36 posts tagged with "build season"

• Autoangle Test (Serena, Nigel): These two tested code for autoaligning with the reef. It works.
• Distance sensor Stuff (Mowi, Griffin): Programmed a thing that makes smart dashboard blink green when sensors activate.
• Other sensor stuff (Davey, Xiaohan): These two finalized the list of sensors we need to send to Build.
• Elevator Stuff (Davey, Me): We finished the early elevator code. We still need to add a distance sensor.
• PID Loops (Rowan): The PID loops are finished.
• Drive pathing (Zack): Zack started a drive pathing project.

I have a headache.

Chris and I ended up working on other things than porting this over, so there's going to be a few more updates here.

• PID Looping (Me, Rowan, Griffin, Davey): All of us worked on adding PID loops and constants to the various subsystems.
• Swerve cleanup (Me, Rowan): The swerve drive code has now been altered for improved readability.
• Reef Lineup (Xiaohan, Nigel, Serena): These three continued working on the code to automatically align the robot with the reef.
• Auto Configuration (Serena): Serena did some experimentation in pathplanner.
• Reef Sensor Work (Griffin): Griffin finished the close-in reef sensor and alignment code.

I really, really hope we can switch sites next week.

Starting on Saturday, updates will be moving to the regular team blog. Anyway, things that happened today:

• Swerve drive refit (Me, Griffin): I improved the swerve drive code, continuing a project I was working on in the off season.
• Auto testing (Davey, Mowi): Davey and Mowi did PID tuning and made some auto paths using the new software.
• Third limelight testing (Rowan): We now have a limelight program that works with a third limelight.
• Alignment work (Griffin): Griffin made a system that lets us align the robot with poles on the Reefscape field.
• Skeleton work (Nigel): Nigel made some very basic subsytem stuff.
• Other alignment work (Xiaohan): Xiaohan made some other code to help us line up with the reef.

See you over there.

Hello. Sorry about the lack of updates for the past several months, but there have been talks about not using Docusaurus anymore. The primary concerns are the requirements of pulling code to VScode and knowledge of Markdown. If this happens, the blog will likely die. I did not want to upload things that would get deleted in a few short months anyway, and no one else uses this without prompting because of the above issues. Anyway, there will likely be one more post covering the training season in broadest forms, and then a cancellation announcment (with a link to the new p-log if that plan pans out). Anyway, things that happened today:

• Updating (all): New season means new software updates, so we spent the first chunk of practice dealing with that. Most of us updated computers, but Griffin handled the limelights and Xiaohan did RoboRios.
• 2025 Skeleton (Nigel, Mowi): These two started working on the skeleton of the new robot.

Maybe something more?

This post is so named because I actually was to be in the gym while the robot was being tested. And what a test it was.

• Voltage & Current Limiters (Me, Griffin): It was noticed that the robot was having brownout issues due to the sheer number of motors and subsystems, so we were assigned to do something about it. This meant making bits of code that would display the voltages and currents, and then making limiters that would stop the various motors from drawing too much power. It should also be noted that I called this around week 2 when I did the math and realised that the robot would have around 16 motors.
• General Testing (Rowan, Serena, Xiaohan, Zach): These four were using the robot for most of practice. They managed to make a path that would let us consistently score in the amp and finished it right after dinner. Then they came down to the practice field to make a number of tests. The main one was odometry, which took a large chunk of time.

Also Griffin and I got bored so we went outside and played catch with one of the spare notes for about 10-15 minutes.

Hello again. This is the last proper week of build season. We have practice tomorrow and Thursday to get everything done, week 0 is on Saturday, then it's just Tuesday and then Duluth. Orpheus and Euridyce should be ready by then.

• Intake Testing (Xiaohan, Rowan): One of the intake motors burned out and needed to be replaced. We tested it to make sure. Then later in the day the offsets needed to be altered again.
• Climber Work (Rowan, Serena): A lot of testing was done on the climber limits. It was also made faster.
• Logging Tests (Serena, Me): Serena set up a system to let us log all of the motor data, and I did a very brief test towards the end of practice.
• Auto Work (Me, Zach, Rowan, Xiaohan): Zach and I worked on autonomous stuff. Specifically updating the autos because we learned that they couldn't just use the default commands. So we needed to make sure that every single auto turned on the intake and shooter and had shoot commands in the proper places. Zach dealt with a lot of it. Then most of the autos were actually tested
• Bumper Work (Griffin, Davey): These two went to go work on bumpers for today due to lack of things to do.

It appears that despite my sucessors, I shall be making most blog posts for a while longer. For I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep.

(Sleep in this context means graduating and thus leaving the team.)

Today we shall learn the names of the robots. Our two options will either be Purple Rain and Delirious or Orpheus and Euridyce. I am voting for the former. Despite that, there were only a few things that happened today. On that list was:

• General Robot Work (Rowan, Zach, Xiaohan, Serena): We got to bring the robot to the practice field, and there was a lot that had to be made ready. Wiring, tuning, rearranging the CAN network because they got merged at some point, making sure the intake limelight had a working neural net, the works. Also messing with limit switches.
• Shooter PID Work (Me, Rowan, Chris [M]): As part of the testing it was decided that we needed a feedforward PID system to make sure the shooter wouldn't be pulled down by gravity. This took like an hour of Chris and I struggling with various encoder types before Rowan came over and solved the problem in about ten minutes. I'm glad that Rowan is the captain instead of me.
• Bumper Work (Davey and I): The bumper construction team required assistance, and we obliged. I only worked with them in the morning, Davey stayed during the whole practice.

Just four more practices until Duluth.

Today was a bit of a disaster. One of the intake motors started smoking (this is bad for you, don't smoke). The programming room smelled like burning tape, which is a lot worse than burning hair.

• Canceled task (Zack and I): We were going to set up the gym for testing Moirai but build stole her permanently.
• Shooter angle (Augie, Rowan, and Serena): worked on testing the shooter angle math.
• Wireing and such (Xiaohan):They worked in build with wiring and other stuff Rowan said he's good at. Also he (maybe) fixed the practice bot! This is great news.
• Hall effect (Griffin): He worked on testing the hall effect sensor (I am not really sure what this is).
• Limelights (me): My new job was to make the limelights on the practice bot have the correct values for something. I'm not exactly sure what. I also wrote all over the white boards in Orbonian glyphs. This was not exactly important but it made me feel better.

Side note: having itchy eyes sucks. Side Side note: It snowed last night. That was weird because it has not snowed most of the winter.

Davey is the new music person. Also I have a headache again.

• LED Work (Davey and I): The first chunk of practice was spent trying to find LEDs to test the code with. After learning that none of the LED strips had working adapters, we decided to go look for Moira's old sponsor board. This took us to the backend of the gym closet twice, all over the shop, and at the end we learned that the board had probably been thrown out. Then we tried to jury-rig together a working adapter before Chris showed up with definetly working LED strips, which had to have a jury-rigged adapter anyway. Then we tried to test the code and the Vera-be-damned thing tried to call LED 204. We only had 52 lights in the code. This turned out to be because we were creating one less LED in the code than actually existed (that number was 24 by the way) and then tried to call the last LED which according to the code didn't exist. After dinner we discovered that error and fixed it, before finally getting the lights to work. Then we learned that we could have just used the functional lights branch that hadn't been merged with main yet. By that point I was willing to call it quits, but we kept going and even got the lights to actually respond to the code.
• Button Binding Work (Zach, Griffin): These two made a new button diagram and re-bound all the buttons so that everything works. They also added a bunch of things to Smart Dashboard.
• Collect Note Work (Rowan, Serena): Debugging is occuring on the collect note command. That is all Serena will tell me.

That is all.

Can someone who is not me write a blog post for once? Every time I am out sick for whatever reason no post gets made. i might need to just start adding 'write a blog post' to the list of things to do. Anyway, things that happened today:

• Distance Sensor Work (Me, Rowan): I spent most of practice working on a distance sensor. This involved soldering a lot of thingas, fighting with CAN errors before learning that the fleeming thing was unplugged, and then Rowan moved everything from the intake to the indexer. Also we accidentally turned on preferences that weren't supposed to be on and had to do some work to fix them.
• Limelight Work (Xiaohan, Act of Liam): The limelight that broke yesterday is fixed.
• Lights Work (Rowan, Zach): The first chunk of practice was apparently spent dealing with a github error. By the end of the day the lights were finished.
• Move 1 Meter (Serena, Davey, Griffin): The 1-meter auto is in progress. Apparently part of the issue was wheel diameter, which was re-measured and now the robot moves almost one meter. It does still consistently undershoot.

I have convinced Rowan to add 'write the blog post' to the list of things to do each day.