Monday, December 15, 2014

Post VEX and Preseason

The VEX competition, considering its enormous size of 60 teams, turned out to be pretty good. 3 Vanden teams and a Golden West Middle School team moved on to eliminations, and the Vanden-Golden alliance moved on to semifinals, where they lost to the future champion #1 alliance. After the competition, there were scratches on the gym floor left after teams moved out of the gym. Thankfully, we were able to cover much of it up with some chemicals. We did the same for residue that was left from packaging tape that was used to tape carpet to the floor. It took three hours, but by 9:30pm we finished.
This week is a pretty busy week regarding preseason. Though we are still awaiting the RoboRio, we have plenty to do instead of sitting down playing cards and simply waiting. We are designing robots in our groups for the mock Green Game, Noodle Frenzy. We present them on the day of our robotics final, December 17th. This Friday, after the 6th period final, we are all going to 7th period immediately after to celebrate as Devin Sigley is leaving the following day to Youngstown, Ohio and the FRC team 3193, the Falco Tech. Right after, we are cleaning up the whole shop: the electrical room, the mechanical room, and the CNC/welding area. Build season is less than 3 weeks away, so it's crunch time now. We still have 3 more dates for selling raffle tickets for the Microsoft Surface Pro 3. All of the dates are accessible on our website. Next week, during Christmas break, we are planning out the video outline of our Chairman's presentation. Also, the Friday before kickoff, we are cleaning up more and preparing the H3 room for kickoff. It will be full, so we will be ready.

2014 Vanden VEX Competition Photo Album

Tuesday, December 09, 2014

Anticipation...and More Anticipation

24 days til Kickoff. We know. It's coming.


One of our own, Devin Sigley, is moving back to Ohio on December 21st. We're all going to miss him. He will be joining the Falco Tech, Team 3193, in Austintown, Ohio, when he is there.


2 big topics have come up this month, right before build season. One of them is competitions. We have registerd for the Sacramento (UC-Davis) and Madera (Central Valley) regionals, weeks 1 and 3, respectively. However, we want to register for a third regional. There are no week 6 regionals left open in California, but there are some out of state: Chicago, Houston, Minneapolis, and Queen City (Cincinnati). Everyone in 701 (parents, students, mentors) are filling out a survey to see which one we are going to go to.
We have been working with the Robo Knights, FRC team 5496 from Buckingham Charter Magnet High School since October. We've now been thinking if we should work with them during build season, considering that they are a rookie team. Something like what the Cheesy Poofs, team 254, did with the Space Cookies when they first started out.

Monday, December 01, 2014

Back to School!

The China trip was great. The part of our team that journeyed to Shanghai returned full of jetlag but breathless. Many of the RoboVikes want to go back. While there,we taught many Chinese students about VEX robotics. We also played some soccer with the 9-11 year old girls. Along with that, we got to know some of them, as well as sightseeing the Forbidden City, the Great Wall of China, the Tiananmen Square, and much more. Some of us are tired of Chinese food, and others...well, they're still alive.
Thanksgiving break has come and gone, and now all of us are back to work on the battery cart, the Chairbot, and the Chairman's essay and video outline. Mr. Green has given us his "Green Game" final, a mock FRC challenge that he makes every year for the 1st semester final. He puts all of us in groups of five to design or make a visual of a robot that can complete the tasks of that game. This year, the game is called Noodle Frenzy. The object of the game is to score big pool noodles into horizontal and vertical troughs. Our "presentation" of our robot is due December 17th, and we were introduced to the game today and put in groups. We have 2 solid weeks to draw this out and possibly design this on Autodesk Inventor.
We still await the RoboRio, so that we can do some testing with it before build season.

China Trip Album