Bright and early on the morning of January 7th, 2023 a motley crew of bright, intelligent teenagers embarked on a highly anticipated quest. Charged Upsm with sugar and caffeine our intrepid youngsters made the long…looooong journey to the campus of Oregon State University to witness the reveal of the 2023 First Robotics Competition game. This long-awaited event revealed the 2023 game, Charged Upsm presented by Haas.
The task assigned to the multifarious teams located around the globe was this:
Two competing alliances process game pieces to bring energy to their community. This is accomplished by retrieving game pieces from their Human player manning their substation and scoring them on their grid. In the final moments of each match, the alliances race to dock or engage with their charge station.
Each match commences with a 15-second autonomous period during which the robot completes the instructions programmed by the team. Hopefully, the programming instructs the robot to score points by leaving their community (and returning), retrieving, and scoring game pieces onto the grid, and finally docking on or engaging with their charge station.
During the final 2 minutes and 15 seconds of the match, the robot is controlled by the team’s driver. The driver attempts to wrest control away from the robot and score points by continuing to retrieve and place game pieces onto their grid and finally docking or engaging with their charging station.
The overreaching goal of each match is to score the most points and thus win.
The teenagers piled into their various conveyances and began the long trek back to their shop. Once there, they began the arduous task of conceiving, designing, painting, fabricating, and building their masterpiece.
For 6 grueling and arduous weeks these determined young people toiled to bring their creation to life. In a final burst of productivity Cubert was born.
This magnificent specimen of creativity and genius was the focus of all their hopes and dreams. But could such a humble robot bear this mighty load? Could it accomplish everything it needed to? There was only one way to find out.
In the final week before their first competition, there commenced much banging, twanging, coding, riveting, and copious amounts of duct tape. Finally, Cubert was functional. More or less.
On March 23rd, having spent many hours, days, and weeks accomplishing such a daunting task the team journeyed, bleary-eyed, to the magnificent town of Wilsonville, OR to strive against many other teams to determine who would take home the laurels.
Our heroes and their mighty robot battled tirelessly for 16 matches. There was much frantic duct taping, riveting, and hoping that Cubert would hold together and continue this endeavor.
After an exhausting weekend of battle, in which our budding robotics masters were the first pick of the 4th seat alliance and went 2-2 in the finals, the herd of nerds found themselves in 16th place with 32 district points. They finished with a record of 8-7-1.
Arriving back at the shop, the team carefully carried the injured robot into the shop for multitudinous repairs. The next two weeks were spent in a frenzy of reconstructing, rewiring, reprogramming, resuscitating Cubert to prepare it for its next mighty competition. There was also some much needed drive practice.
After losing count of how many hours they toiled to make Cubert into a stronger and more robust robot the team was able to lay down their tools and revel in the fruits of their labor.
Cubert once again stood proud and mighty.
Finally, the morning of March 23rd dawned bright and clear. With great care, Cubert was once again loaded into the trailer and carted southward to the Metropolis known as Salem, OR.
The work that was done to repair and reinforce Cubert was so well done that the team found themselves enjoying the competition instead of frantically scrambling to resuscitate their robot.
Besides the 14 matches they participated in, they enjoyed the many fun activities that were spontaneously happening.
There was much dancing, sweating, wearing of the costume of Connor the cow, sweating, watching other matches, and more sweating. It was a hot couple of days.
By the end of the competition, NerdHerd found themselves the first pick of the 8th seat alliance going 0-2 in the final matches and in 12th place with 23 district points and a record of 6-8-0.
After such an exciting yet exhausting weekend the team headed home.
Would their endeavors reward them with a coveted spot in the District Championship? They would have to wait for a fortnight to find out.
The answer was no.