Antares Blog Week 7 and 8

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Week 7 was more focused, with only veteran members coming to finish incomplete parts for a V2 robot. We got back into the rhythm on Week 8, and began thoroughly testing our robot in preparation for our field practice at Bellarmine and the Regional next in week 9.

Code & Vision
Our Code team prepared the robot for full testing during Ski-week by working on detecting the Note’s location in the Transfer and Amp. Initially they planned to use Current Sensing, but changed track and used IR Beam sensor after it became clear that the Current Sensing was unreliable. They also spent time fine tuning the Amp, Intake and Shooter system, making sure everything was ready for robot tests. Vision continued to train their Note detection models through week 7, and uploaded them in week 8, and they also uploaded the go-to-note function, though they plan to continue refining on it to ensure the robot velocity does not affect accuracy. The teams also worked closely with Build & Design during testing in week 8, perfecting the code and writing out the auton code (we are now able to score 4 Notes during the autonomous section). Videos of our robot tests are on our
youtube channel.

Build and Design

Over Ski Week, a few members of our Build & Design team worked on completing and attaching competition-ready systems to the V2 robot. Hang spent 3 days getting the arms assembled and attached, though the Gripper couldn’t be cut until week 8 because of the large backlog with the CNC machine. Shooter, Amp and a nearly complete Hang have
been put on the robot, and we have begun on-robot testing for these systems. We didn’t do any building in Week 8, rather we rigorously tested the robot in all situations, making sure the robot had no deficiencies. The testing also gave our robot drivers Nihal V. and Zaeem H. lots of practice before our field trial next week, and the upcoming regional.

Marcoms and Outreach

Like all other subteams, Marcoms spent the last 2 weeks planning for the upcoming regional. Using our button machine, members from now disbanded or reduced groups created pins, stickers and magnets for our team which we can give out at competition. They also finished filming the fundraising video, and will work on editing it through weeks 9 and 10. Outreach manager Mira V. also got into contact with The Cheesy Poofs, and organized a practice at their field. While we have game structures, we do not have the carpet used in the game or a large enough room to accurately space structures
apart. We hope this practice in week 9 will give us a realistic idea of the matches. Meghna C. and Mira V. also worked on personalized notecards for teams at the upcoming regional to give alongside the rotary cutting mats our biggest sponsor Powertec provided (they gave us 350 boards).

Spirit

After a quiet Week 7, many members of our team joined our Spirit group in week 8.
Informally led by Pooja P., Sharanya N. and Megan C., it is now in full swing ahead of the upcoming regional at the end of week 9. With the final touches being placed on our boards and lettering, the spirit team turned their focus to designing the pit for our regional. They created 4 pointed paper stars and bought fairy lights to hang, as well as ordered bandanas fitting our new color scheme. They also painted the new robot cart in our colors, and decorated the diver station that Sophia D. upgraded with a stronger connection to the monitor and easier setup. We also took delivery of our hoodies and t-shirts, organized them by name and size, and will distribute them in early week 9.

Other

Over Ski Week, we completed both the blue and red bumpers and attached them to the robot in time for testing. Unlike last years bumpers, they fit on our Swerve drive chassis, and have one edge lifted up slightly to account for the extra space needed for the under the bumper Note Intake. Mentor Eric L. and student Brian L. also spent lots of time researching our batteries, understanding how they function, losing battery and charge, testing them to ensure they are working at full capacity (to power our record 18 Neo motors), and documenting which batteries can be used at competition. Sophia D. and Roham A. also designed a Tech Binder and Marketing & Business Binder for our robot and work this year. While subsystems are still compiling information, we hope to have it completed before we go to San Francisco so that information about our robot is more well known. Alisha F. also updated the sponsor list and fonts on our website, completing the last bits of the transition from RobotX to Antares. On the 24th of February, team alumni Peter W. gave a short talk about mechanical stress in our robot. He explained the
weaknesses of our previous robots (which he worked on), and we discussed ways to detect the stress, and possible ways
to reduce it this year.