In our hiatus from Blogger we have been meeting every Friday night. We've been working on building a demo-bot, in addition to learning SolidWorks and LabView. We have been reviewing our technical skills focusing on engineering terminology and GDT.
We drove the robot in the NorthWest Hills 4th of July Parade, leading the local area Girl Scouts down the parade route. We took the robot to JCPennys, IBM, the Austin Microsoft Store, and Austin Community College. We taught the GSCTX LEGO Mindstorms Summer Camp and assisted the GSCTX LEGO Waterbotics Camp. Yes, we were making the robots swim but don't try this without the specific waterproof parts. I think LEGO is still developing this system but it was extremely cool watching LEGOs swim (think propellers from a boat).
We are extremely excited for this upcoming year and are looking forward to the next FRC challenge.
Thanks for Reading!
the Lady Cans
PS we are sad to see our seniors go but are actively recruiting. If you are interested in joining, contact us!
Friday, September 7, 2012
Sunday, May 13, 2012
2 weeks until Summer, 35 weeks till kickoff '13
The last couple of Fridays we have begun lessons in Solidworks. So far everyone seems to be picking up the CAD software pretty easily. Since we aren't building anything at the moment we've begun to draw up the Minion, from Despicable Me, in Solidworks. It will be quite an endeavor but we're all looking forward to learning more in Solidworks. Our robot finally came back from St. Louis. We uncrated it in the first rainstorm Austin has had in a while. We stored the robot in the house. The crates are outside protected in the bag & tag bags. As soon as things dry out, we will move the crate to the storage unit. Right now we are all taking End of Course tests, IB tests, AP tests and then finals.
In regards to demos,
Microsoft opened a new store in Austin. Girl Scouts of Central Texas asked us to demo our 2012 robot along with the robot from the Girl Scout Waco team, #4335 the Metallic Clouds. The robots were in the Microsoft store for a combined total of 4 hours. At the end of the day, we decided to have a little fun and drive the robot to the car, effectively drawing quite a large crowd. We are looking forward to working with Girl Scouts of Central Texas' new sponsor, Microsoft.
thanks for reading
graduating captain Allison
PS We would like to welcome our new sponsor, Duck Tape, to the world of FIRST.
In regards to demos,
Microsoft opened a new store in Austin. Girl Scouts of Central Texas asked us to demo our 2012 robot along with the robot from the Girl Scout Waco team, #4335 the Metallic Clouds. The robots were in the Microsoft store for a combined total of 4 hours. At the end of the day, we decided to have a little fun and drive the robot to the car, effectively drawing quite a large crowd. We are looking forward to working with Girl Scouts of Central Texas' new sponsor, Microsoft.
thanks for reading
graduating captain Allison
PS We would like to welcome our new sponsor, Duck Tape, to the world of FIRST.
Friday, May 4, 2012
Championships Update 3
Continuing where I left off...
Friday
Well things didn't go quite as planned because we lost all of our matches on Friday :( . All of our matches were very weird and nothing went as planned, but we still had a blast and managed to learn a lot from all of the teams in our division. Since we only had 4 matches on Friday there was a lot of down time and I spent alot of the day wandering the pits and taking pictures of cool robots, pit displays and everything in between. Mostly I was curious how teams displayed their outreach/Chairman's information. There were several clever ideas (like #1114 Simbotics Chairman's Museum poster) that our team can run with for Chairman's next year. In the evening we went to the Girl Scouts reception and had a nice chat with some of the Spacecookies (the other Girl Scout sponsored FRC team....they're from northern california). We ended the evening with a St. Louis Cardinals Baseball game. The baseball game was a different exerience for all of us because Austin doesn't have any major league professional sports teams, just minor league. We were all kind of shocked how fake the fans cheering sounded from the outside of Busch stadium (the noice sounded like the stereotypical roar on a TV/radio program). The game was a blast, but it was freezing (well for us Austin girls) and not quite as exciting as the atmosphere of a Texas High School Football game. We left during the 8th quarter with the Cardinals winning 12-1.
Saturday
We only had one match on saturday which we lost by 3 points but we fell over within the first 30 seconds of the match. We were crossing the bridge to play defense but in the process I drove over a ball and ended up with one wheel off the bridge; I didn't do a very good job of saving it and soon the robot was on it's back. We packed up shortly thereafter and headed to lunch, sad that we didn't get picked for an alliance yet glad that didn't have the stress of the elimination bracket (there were so many good teams it was hard to predict which alliance would win). We spent lunch eating in City Garden, which is a cute little interactive garden in the middle of downtown St. Louis. We made it back to the dome in time to catch the last of division awards and to go find a seat infront of the Einstien field. THE EINSTEIN MATCHES WERE CRAZY!!!!! The red side of the field was having comms. issues so the first two semifinal matches were replayed. To make a long story short #1114 Simbotics walked away with a Chairman's win (they truely deserved the win; the impact that this team has made across the FIRST community is remarkable), The Galileo Champs beat the Curie Champs for the Championship title. So Congrats to teams #16 (Bomb Squad), #25 (Raider Robotix) and #180 (S.P.A.M.). We ended the day with dinner at the resturant in our hotel, set our alarms for 4:45am and passed out in our respective hotel rooms.
The Conclusion of our Amazing Trip
We might not have walked away with a top 10 finish or a trophy but we did walk away with a lot of knowledge. We learned how important our mentors are; not just for all they do during build season but for all the effort they help during competition. We went to Championships with with no engineering mentors and we held our own, but our mentors were truely missed. We recognize that our team is heading in the right direction and learned ways to expand and improve. We've begun to build a stronger relationship with our major sponsor Girl Scouts of Central Texas and are working on getting more Girl Scout teams started across the country. We've set a schedule for off-season meetings and as I type this the team is getting a lesson in Solidworks. 4 of the 7 graduating Seniors are pursuing careers in STEM, a field that none of us would have even thought about had we not joined FRC.
Thanks for reading
Allison
graduating team captain
Friday
Well things didn't go quite as planned because we lost all of our matches on Friday :( . All of our matches were very weird and nothing went as planned, but we still had a blast and managed to learn a lot from all of the teams in our division. Since we only had 4 matches on Friday there was a lot of down time and I spent alot of the day wandering the pits and taking pictures of cool robots, pit displays and everything in between. Mostly I was curious how teams displayed their outreach/Chairman's information. There were several clever ideas (like #1114 Simbotics Chairman's Museum poster) that our team can run with for Chairman's next year. In the evening we went to the Girl Scouts reception and had a nice chat with some of the Spacecookies (the other Girl Scout sponsored FRC team....they're from northern california). We ended the evening with a St. Louis Cardinals Baseball game. The baseball game was a different exerience for all of us because Austin doesn't have any major league professional sports teams, just minor league. We were all kind of shocked how fake the fans cheering sounded from the outside of Busch stadium (the noice sounded like the stereotypical roar on a TV/radio program). The game was a blast, but it was freezing (well for us Austin girls) and not quite as exciting as the atmosphere of a Texas High School Football game. We left during the 8th quarter with the Cardinals winning 12-1.
Saturday
We only had one match on saturday which we lost by 3 points but we fell over within the first 30 seconds of the match. We were crossing the bridge to play defense but in the process I drove over a ball and ended up with one wheel off the bridge; I didn't do a very good job of saving it and soon the robot was on it's back. We packed up shortly thereafter and headed to lunch, sad that we didn't get picked for an alliance yet glad that didn't have the stress of the elimination bracket (there were so many good teams it was hard to predict which alliance would win). We spent lunch eating in City Garden, which is a cute little interactive garden in the middle of downtown St. Louis. We made it back to the dome in time to catch the last of division awards and to go find a seat infront of the Einstien field. THE EINSTEIN MATCHES WERE CRAZY!!!!! The red side of the field was having comms. issues so the first two semifinal matches were replayed. To make a long story short #1114 Simbotics walked away with a Chairman's win (they truely deserved the win; the impact that this team has made across the FIRST community is remarkable), The Galileo Champs beat the Curie Champs for the Championship title. So Congrats to teams #16 (Bomb Squad), #25 (Raider Robotix) and #180 (S.P.A.M.). We ended the day with dinner at the resturant in our hotel, set our alarms for 4:45am and passed out in our respective hotel rooms.
The Conclusion of our Amazing Trip
We might not have walked away with a top 10 finish or a trophy but we did walk away with a lot of knowledge. We learned how important our mentors are; not just for all they do during build season but for all the effort they help during competition. We went to Championships with with no engineering mentors and we held our own, but our mentors were truely missed. We recognize that our team is heading in the right direction and learned ways to expand and improve. We've begun to build a stronger relationship with our major sponsor Girl Scouts of Central Texas and are working on getting more Girl Scout teams started across the country. We've set a schedule for off-season meetings and as I type this the team is getting a lesson in Solidworks. 4 of the 7 graduating Seniors are pursuing careers in STEM, a field that none of us would have even thought about had we not joined FRC.
Thanks for reading
Allison
graduating team captain
Championships Update 2
Wednesday
Since Championships fell on TAKS week (stupid statewide testing) only the 6 seniors could get out of school. Wednesday by 8am the Girl Scout van dropped the 6 seniors and our 2 Girl Scout Leaders/Mentors off at Austin Bergstrom International Airport. We hopped on our Southwest flight and were in St. Louis by around 2pm.
We drove downtown and found the Dome and Convention Center easily, we didn't have enough time to check into the hotel so we began to look for lunch. We found a cute 50s looking diner and had an amazing lunch.
By 4 were were in line waiting for the pits to open so we could uncrate and get inspected. 3 hours later we had a working robot, a set up pit display (a modified version of our usual pit because we had to fit everything in 2 suitcases), and had passed inspection (although the Inspector did not seem to understand that we didn't appreciate his since of humor o_O).
We threw our stuff in our hotel rooms and began looking for food. The search for food was harder than we thought, apparently most of the restaurants near our hotel were lunch only.....finding a restaurant that could feed 8 people at 9pm seemed to be a problem that we weren't anticipating. We had an amazing Italian dinner (St. Louis is such a sports town, you couldn't go anywhere without seeing someone in a red Cardinals shirt).
Thursday(we were on Curie Division)
The first half of Thursday was practice matches. We did a couple of practice matches and everything seemed to be working. Our first match was Q#2 we lost 14-36 but our alliance mates didn't quite live up to what they said they were gonna do. Our second match Q#19 was a win 33-12....I don't remember the specifics of the match but everything went as planned. Our third match, Q#49, was a win 66-49 but our robot lost power shortly after the match started so we didn't help much. The field tech guys were very puzzled by our power loss so they told us to change out the breaker (the on/off switch). We changed it out but the robot still wasn't turning on, turns out the battery was the issue all along. Our last match on Friday Q#60 was a loss 3-41......we were against some bad-a** teams and our shooter bands kept popping off so we didn't score anything that match :( . We found an old Brewery/Restaurant in Old St. Louis and had a delicious meal complete with desert (the chocolate cake was to die for).
Keep reading for more
allison
Since Championships fell on TAKS week (stupid statewide testing) only the 6 seniors could get out of school. Wednesday by 8am the Girl Scout van dropped the 6 seniors and our 2 Girl Scout Leaders/Mentors off at Austin Bergstrom International Airport. We hopped on our Southwest flight and were in St. Louis by around 2pm.
We drove downtown and found the Dome and Convention Center easily, we didn't have enough time to check into the hotel so we began to look for lunch. We found a cute 50s looking diner and had an amazing lunch.
By 4 were were in line waiting for the pits to open so we could uncrate and get inspected. 3 hours later we had a working robot, a set up pit display (a modified version of our usual pit because we had to fit everything in 2 suitcases), and had passed inspection (although the Inspector did not seem to understand that we didn't appreciate his since of humor o_O).
We threw our stuff in our hotel rooms and began looking for food. The search for food was harder than we thought, apparently most of the restaurants near our hotel were lunch only.....finding a restaurant that could feed 8 people at 9pm seemed to be a problem that we weren't anticipating. We had an amazing Italian dinner (St. Louis is such a sports town, you couldn't go anywhere without seeing someone in a red Cardinals shirt).
Thursday(we were on Curie Division)
The first half of Thursday was practice matches. We did a couple of practice matches and everything seemed to be working. Our first match was Q#2 we lost 14-36 but our alliance mates didn't quite live up to what they said they were gonna do. Our second match Q#19 was a win 33-12....I don't remember the specifics of the match but everything went as planned. Our third match, Q#49, was a win 66-49 but our robot lost power shortly after the match started so we didn't help much. The field tech guys were very puzzled by our power loss so they told us to change out the breaker (the on/off switch). We changed it out but the robot still wasn't turning on, turns out the battery was the issue all along. Our last match on Friday Q#60 was a loss 3-41......we were against some bad-a** teams and our shooter bands kept popping off so we didn't score anything that match :( . We found an old Brewery/Restaurant in Old St. Louis and had a delicious meal complete with desert (the chocolate cake was to die for).
Keep reading for more
allison
Championships Update 1
I know that I'm late in posting this but life got a little crazy and this is the first chance I've had to talk about our experience at the 2012 FIRST Championships in St. Louis. Let me explain a little about how Championships works:
In my next post I'll get share more about our experiences at Championships
thanks for reading
allison
team captain
- there are 3 seperate compeitions going on: FLL, FTC, and FRC
- There are 3 ways to attend Championships (for FRC)
- FRC Teams are eligible to register for the FIRST Championship if:
- They are a "Pre-Qualifying" Team;
- FIRST Championship Chairman’s Award winners in prior years;
- Original and sustaining teams from 1992 on;
- 2011 FIRST Championship "LOGO MOTION" winners (3);
- 2011 FIRST Championship Engineering Inspiration Award winner (1)
- Become a Merit Based Qualifier during the 2012 FRC Season
- Chairman's Award winners
- 2012 Regional -1 per Regional
- Engineering Inspiration Award winners
- 2012 Regional -1 per Regional
- Rookie All-Star Award Winners
- 2012 Regional-1 per Regional
- 2012 Robot Competition Winners
- 2012 Regional-3 per Regional
- Have Veteran Team Status and register during the open enrollment phase.
- Veteran FRC Team - Open Registration = A selected number of FIRST Championship slots will be available for this open registration.
- Wait List - A wait list will be maintained for any openings that become available.
- There were 400 FRC teams in attendance
- the teams are divided into 4 divisions
- Archemedies
- Newton
- Curie
- Galileo
- each division is essentially a regional, each of the 100 teams compete in 9 qualification matches over the course of Thursday 1pm-8:15pm, Friday all day and Saturday 8:15am to 10:30am
- Saturday at 10:30am division alliance selection happens
- 12pm quarterfinals begin
- By 3:30 each division has a winning alliance
- the winners of each division move on to Einstien to compete for the World Championship title
In my next post I'll get share more about our experiences at Championships
thanks for reading
allison
team captain
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