors of code (RobotC, LabVIEW, NXT-G) present an award to teams who use their code innovative ii. CAD Award from PTC iii. Awards help teams 1. Gives sponsors and community a reason to donate more money a. Allows teams to function and encourage expansion of program b. Release the Finalists of the award i. When presenting awards give out the people who were runner ups for each award ii. Equivalent of more awards & recognition without extra costs iii. Ken Johnson explained that this was already planned for this competition c. Qualifiers for the tournaments (or Scrimmages) i. Gives teams more time of the field and at a competition ii. Made much more competitive tournaments (Florida) iii. People learned lessons d. Male to Female Ratio i. Low female ratio ii. Try to improve ratio & encourage expansion of program overall iii. Need more mentors and coaches to encourage e. Expand numbers of mentors and coaches i. More mentors and coaches needed to expand program ii. Some teams need more people to assist them f. Expand program i. People need to go out into the community to expand FTC ii. Untapped demand for the FTC program, people are out there and need to be found iii. Keep expansion of program up into the future through FIRST and team efforts 3. Competition General a. Give teams more opportunities to get onto the field i. More scrimmages for teams to practice and competition ii. Have scrimmages at FLL tournaments to give FLL teams a view of what lies ahead for them, encourage them to join an FTC team iii. Run summer scrimmages/workshops with the previous year’s game b. Longer Autonomous Period i. Gives people ability to score many more points and more interesting procedures c. Double counted puck i. Benefit to teams who actually do autonomous a very good thing ii. Keep that objects are double counted as it gives an incentive to teams iii. Encouraged more teams to actually do the autonomous mode 1. Huge increases of teams doing the autonomous period because of the huge incentive d. Learning curve i. Big learning curve for new teams 1. Need a handbook to train new teams, “square bot”, exercises, etc. 2. Setup way for teams to communicate with each other a. Setup a forum for just teams to talk and get support b. State organizations support with links to other teams or National website c. Way for volunteers to find each other d. www.techstart.org > (lower right corner) Robotics Resources for teachers 3. Large curve for teams to overcome if they are new a. Need to get the teams support to migrate from FLL, as it really affects teams 4. Schedule a. Large gap from release to first tournament (Sept. release, Feb. competition) i. Have qualifiers early in the season to be able to give teams stepping stones to the tournament and extra experience ii. Seasons “compliment” each other to minimize conflict iii. Encourage state affiliates to release the schedule well ahead of time to be able to find conflicts b. Hard to share FTC mentors and FRC mentors when on the same team e. Field i. Need to get onto a robot onto an actual field 1. Without an actual field, it can be hard to get a competitive autonomous 2. Gives teams a huge advantage if you get onto a field 3. Field kits should be released earlier, especially for fall tournaments 4. Tetrix Competition kit a. Cost i. Cheaper to register a new team than to order all the extra parts ii. Extremely expensive to do many orders, hundreds of dollars to order the parts needed for many teams' designs b. Set Collars / Split Clamps (Gears to Axle) i. Not strong enough to hold the gears under load/torque ii. Very prone to strip when used with the DC Motor iii. Had to double or triple up in order to not damn components iv. New axles are a slightly smaller diameter c. Chain and Sprockets i. A much needed addition to transfer power over longer distances ii. Chain of gear is EXPENSIVE iii. Timing Belt possible, SAFER for teams d. Gears i. 20 Tooth gears to get gear reductions in smaller area ii. Bevel Gears e. Continuous Rotation Servo i. Needed to make gear reductions on arms, to allow DC motors to be used in other places ii. Same servo w/o the limit and stop 1. Allow teams to remove the stop and get a continuous rotation servo w/o buying new equipment 2. Get a new batch of servos w/o the stop for teams to be able to buy f. Motors i. Without a positive link, It would be great to be able to solder the links on ii. The clips on back are too weak iii. Clutches on the motors? iv. Thermal cutoff g. Metal i. C-Channel 1. Make version w/o drilled holes h. Vex Parts i. Would be nice to able to used i. Omni Wheels i. Much missed j. Axles i. Longer axles k. Additional Materials i. Loved the additional Lexan and Aluminum ii. Acrylic, why can’t we use it? 1. A lot of teams with plastic at school it is usually acrylic 2. Cheaper than lexan iii. Threaded rod iv. Glue to be able to get pieces together v. Allow the use of wood in the kit 1. More workable for teams without access to tools vi. No quantity limits on materials l. Fasteners i. Be able to use longer fasteners than in the kit ii. Be able to use standard fastener sizes m. Rotation sensors i. Hard to unplug without damaging cables ii. Very sensitive cables that break easily under strain n. Misc. i. Be able to solder materials on ii. Make new wires iii. Use fuses to experiment with what will yield a “overload” and put in a fuse before problems occur o. Motor Controllers i. When a stall occurs the motor cranks voltage up to 100% and often makes a problem with the motor 1. Often making a “kitchen magnet” of a expensive motor 2. Please fix, as this is a huge problem for some teams ii. Motor controller that controls 4 motors 1. 4 motors, 4 rotation sensors iii. Costs as much to get 2 rotation sensors as it does to get 1 motor encoder p. Sensors i. Add a potentiometer for arms ii. “Proto-board” 1. Very useful, but very steep learning curve a. Make some documentation available for “simple” or “useful” sensors for teams 5. Pro-Engineer a. Huge learning curve i. Little to no help for teams ii. Released so late that teams already had robots done and wouldn’t use it iii. Save the files as an open source file to be able to open in other programs 1. Our versions were locked out of being able to open in other languages b. Inventor, PTC, etc. i. Takes about 40 hours to model parts and learn how to make them
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