The energy was high as hundreds of high school students and mentors gathered together at Orange High School in Hillsborough, NC, and eagerly waited to watch the 2016 FRC game broadcast. Everyone was anticipating what the new challenge was all about, using the teaser video FIRST released a few months prior. After a long introduction and several teasers, the new game was revealed: Stronghold.
Stronghold is a game where two alliances composed of three robots work to conquer their opponent’s alliance’s kingdom. On each side, there is a castle tower with goals both at 9-feet and right on the ground. Each alliance has the option to start off with a total of three “boulders,” which are 10-inch diameter foam balls. With those boulders, the alliances score by launching them into the high goal for 5 points or rolling/pushing them into the low goal for 2 points. Of course, there is a twist. As robots are scoring down field, opposite where their drive stations are, they are required to shoot the boulders from their opponent’s courtyard, a section by the goals they are shooting into. To get to the opponent’s courtyard (the other end), robots have to cross a row of assorted “defenses”, which are obstacles. When a defense is crossed twice in the right direction, it become “damaged”; once 4 defenses are damaged, the alliance has “breached” the “outer works” (row of obstacles) and points are scored. In the last 20 seconds of the game, robots can score extra points and climb on a bar nearly 7 feet off the ground at their opponent’s castle. For a more detailed explanation of the game and animation, check out the official game reveal video below.
After the video was played, our team quickly gathered together to read the rules and started developing strategies. We also joined a few other teams in a brainstorming session. By the end of the day, we had a general idea of we wanted to play the game and were very excited to get working on a robot for Stronghold!
This week, the team accomplished a lot in the building and design of our robot. One of the big focuses of the week was getting the robot to actually drive. After 3 weeks of designing and prototyping, our robot finally came to life. Getting to this point, though, required us to overcome a variety of issues.
One issue that we discovered early on was that the gusset plates of the underside of the chassis were interfering with the wheels of the robot. We also had to modify the bolts that attached the gearboxes to the chassis. Doing this meant sanding down every bolt, which was a time consuming effort. Adding to our difficulties, we had to modify the elevator due to height issues. In the face of these numerous setbacks, we still managed to have a working moving chassis by the end of the week.
During the week, we had three new students join the team. They all quickly jumped in and have been very helpful in building and modifying the robot.
Soon after the unveiling of this year’s competition, Recycle Rush, we began brainstorming everything from game strategies to designs for our robot. We have met every day and have made plenty of progress in striving towards building a robot that will be proficient in this year’s competition.
This last week, we have spent a great deal of time fine tuning our strategy and coming up with various ways on how to achieve the tasks we want to perform. We have built many prototypes out of wood and aluminum, trying out multiple ideas brought up by team members. We worked on prototypes for collecting totes from the ground along with prototypes for stacking the totes. For collecting totes, we had the general idea of wheels pulling the totes into the robot. For stacking the totes, we built a mechanism using pistons to lift the them up. Next, we created a pair of claws, cut specifically to fit into the grooves under the lid of the totes, to hold the totes. These claws were attached to motors with a chain. We learned that this prototype failed to lift the totes any other way but right side up.
Throughout the second week of the build season, we have been hard at work. We started the week by assembling the eight mecanum wheels for the drivetrain, which proved harder than it sounds because of the instruction book that was more like a cuneiform (the earliest picture-written language) script than directions.
Even with mentors that have years of experience, we found three different ways to mess up the wheels. First, we assumed the wheels did not need the bearing-like cylinders to stabilize them. Second, we left out the washers, which the instructions assumed you would put on. And third, we found out that the outer wheel plate had to face stickers in (that last was not in the cryptic instructions anywhere). Though difficult, this taught us two lessons. First, always analyze (not look at) the instructions then think through what you are about to do. Second, if at first you don’t succeed, do what was just said then try again. In addition to building (and rebuilding) those, we worked on prototyping the elevator’s lifting mechanism and the robot’s collector. We also have an almost complete CAD model of the robot. In addition to that, we got to disassemble, then reassemble the gear boxes where we learned to love e-clips for how useful they are, but hate putting them on and taking them off. With all of this done, it put us in a good position to start the next week. We have almost finished the prototyping and will start on the robot’s frame on Sunday.
A buzz of excitement ran through the room where students, alumni, and mentors stood clustered near the TV, eagerly awaiting an impending webcast from FIRST. After several freezes with the live feed and the long introduction that kept us in suspense, the 2015 challenge was announced: Recycle Rush.
Recycle Rush is a game where two teams composed of three robots work to stack totes on scoring platforms, which are a couple inches off the ground. For extra points, teams may place recycling bins on top of these stacks, earning even more points if a pool noodle is in or on the bin. During the autonomous period, robots are preprogrammed to score by moving bins and recycling bins into the auto zone. If the totes are stacked, extra points are scored. In the teleop period, robots are controlled by human drivers as they attempt to make up to 6-tote high stacks. Unlike previous games, this game has a step in the middle that divides the field in half, not allowing alliances to play defense against each other.
After the challenge was announced, our team quickly broke off into smaller subgroups and started reading the game manual and brainstorming strategies and robot designs. A little while later, we all got together and presented our ideas. Working cohesively, our team came up with a strategy and general robot design.
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