2024 Fall Season Blog

Welcome back!

We are halfway through the Fall Season and we have been very productive in many projects and finishing tasks by the deadlines.

Our year started with Provisional Council (PC) meetings, where students selected by last year’s seniors and team managers planned the kickoff with presentations, workshops, and subteam selections. On the first day, we welcomed new members, reconnected with teammates, and honored the 11 graduating seniors. The first week focused on introducing new students to our community, rules, and expectations, with presentations and activities like scavenger hunts and engineering competitions. These helped us discover the talents and passions of new members while reconnecting with returning students.

Our Subteams: 

While team managers selected the new LC, students focused on subteam assignments. We welcomed 16 new first-year students, who initially had no subteam. They received a detailed tour, heard from returning students about their subteams, and learned about Programming (Software), CAD, Machining (Manufacturing), and Control Systems (Electrical and Driver Controls). Afterward, they selected their preferred subteams, and senior students carefully assigned them based on skills, experience, and space. After subteam members were announced, subteam training was a go! Our new LC immediately started teaching the first-years the fundamentals, and our veteran students a review of last year. Curious minds were at work, eagerly working hard and learning.

Programming:

First-year programmers were tested on their starting knowledge and then were faced with presentations and practice programming projects. Receiving mentorship and support from their fellow programmers and our software mentors. Most of the second years have now begun learning more advanced code that is used in Vision which encompasses April tags and object detection. Many also began to dive into our more specialized coding such as creating auto-routines for the autonomous period in the competition and into the complexity of coding our swerve drive-train.

CAD:  

The CAD subteam uses the new curriculum and training course from frcdesign.org to quickly bring first-years up to speed on what they need to know before the build season. They start with simple sketches and plates but work their way up to gearboxes and full subsystems so that they can make an impact with their CADs in fall projects and build season. Additionally, some of the CAD subteam is working on our elevator fall project in CAD and assembly so they can learn the whole process and identify any mistakes to take note of and fix. We also received a sponsorship from Polymaker, a 3d printer filament company, so we have been heavily using their filaments to stock up on parts such as pulleys and create robust parts for the fall projects. Overall, the CAD team is looking great this year and we can’t wait for build season!

Control Systems:

On the opposite side of our room, in the workshop, our control system students were being taught how to crimp wires, test batteries, and test motors. They were taught and then quizzes on amps and volts, later learning how to use our test beds that we made last year. They also got to participate in the yearly tradition of naming one of the 12 new batteries that we purchase every year.

Machining:

Last but not least, our machinists were having fun learning how to perform different manual operations on machines such as the Lathe, Mill, and Belt-Sander in our industrial-grade machine shop(Our favorite place to hang out). They also received a lecture on CAM, a manufacturing software that machinists need to know how to use our CNC Router by Tormach. In CAM, machinists create operations that will be performed on the CNC–where we create most of our tubing and bigger more complex parts. The experienced students, Piper and Alex, started training to learn how to operate and use the CNC safely, all while helping our newer machinists. Overall our new machinists were tasked with creating 2 parts that were known as “widgets” and with practicing CAMing for their two CAMing quizzes.

Goodbye for now! See you in the next blog!