Day 17:  This has been a big day for us.  It’s one of those days when you look back on all that was accomplished and wonder how you did it all!

Some of our mentors from Queen’s University spent part of the day in the McLaughlin Hall machine shop cutting custom parts.  They were thrilled to get to use the water jet cutter, and impressed by the speed with which our parts got finished.  Thanks to Andy and Derek at the McLaughlin Shop for helping us get our work done so quickly!

waterjet cutting custom parts

Here’s a video we made of the process:

After school we divided up and some of our group went to Transformix Engineering to cut more of the metal that we had ordered.  Many thanks go to Lucas the organizer, Ryan the buyer, and Ira who cut the metal for us.  Without them, we’d never get our robot made in time.

While metal was being cut at Transformix, some more sheet metal was being cut and bent at KCVI by hand.

Part of our group has formed a bumper fabrication crew.  We made pattern pieces and cut out the material we need to make our red and blue bumpers.  We had sewing lessons on machines brought in by one of our dedicated K-Botics parents.  Some of our mentors were learning how to sew on the machine.

One of our mentors painfully learned that he is too tall to sit at these tables!

Poor Duncan!

After a minor knee injury, Duncan learned how to sew!

In the end, we had made a hat, and an ipod sock, and made good progress on our reversible bumpers.

It was the last day of class today, so we are all kind of silly!  Exams start tomorrow, and there’s nowhere better to study than at robotics!  Tonnes of helpful study buddies, and a big white board!

Best of luck to all K-bots writing exams in the next few days.  Study hard, then come and build robots.  There’s lots of work to do!