BinaryBots attended Duel in the Desert, a scrimmage event before the robots have to bagged and tagged at Arcadia High School. Our robot is almost complete so we wanted to use this day to test our design and meet other teams. Once the code was deployed, BinaryBots headed outside and everybody had a chance to practice driving the robot.
The first obstacle we tested was the cheval de frise. One of the planks can go up while crossing this defense and the plank got stuck under the robot. To solve this problem, our team is going to install a bellypan. The cheval de frise was also a surprisingly bumpy obstacle. The two times the robot successfully made it over the cheval de frise we lost connection. BinaryBots concluded the issue was that the planks had to tilt down on the other side and the robot cannot simply fly off the planks "Dukes of Hazzard style".
Our robot is not sturdy enough for competition yet. The air tanks need to be secured by a stronger method than zip ties. The electronics board also need to have components hot glued down. The bumps disconnected the solenoid and created issues with our piston. Luckily, BinaryBots are including the powerboard in our witholding allowance so we have time to secure our electronics.
After the cheval de frise, we tested the sally port. Our robot can successfully cross the sally port with the current configuration. We will add a side appendage to the arm so that opening the sally port is even easier. Unfortunately while we were testing the sally port, we bent to the bore to our piston. The arm of our robot was too low and the piston was extended while the robot was driven too fast over the obstacle. The hook on our arm got stuck on the seam of the wood and the piston wass bent so there was no way to retract it.
Breaking our piston was disappointing because it meant that BinaryBots could not go out on the field and practice during the scimmage. We will replace the piston tomorrow, add the limit switches so the arm cannot extend so low to the ground, and attach surgical tubing to the back of the arm to help counterbalance the weight. Overall, BinaryBots think we can bag and tag our robot at the end of tomorrow. The progress we have made this year as a team composed mostly of rookies is amazing. BinaryBots are not discouraged by the setbacks of today, we look at these as learning opportunities and will keep building tomorrow.