Post-RIDE discussion summary

[Louis L]

A few students showed up for the debriefing. Here's what went on the white board.

Problems encountered at RIDE

   
• Ice pick sometimes did not release cube
• Drive team user errors - picking up and dropping Cubes
• Arm movement is slow (not everyone agreed here. But SW says they did not max out the arm speeds)
• Ice pick open/close is slow
• Observation - drive team could have used a camera to better see the placement of Cubes on the Scale.
• Drive team coordination and teamwork - not always in sync
• Cube can fall backwards off the arm (happened a few times)

What we can do in the next few weeks leading up to BC19. In parenthesis is a number and letter. The number (1,2,3) is priority. The letter (S,M,L) is size of task. Tasks with some element of uncertainty are bumped up one size from where they would otherwise be. Boldface text is current status. Tasks that provide new functionality have higher priority than those that are improvements over something we already have.

   
• Weight is about 107 pounds so we have 13 pounds to play with.
• (2) (S) Make ice pick open and close faster (done 4/4/18, reverted 4/11/18)
• (1) (L) Add climber (done 5/8/18)
• (1) (S) Fix cube release (seems to be good 4/11/18)
• (2) (S) Max out motor speed on arm (done 4/9/18)
• (1) (M) Fix arm pot (done 4/9/18)
• (3) (?) Add feedback / sensing aid for cube placement. Add camera. (done 5/7/18)
• (2) (L) Add intake for faster acquisition (no longer needed 4/6/18)
• (3) (M) reaching behind to drop cube (no longer needed 4/9/18)
• (3) (M) narrow cube pickup (Skip)

Lessons learned

   
• KISS
• Do not repeat past mistakes

Other things to do:

   
• get parts / IMU (4/4/18) Ed got some belts and pulleys from McMaster for prototyping. Turns out we already have the NavX IMU)

Open issues:

   
• who is on drive team? (Ben K, Pablo, Sepher, Saharsh, Gargi, Ishita)

[Louis L]

updated pincher speed fix.

[Louis L]

updated intake, pot, max speed, and reach behind status

[Louis L]

We gave the pincher a good workout tonight and the new faster motor doesn't grab as tightly as the old one; it can drop Cubes. So we put the old motor back. It's back to the slower speed but it holds great. Updated OP.

[Louis L]

Made what is probably the last update to this thread.

We tested the climber last night and the camera the night before so all hardware mods are done. There is some minimal cleanup to do still - strap some wires down and grease the drivetrain. But aside from that the robot (hw and sw) are done. We have next week to practice before BC19.