By Harlan Rose
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On Dec. 7, MHS’ FIRST Robotics team competed in the First Tech Challenge (FTC) competition for the first time. After many months of planning and building, the team was able to secure second place with robot 7851 “Sack-a-Rice” and tie for third with robot 7438 “Double Pastry” at the Hawaii regional competition.
“(Placing second) was a surprise, especially because this was our first year in (the FTC) competition,” said FIRST Robotics adviser Tyson Kikugawa, “We didn’t know what to expect, so it was a very pleasant surprise.”
The FTC competition serves as an introductory challenge to the upcoming FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC), allowing teams leeway and an extended 12 weeks of preparation. “(The teams) are given a game in the beginning of September and from there they get to design and build (a robot) using modular systems,” Kikugawa explained, “Basically they can go ahead and put something together and if they don’t like it they can take it apart, it’s very easy.” In contrast, the FRC only allots six weeks for preparation and teams are not allowed to take apart their robots.
Before the competition, the team spent many hours after school planning and building the robots. “(There was) lots of research and a lot of caffeine,” said Senior Joanna Hugo, “We were lucky enough that at one point Punahou even invited us to their shop and they helped us a lot. They lent us some very valuable parts that became integral to the overall design of the robot.” By the time of the competition, the team had successfully constructed a robot that was capable of completing several tasks, such as placing blocks in a basket, raising a flag and hanging from a pull-up bar.
However, the team faced many challenges during their construction. “(There was some) miscommunication, (a) lack of commitment and (we had trouble) staying focused,”
Hugo said. Junior Allan Ching added, “Our greatest (challenge) we really believe, was the fact that so many of our members had to leave us for personal reasons.”
The team entered two identical robots in the competition, codenamed “Double Pastry” and “Sack-a-Rice.” As the team worked their way up the ranks, they competed in numerous two-and-a-half-minute matches. The matches were divided into three parts: a 30-second autonomous period, where the robots ran on pre-installed programs and a two-minute, driver-controlled period, which included a 30-second “end game” where the teams could score the most points. “We concentrated on the end games (because) it was a good amount of points,” Ching said.
The team’s hard work paid off, as “Sack-a-Rice” placed second while “Double Pastry” tied for third. “As a rookie team, it felt amazing to even move on to the semifinals, and then we got second and third and all of our brains sort of erupted,” Hugo said. Ching added, “There were lots of (emotions), such as, ‘Yay, I can’t believe we made it!’”
After the competition, the team acknowledged that there were many areas they could improve in. “There were a lot of mistakes made and (the team understands) that if we can fix those mistakes there’s a chance we can do better,” Kikugawa said. Hugo added, “We had a bad case of ‘analysis paralysis’ and spent entirely too much time thinking when we should have been building and prototyping.”
The FIRST Robotics team is currently preparing for the upcoming FRC challenge, scheduled for February.
