FIRST 2008

New Jersey Regional Competition
Trenton, NJ
Sovereign Bank Arena
2/29/2008 - 3/1/2008

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Attending the New Jersey regional was a real treat for me, and an educational experience because this was the first competition I had seen. There were 63 teams present. The qualifying rounds were all day Friday and half of Saturday. Then after lunch on Saturday, the top 16 teams were in the semifinals. In the finals were 6 teams comprising two alliances, and they competed in "best 2 of three matches." In the end, the alliance with Team 103 easily won the matches. The Cybersonics robot was fast, agile, and literally threw the ball over the overpass while speeding around the course. It was quite a clever mechanism because Team 103 was fastest at acquiring the Trackball and tossing it over. Other robots struggled to acquire the Trackball, but Team 103 seemed to grab the ball easily. I posted 4 videos at the bottom of this page, in case you want to see how the Cybersonics 103 robot "throws" the Trackball over the overpass. By the way, these videos are from the finals, with the six best teams on the track. These teams were experienced in driving, so these videos show the robots. During the qualifying rounds on Friday, I had 2 observations. First, only about half the teams had programmed the autonomous mode, so during the first 15 seconds, only a few of the 6 robots on the course even moved. Second, I was surprised how difficult driving was for most. Except for the most advanced teams, many of the robots were difficult to control, crashed into walls, turned the wrong way, etc. Most teams need lots more driving practice AND better control programming.
Here are some of the carts, most of which are waist-high:
			socks make the uniform
Check out these wheels and designs; also one of the "pits" all fancy designed...


Here are some of the robots being worked on in the PIT. Check out the various designs.




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In the pits: NASA's mobile machine shop is available to all in need:


Changeover
		There were 23 judges, including Dean's brother Dr. Bart Kamen

FIRST people




VIDEOS from the finals (click the WATCH button)

20MB Watch 25 throw the ball over	26MB In this clip, 103 throws and misses! (a rare error)	Watch 25 toss the red ball over. 12MB This video is the smallest.	56MB End of the finals. See 103 really throw the ball. Note that one robot has fallen over... And 25 misses a shot, then recovers and scores.

Pictures I took of potential sponsors from Data Inc. in Montvale (George Nikanorov)

New Jersey Regional Competition Trenton, NJ Sovereign Bank Arena 2/29/2008 - 3/1/2008

New Jersey Regional Competition
Trenton, NJ
Sovereign Bank Arena
2/29/2008 - 3/1/2008