One of the ways we are constantly improving our safety program is to visit local companies who have an interest in safety. (more…)

From May 19^th to May 21^st, C.O.R.E. spoke to the students there about FIRST and our previous years as a team and presented our most recent  robot, Daedalus.

We took a three day trip to Sheboygan to talk with many students at their own STEM competition based on rockets.  Not only we were promoting STEM, it was also a lot of fun. Quite a few students were interested enough to consider starting their own FTC or FRC team! Overall, it was a successful weekend.

From March 31^st to April 2^nd, we participated in the 10,000 Lakes Regional Competition, held in the Williams Arena on the University of Minnesota-Minneapolis Campus. We learned from our experiences at the Wisconsin Regional to better our team and our robot. Between the two regionals we developed a new minibot and minibot deployment system. We also continued to improve our autonomous code to consistently hang an Ubertube.

We ended qualification rounds at 6th place from a group of 63 teams. For our alliance we chose Teams 2232: Deus ex Machina and 2545: Quantum Mechanics. In quarter-finals, our alliance lost one round and won the next; in the determining round, our alliance lost: 72 to 89. Our team earned both Rockwell Automation’s Innovation in Control Award and UL’s Industrial Safety Award. Safety in C.O.R.E. is more than a concept or idea–it is a culture. Our members distributed safety manuals and gave safety presentations at the 10,000 Lakes and North Star Regionals.

We can’t wait to reveal the changes we have made to autonomous and our minibot, Icarus, at the 10,000 Lakes Regional in Minneapolis. Our robot, Daedalus, consistantly scores ubertubes on the top-middle peg during autonomous. Icarus 2.1 was inspired by a Chief Delphi thread. To learn more about Daedalus and Icarus, click here.

C.O.R.E. was featured in a Waukesha Patch article about our participation in FIRST’s Wisconsin Regional Competition featuring the 2011 game: LOGO MOTION.
To read this article, click here. For more information on LogoMotion, click here.

March 10^th through March 12^th, 2011, our team went to the Wisconsin Regional  at the Milwaukee US Cellular Arena. It was a great learning experience for our new driver and rookie members. The drive team did exceptionally well, scoring quickly and efficiently as well as deploying the minibot. Before the 2011 10,000 Lakes Regional, we plan to make the necessary changes to our minibot and scouting system. In the end, we ranked 7^th out of 51 teams. We also made it all the way to the quarter-finals with the help from More 1714, Mukwonago B.E.A.R.s 930 and Saber Robotics 2506. We also received the Website Award recognizing excellence in student-designed, -built, and -managed FIRST team websites.

From March 10^th to March 12^th, C.O.R.E. will be attending the Wisconsin Regional! We would love it if you could come and join us and cheer us on. It will be at the US Cellular Center, in Milwaukee. (Spectators come from 9:00am until 6:00pm, and spectator admission is free, but assume $5-10 for parking.) For more information on the competition, go to the FIRST page. For more information on this specific regional, go to the Wisconsin Regional page.

Officially three days till Ship! Everyone is working hard and trying to get everything accomplished. The robot is up and running and placed its first official tube on the rack. We’re hoping that Daedalus will succeed, even though we have new drivers, and that Icarus flies high.

CAD team has almost completely built the robot on AutoDesk, and are finishing up the last few parts. The Manipulator team is making the guards to protect the robot and will be making spare parts for the robot. They are also making minor modifications. Chassis team is still working on the second chassis and checking and fixing all stripped gears. The Lift team drilled extra lift plates and assembled the second lift. The Minibot team is redisigning the deployment system and hope to integrate it into the robot. Programming is making progress on pre-programmed heights with an encoder. In addition, they have also optimized the code for the robot, collaborated with drive team to finalize the control scheme, and began testing for teleoperated mode. Our Website, Animation, and Chairmans’ awards were submitted. (To see our animation, click here.)

This week we are meeting nearly every day to perfect the robot. Driver training kicked into high gear. We have drivers in training that are nearly ready to take up the controls on the field. This is due to our hardworking controls and programming teams who have finalised and perfected their respective areas.

Early in the week we had problems with our actuator system. Our lift team put in a phenomenal amount of effort to re-design our actuator in record time. Our manipulator team perfected the grabber by adjusting the spacing. Other members of our team created our bumpers and performed repairs to the crate.

CAD is vigorously trying to keep up with all of the mechanical teams changes.  Also, our animation team is close to finishing. They are completing the final render to HD quality and have to still have to compile their scenes.

The Chairmans essay is nearing completion. It is being proofed by several of our students and mentors.

We are now at 19 days to Ship date and competition is coming up fast. We have reached a consensus and decided on our name for the host and minibot: Daedalus and Icarus. This comes from the ancient Greek mythological tales of the great inventor, Daedalus, a son of Athena, the goddess of wisdom. According to myth, Daedalus and his son Icarus were trapped and, as a method of escape, created wings of wax and feathers. Icarus indeed flew out of his prison, much like we hope our Icarus will climb high in Logo Motion.

The finalized control board was built and mounted on the chassis. The actuator was assembled and we conducted preliminary tests with it. On February 4^th, the manipulator was tested and successfully grabbed a tube. We were able to utilize our 3D printer to produce the rollers to be used on the manipulator. The programming team continued to work on their drive code to run on voltage mode in addition to working with a tracking system to be used during the autonomous period. Another subteam began to construct field elements so as to allow for more accurate practice with the host bot and minibot.

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