BC Championships – Season Wrap-up

BC Championships marked the end of the season for FIX IT. Although this year was challenging for everyone, we persevered; working together to build the best robot we could, and constantly improving our robot over time. Even though the pandemic has separated us physically, we continued to reach out to other teams and communities. We created and led workshops, while continuing to connect with companies such as Boston Dynamics and Battlesnake.

And in the end, this would all pay off in BC Championships…

This year gave us many firsts, both good and bad.

In FIX IT’s 12 year history, it was the first year we didn’t get to travel to and compete in Washington; the first year that we didn’t get to meet other teams in person.

It was also the first time we won the Inspire award in BC, and the first time we were part of creating a network in which all BC teams can communicate together – helping each other through the season, from giving each other advice to improve their robot, to providing outreach opportunities for other teams.

It’s almost time for our two seniors, Ines and Mythri, to leave the team. We’ll miss them, but hope to see them as Alumni volunteers at events!

With the season now finished, we’re planning on how to develop our skills this summer, reaching out to our community and connecting with other companies, as we prepare for next season. And we defintely need to find some girls to join our team. ( And wishing for a Water Game! )

BC League 5

League 5 is the final FIRST Tech Challenge league event in British Columbia, and it was a success! All of our team members at the workshop did an amazing job during practice and during scoring matches.

Beyonce didn’t have any mechanical issues, but it was clear that we need more driver practice.

Picture of our robot, Beyonce, in March 2021

As a part of Fair Play, we recorded all of our matches, available for everyone to see on YouTube.

We are all excited for Wednesday, the Virtual Pits with League Wrap-up. We’ll see how we did compared to other teams around British Columbia.

Scrimmage

Today we were invited to a Remote Scrimmage with High Definition and RoboEclipse.

High Definition has a carbon fibre drive train and can shoot quickly. They have a big arm for the wobble goal and collecting and shooting is done in a linear path.

Robo Eclipse 11138 has a really cool like triangular arm and lots of quick shooting.

We then played some matches. It was a little difficult getting the match up and started, but we managed to do it! Every other team seems to have the same struggles anyways; whether that was randomization or autonomous and it took the full 2 hours to get through all the teams. The lag on discord also made some matches harder to watch.

It was a fun day and chance to see more FTC people.

FIX IT is a Fair Play team

What is Fair Play?

Fair play is a new program for FIRST Tech Challenge teams It was started by Mark Eldeman to “provide encouragement (and maybe a bit of extra incentive) to “do the right thing.”

In order to be a Fair Play team, a team must be:

Honest
Transparent
As a team, take the Fair Play for FTC pledge

Fair Play teams will publish robot match videos with scores and encourage comments and feedback from other FTC teams. It’s a great way for all teams to get better at scoring their own robot matches this season.

For more information regarding the Fair Play initiative, please visit:
https://firstroboticsbc.org/ftc/fair-play/

Workshop – Create a Virtual Pit

On March 6, FIX IT hosted a workshop called “How to Create a Virtual Pit” for FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) robotics teams. It was designed to help FTC teams with making a Virtual Pit, and potentially helping them with judging interviews. For this workshop, we invited two FTC teams from Washington, Team 3805 Atomic Robotics, and Team 417 S.K.I.D., to help with the presentation.

We covered what is a Virtual Pit, and how to plan for one. Half way through our presentation, Atomic Robotics and S.K.I.D. presented their Virtual Pits to give an example of a Virtual Pit. Then we moved on to topics like how to make the most out of visiting pits, the importance of asking questions, how to cope with technical difficulties, and additional tips.

COVID Heroes

In March – May of 2020, FIX IT was part of the Vancouver Island COVID Printing Group who 3D printed face shields and ear protectors for medical facilities and front line workers.

It was a opportunity for our team members to use the skills they had developed by being on a robotics team, and do something to help make the lives of front line workers a little bit easier. We could use our CAD skills to create a new design for ear savers that would work better for people with straight hair, and then use our printing skills to create the ear savers.

In place of their popular annual awards for the Technology Industry, VIATEC held a celebration of the people and organizations in Greater Victoria that have made exceptional contributions to our community during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Our COVID 3D Printing group was recognized as COVID Heroes!

Robot Design Process and Implementation

This is a narrated presentation. On the top right corners of some slides, there is a speaker icon; that indicates that the slide has been narrated, and you may listen to our presenters walking you through the slide. Please turn on your audio for the best experience.

There are two presentations: the first is the “Robot Design Process” presentation, and the second is the “Robot Design Implementation.” Please view the presentations for the best experience.

Robot Design Process

Robot Design Implementation

Thank you for reading “Robot Design Process and Implementation,” we hoped that we have helped you. If you have any more questions or comments please feel free to let us know through our Google Form:

This was last updated on the 10^th of September. 2020.

Comparing FTC Kits

We have created a simple handout to compare between four main kits from:

Comparing FTC Kits Download

Thank you for reading “Comparing FTC Kits,” we hoped that we have helped you. If you have any questions or comments please feel free to let us know through our Google Form:

This was last updated on the 4^th of September. 2020.

This post is only applicable to the FIRST Tech Challenge.

STEM Leaders of the Future Contest

BC students (Grades 1-12) are invited to celebrate all things science, technology, engineering, and math with Engineers and Geoscientists of BC by taking part in the STEM Leaders of the Future: Engineering and Geoscience contest!

Check out the list of challenges to help get those creative thoughts flowing. Using items you can find around the house, students are encouraged to create something brand new that solves one of today’s big issues.

Here are the basics of the contest:

How to Get Started: 6 steps to becoming our next STEM Leader of the Future
Challenge Topics: Thought-starters to help you identify a problem and think about a creative solution.
FAQs: Find answers to our most commonly asked questions
Project Submission Tips: Wondering what it takes to make a great project submission that is clever, original, and inventive? Here’s some tips to help get started.

Prizes will be awarded to the top entries in the following grade groups: Grades 1–3, Grades 4–6, Grades 7–9, and Grades 10–12.

Deadline to enter the contest is October 30, 2020.

Launching Planes

Our team spends a lot of time working on robots, but in the summer, we like to try some different types of projects too.

As a fun, design challenge we decided we wanted to do a paper airplane competition, with a twist – we would also have to build separate launching devices to launch the planes instead of throwing them. We ended up using 3 different forms of potential energy. Our first team used elastic potential energy pulled back into a Tetrix based launch to launch their plane. Our second team used air pressure by making a closed-air system which launched a plane by pushing down on a soda bottle. Our final team used chemical potential energy from the reaction of Coca Cola™ and baking soda to launch a rocket-shaped plane.

We had a lot of fun planning our strategies for the competition and painstakingly assembling our planes and the launcher. Our elastic plane launcher ended up taking the prize for the most accurate, landing in the nearest target hoop twice, and in the farthest hoop once. The plane that launched with air pressure wasn’t too accurate, but it managed to land in the near hoop once (unfortunately the soda bottle broke immediately after the first accurate launch). When you shoot for a moonshot you take a lot of risks and unfortunately the third plane was unable to launch, though we were treated to a pretty snazzy show of explosions.

At the end of the day, we had fun, learned lots, cooperated and had a pretty cool air show!