Their Custom Robot’s Tournament Debut is March 15-17

Over the last couple of months, we’ve been following the progress of the RoboBlazers as they make their way to the FIRST Robotics Competition. 

There’s still much work to do before the first tournament of the season. But we’re celebrating some big milestones they achieved in the last few weeks:

• Powering up - robot turn-on day was a success! It’s always thrilling when the students turn on the robot they designed, built, and programmed for the first time. Of course, there are some minor details to work out. 
• Electrical team - wiring the robot took about a week to complete. As most engineers know, you can’t put wires anywhere — they must be carefully planned to be accessible, yet protected from damage. The team also had to adhere to FIRST’s rules about how the robots are wired to ensure safety. 
• Mechanical team - the mechanical build is complete except for assembling the climb mechanism and finishing constructing the bumpers. The team’s efforts in CAD made the robot assembly much easier than in previous years. They anticipate minor tweaks because of the work and detail that went into the front end of the design.
• Drive team - drivers have been hard at work using a practice bot to toss notes onto the stage poles as part of the Crescendo game they will be competing in.
• Programming team - with the robot build nearly finished, the programming team put their coding to the test. They already discovered some minor issues with a mechanism and resolved them together. Next up, finalizing the autonomous routines that must be perfect before the tournament. 

Their Enthusiasm & Effort Goes Beyond the Robot Build

Outside of the actual building, programming, and testing of the robot in this short timeframe, these students also took part in:

• Advocacy - one of the RoboBlazers recently testified before the Indiana Senate Education Committee in support of HB1233. This bill would make robotics more accessible to teams and schools through expanded funding.
• Self-promotion - many team members have also been busy promoting the RobBlazers on social media, as well as designing t-shirts, banners, buttons, and pit giveaways for the big event. They also prepared for post-award interviews.
• Scouting - like other sports, FIRST tournaments give teams the chance to scope out the competition. The RoboBlazers are part of a scouting alliance and have a strategic plan in place to track how well other robots are doing and share this information with other participating teams.

Whew! It isn’t quite go-time yet, but MCC is proud of the teamwork and dedication this team has already shown. 

We’re confident the RoboBlazers will do well at the first tournament on March 15-17. Stay tuned for details on how they did!