Today marked the close of week 5 of the build season. At the time of writing we have 7 days, 3 hours, 7 minutes, and 13 seconds to go. It's crunch time for Team 3245. One of our objectives this year, as we often set most years, is to have our competition robot done by this time of the build season. This allows time for driver practice, refining mechanisms, perfecting our "sweet spot" (where our robot can be on the field and still make the goal), and developing sophisticated autonomous. Needless to day, we did not make this date.

So what do we have right now? We have two robot bases which are built to scale, can drive, have pneumatics, and allow for us to build mechanisms upon. One of these is our competition bot, made of some awesome looking aluminum channel, and which we will be bagging up very soon. The other is our practice bot, which we will continue to work with throughout the season. This will help with driver practice and continuing to develop more mechanisms for the robot. This year we tried something new on our drive base. We are doing "West Coast Drive" (WCD), a system on which the wheels are on the outside of the robot, rather than being sandwiched between two metal plates. This allows for a wider stance, a narrower drive chain assembly, and easier wheel replacement. Its a good thing we chose WCD, because it not only does the driving look awesome (many thanks to our driver George), but it also looks like the intense driving will require a lot of wheel changes this year.

So what are we working on right now? Sadly the game is not just driving around. We need a shooter, a floor loader, a catcher, and hopefully a way to not only shoot into the high goal, but a way to shoot to ourselves. That sounds weird, a way to shoot to ourselves? Yep, it would be amazing in Utah if we were able to cross the field, including drive under the metal truss that spans the field at 5'2" tall, and still earn the "truss shot" points - awarded for shooting a ball over the truss. But to do this "truss shot" we don't really want to shoot it across and then go chase down the ball to control it again. Imagine if we could drive under the truss while the ball flies over the truss, and then have it land back in our robot!

Alright enough with what we could be working on. This week we split up into two groups, the Veterans and the Rookies. Each group is building their own robot, for which they will earn a grade toward their final in the Robotics Class. Doing this allows for more students to benefit from hands on learning and experience. This also gives us two robots with which to practice after stop-build day.

So what are the plans for our competition bot? Right now we are working on the shooter, as we aren't much help without the ability to score goals. Our schedule looks as follows:
- Tuesday, Feb 11: Shooter Motors Attached, Shooter Mounted, Pneumatics Completed, UpperLid Attached, PracticeBot Reassembled.
- Wednesday, Feb 12: Floor Loader Started, Exploration into Rotating Wheeled Shooter.
- Thursday, Feb 13: Bumpers Constructed, Floor Loader Motorized.
- Friday, Feb 14: Floor Loader Mounted, Bumpers Attached, Start Decorations

We are also pursuing the "Chairmans Award" this year. This is a first for our team, but gives us a greater chance to receiving recognition at our Regional Events, as well as increases our chances of making it to Championships!

I hope to see everyone at robotics this upcoming week. Hopefully there is a lot coming together and quickly! I'm looking forward to a great competition season!

-Harris Christiansen
frc@harrischristiansen.com