FTC 2018: Amazing Students, Robots, and Results
In the Fall of 2018, Code Red’s two FTC teams, Neutrinos: Breaking the Laws of Physics (#5383) and Emergency Situation Evacuate Now (#5384), had a fun and successful season. FTC is a group of 7th & 8th graders who build a robot for a specific game. The 2018 game was called ‘Rover Ruckus’. This game was a space themed game, and it had minerals (gold and silver), a crater, and a lander (spaceship). We had to figure out how to build a robot that would be able to take the minerals from the crater, and put them into the lander. Our robot also had to be able to climb onto the lander to get an extra 50 points.
During the build season, we came up with a robot design that would allow use to park between the crater and lander, then retrieve minerals from the crater and transfer them into the lander. We also worked on our Engineering Notebook. Throughout the season, the FRC students helped us with feedback about our robot and strategy and feedback on our Engineering Notebook presentation. After lots of hard work, we had our robot ready to drive. Unfortunately we finished it right before our first competition, and had little drive practice. Sadly, we didn’t place very well at our first competition. However, we were able to try again at our second competition. For our second competition, we had had a week’s worth of drive practice, and because of that drive practice, we were able to get first place!
In addition to building the robot, we also completed an Engineering notebook that is filled with ideas about our robot, how we built it, our teams, pictures and it even information about Code Red’s sponsors. Along with the Engineering Notebook and building the robot, we also did a presentation about Code Red Robotics in front of a panel of judges about our robot, how we impact our community, and Code Red’s sponsors. In the presentation we had to describe the robot, how we built it, what troubles we had, and what we thought was unique about our robot.
After winning the Kentwood Qualifier Event, we qualified for the Michigan State Championship! At the Michigan Championship event, we experienced a few problems, but we were able to recover from them. We were selected by the 8th place team in our division, and made it to the Quarterfinals before we were eliminated. As a result of our season, we learned a lot about teamwork, Gracious Professionalism, and Robotics.
