REBUILT™ presented by Haas
In this year’s game, two opposing alliances compete to score fuel into the hub. Each piece of fuel is worth one point, and the two hubs alternate between active and inactive every 25 seconds. The game starts with a 20-second autonomous period, during which robots score points based on a preprogrammed move set. In the final moments of the game, robots can climb onto the towers to score additional points.
A Unique Robot
For most teams, the obvious approach would be to have a large hopper to store the most balls to shoot at once. However, after considering the pros and cons of this strategy, we decided on a different approach. Our robot for this season is hopperless—one of three hopperless robots at the World Championship out of a total of 600.
Our strategy consisted of using a turret to continuously fire fuel into the hub from our side of the field, while using the off time to ferry fuel from the middle zone into our alliance zone. This way, we were able to achieve a high scoring rate while maintaining the agility, speed, and space that would have been sacrificed for a hopper. Additionally, we were able to climb onto the first level of the tower during the endgame.
This year, our creativity and persistence brought us to the World Championship—for the first time in nine years.
Season Highlights:
- Hudson Valley Regional — Creativity Award
- NYC Regional — Excellence in Engineering Award
- NYC Regional — Alliance Captain and Regional Finalists
- NYC Regional — FIRST Leadership Award Finalist
- World Championship, Milstein Division — Industrial Design Award