2007 FIRST Robotics Challenge: Rack and Roll

For this past year's event the goal for the robots was to team with two other robots and place inner tubes on an octagonal rack to attain points. The game is made up of two scoring periods. The first period is Autonomous lasting 15 seconds. In the autonomous period, robots try to place a "Keeper" tube on one of the spider legs of the Rack using a color vision tracking system to find one of the four target lights at the top of the rack. Once placed, a "Keeper" tube may not be removed or "Spoiled."

During the second period, the robots are driver controlled. In this period the teams will attempt to score more points by using the robots to add "Ringers" onto the spider legs or by "Spoiling" the opposing teams score by placing a black tube over the "Ringer." Points are earned and scored exponentially by the number of consecutive Ringers and Keepers in a column or row.

Alliances may score additional points if, by the end of the match, their robots are in their home zone and have been lifted off the floor by 4" or more by another robot before the final buzzer sounds.

When our team decided on how we should design the robot, we agreed to focus our attention on the lifting aspect of the game more than on the tube placing part. Due to the nature of the different kinds of tubes and the scoring methods the extra sixty points at the end of the game proved to be vital in our team winning most of our matches. In the end, our robot was not the best tube placer, and possibly not the best lifter (although it was exceptional), but it did both tasks really well.

Game Animation