The last day of build season was an exciting one! Rodrigo was so excited that he wore his safety glasses all day long!
After school many parents volunteered to drive us to Transformix Engineering where we ate snacks and did homework….
…and worked on programming the robot….
…and finishing up the wiring.
Thanks so much to Transformix for letting us use their space for the weekend and letting us bag and tag tonight. We’re making ourselves at home! There are Queen’s jackets everywhere!
We had a few visitors come to see the last exciting moments where our robot was driving around and shooting baskets. It’s really thrilling to see everything come together at the last minute and work like it was supposed to!
Chris, from FESTO, was excited to see the pneumatic components in action. He’s arranging FESTO giveaways for competition this season.
We also had our follow-up with CKWS TV. It was exciting to have media present for the final moments of our build. Bag and Tag was officially documented this year, and a two part series about our team will air Monday and Tuesday at the 6pm news on CKWS.
One minor hiccup that we had to negotiate before bagging the robot was our bumper design. After recent clarification our original split number bumper was deemed to be against the rules. We quickly made some patches to sew on. 
There were still plenty of people taking naps on the sidelines…It will take time to regain all of the lost sleep from recent days.
With 30 minutes to go, we separated our shooting device from the robot to hold back and work on over the next little while. Thank goodness for a withholding allowance!
There was great hustle near the robot, and also in the Transformix lunch room. We cleaned up all of our dishes and food and prepared for the excitement of putting the robot into the bag.
But first…we needed to weigh our robot. Using the bathroom scales gave us one estimate…
…Transformix’s industrial scale gave us another….
With a 20 pound shooter, we’re under weight! 
We gathered at 11:50 to bag our robot. Everyone wanted to be a part of the momentous occasion.
It’s all caught on film!
With a sigh of relief and a few cheers we were done, with a few minutes to spare!
It’s a strange feeling to be done building. We’re used to seeing each other every day, and now we’ll take a day to rest and recover before we start thinking of all that remains to be completed before going to competition. 
We’ll miss each other in the mean time though! Good work everyone. Thanks to all of our families and supporters for helping us through an intense 6 weeks. Enjoy your rest.
…and some robot weighing….”uh oh!”…
….we then discussed where we could drill more holes to lose those 2 extra pounds…
Many thanks to Allan from Transformix for volunteering his time to help us in the machine shop today. In the end we weighed in at approximately 119 pounds!
We spent our time riveting…
…eating…
…knitting…
….and scoring lots of points with our amazing shooter.
We were glad to have visitors here today. Mentors from our rookie team came to get some parts and discuss the finer points of programming, and how to pass robot inspection. Our friend Chris, from FESTO, came to see how things were doing. He’ll be back again tomorrow to watch the shooter work.
We had families come to spend part of their family day with us, to eat meals with us and watch the robot do its thing, one system at a time. Some parents pitched in to help with the robot building.
For most of the day we had only one system working at a time. It became a bit of a running joke that the entire robot would be fully functional “in the next 10 minutes”. We waited a long time for those 10 minutes to pass. 
When the robot was finally driving, and shooting, and went over the bump, and balanced on the bridge, we celebrated with Girl Guide cookies, courtesy of the Pathfinder group we worked with last week. Thanks so much girls, they were delicious!
Today we continued to cut holes in our robot…
….and we are optimistic about reaching the 120 pound weight limit.
We’re filing down all of our parts to keep things smooth and to lose weight where we can.
As the mechanical team finished up their work, the programmers kept working hard writing code….
….while wires were run between all of the robot’s electrical components.
Our human players took to the field to try their long distance shots.
We had two really great meals which kept us working hard all day.
We’re realizing the importance of washing hands before we eat. Look at all of the dirt!
After getting the mechanical and electrical and pneumatic systems all rigged up, we ran into some issues with our victors…
…and our jags…
We’re working hard to resolve these issues, so we can make our robot fully operational!
Today we started off bright and early in the Transformix Engineering Plant 2 Warehouse.
We worked hard to reassemble our robot to get everything in working order to test some key components that Purolator delivered today! 
We’re so excited to be in the warehouse and wrapping up build season. Some of us are wearing robot themed accessories!
Before too long we set to work putting holes into our robot….EVERYWHERE!
We weighed the robot….and look what the scale said!
Just kidding….that was only part of the robot. We think we’re on target though.
We ate a yummy lunch provided by our parents. It’s so nice to be well taken care of during a very stressful time.
After lunch it was nap time, until we had to construct the field. It takes a lot of power to keep the warped wood lined up properly.
The Cyberfalcons, FIRST team 3710, joined us in the warehouse today, and helped out fastening the field pieces to the carpet with heavy duty velcro.
Hard work leads to more nap time!
Our electrical and programming team worked hard to get all of the sensors connected and working.
Productivity was everywhere….
The Cyberfalcons made bumpers…
We worked on programming….
…and built a human player station….
….and made sparks fly!
Some of our mentors were ABSOLUTELY happy with all of our progress…..while others were a little concerned to see the robot disappearing before their very eyes.
Our families came to visit us and see our progress all day long. All of Mr. Wood’s family was here all at once!
We appreciate our families encouraging us through these last busy days. It’s nice to share the excitement with everyone we love.
Spontaneous sweeping is always a good thing….so is collecting piles of files! Rhyming organization is the best kind.
While waiting for the testing to begin, we entertained ourselves in many different ways….one of which was a crazy hair extravaganza! Thumbs up to everyone!
It was such a great work day today. Thanks to everyone for bringing your best effort, enthusiasm, and patience today. Please also bring your homework tomorrow….there will be some moments of down time where you can get ready for Tuesday. Also….when you arrive tomorrow, say happy birthday to Kevin!
See everyone here at 9AM!
Scouting meetings have happened, and we’ve started working on a database.
Our robot must have done a lot of exercise and eaten a lot of healthy food! Today it lost some weight. We used rivets instead of bolts…. 
We cut holes in everything…
Using the vacuum is important….otherwise the 4 pounds of aluminum shavings would have ended up in the chain.
We nibbled a lot of lexan….
…and a lot of metal…
Challenges were given, and accepted….to get all the nibbling done in half an hour.
We ate MEAT….on a stick! Thanks parents for keeping us fed.
After dinner we cleaned up our workspace. “I used the vacuum! It sucked” -Sam
We packed up our gear to get to the warehouse tonight. We’re making a nest…but we feel it will be empty without you!
After a few jokes about exercise and eating vegetables, we started having a serious discussion about how to reduce our robot weight. It seems that this time of year, we’re always trying to reach that magic number of 120 pounds
To do this, we’re going to be drilling a lot of holes, and making some tough decisions about what can remain on our robot. Some mentors have done calculations about just how many cheeseholes it takes to lose a single pound. Others speculated that shortening wires would make a similar difference. “4 inches of wire equals 1 cheese hole” -Kevin H. [we haven't seen the proof yet]
We drilled and deburred a lot of aluminum. “Deburring is a pain in the arm!” said our little helper.
We even cut holes out of our Lexan panels.
We’re investigating where it’s possible to take weight out of our electrical box. With a bit of finesse, we might just squeak by under the weight limit.
As we’re removing some components, we’re adding others. It’s a balancing act, deciding which features are necessary and which are extra.
Between discussions and machining, we took some breaks to complete homework and study for tests.
We also got a great head start on organizing our scouting binder for GTR East.
We completed the first phase of our super-top-secret project…
…and we ate a great spaghetti dinner.
It was really nice to have a special visitor join us on his 13th birthday!
We’ve already started packing up some of the essential tools.
We’d like to thank Allan for doing such a great job for us.
This afternoon we were excited to see our new friends, the leaders from the Pathfinder group that we visited yesterday! They came to see our robot and have a look around. We hope to arrange a visit for their pathfinder group in the spring.
We had more visitors this evening when our school hosted Grade 8 information night. Many grade 8 students toured our room and saw our 2009 robot on display in the library. We’re always game to show off our robot to an enthusiastic crowd!
We worked hard today putting more pieces onto our robot. Wheels are turning, and other components get added each day.
Thanks so much to Bruce at Transformix for all of the machining support this past week.
Outside in the hallway we continued our driver tryouts. Thanks to all who tried out for driver and operator this season. A list of competition roles will be posted soon.
We had so many treats today! Thanks so much to our supportive parents who take care of us so well. 
Thanks also to Mike for coming to visit us today. It’s always great to see members of our big purple family come back to lend their support during build season. 
This evening a small group of K-Bots went to a local Pathfinders meeting to do a workshop using LEGO robotics and to also teach them how to knit.
The LEGO robotics portion included putting together a robot and also programming it.
After a short time we had little robots spinning around and singing songs.
Knitters on the other side of the room were hard at work learning the skills of casting on, knitting and casting off. It takes great focus to get all of the steps in order!
Many thanks to the girls and their leaders for agreeing to make some 
Many thanks also for the gift of girl guide cookies!!-
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award brainstorming breakaway build season bumpers CAD Chairman's Report communication community competition construction Cyber Falcons dance demo design electrical families field field trip First Robotics FLL FRC fundraising GTR kick off Logomotion Machining media mentors New York City Regional organization pre-season challenge programming prototype Queen's University rebound rumble safety scouting sponsors team building testing thank you Transformix video WAFFLES
