The Mighty Axle ...

 

... Is not so mighty.  The axle we used for the arm got twisted ... again.  Therefore, we replace the axle (yet again). 

For wheeling

Nik is building a new drive train for Sonic which will give us better control and will help prevent the motors from burning out

Two is better than one

The gears were having problems meshing properly with each other (they weren't fully aligned and would occasionally slide past each other).  We therefore added (and painstakingly aligned) two (2) more gears to the problem area to solve this.

Covering All Our Bases

Since the encoders starting behaving again, it looks like we'll be spending the next few days trying to expand our autonomous code. More specifically, we're trying to get code ready for both starting posistion and all IR locations. From what I understand, Casey is using a program chooser and the IR sensor to run different codes, or something. It's not my cup of tea; I'm just the one who gets to reset the robot after every run.

Fixing Autonomous

Despite Sonic's great performance at Western, the qualifier showed us just how broken our Autonomous mode really was. Out of all our matches, we only scored autonomous rings a few times, and, even though we were the only autonomous score the judges had seen all season, I know we can do better. I'm going to have to work with the encoders to try and get Sonic to score more consistently.

Above the Rules

Well we're back from winter break, and for most of the class robot season is over; not for us though. So while everyone else disassembles and organizes and sorts, it's business as usual for Sonic Team! Casey and Pierce are practicing with the robot, Travis is building things, I'm writing this post, and none of us are doing inventory. It's great to be king!

Coming Soon To a Theater Near You

Thanks to the industriousness of Nik, we finished our mid-season video for out robot. While we could describe it here, we think the video should speak for itself...

Shoot to Thrill

Now that our first match is over and gone, we're shifting our focus away from our robot and onto our Mid-season video, a three minute video that documents our achievements with our robot as well as the unity and charity of our team. We have many areas to cover - Design, Strategy, Fundraising, etc. - which must now be focused and condensed. Our plan for the video is for each part to be a channel on a television, though the hard part is to film.