Day 31

Even though the team had off today, we spent a couple hours in the shop cutting parts on the new CNC machine! I LOVE THIS THING! It is awesome. Here's some pictures of the first cuts!

Day 30

Today was a busy day. The first test cuts were made on the CNC mill! We are still waiting for the software to be shipped to Mr. Morrison before we can start cutting stuff, unfortunately the trial only lets you run test samples, and not generate your own tool paths. Tomorrow it comes in though! I spend most of today getting organized and making drawings. Every year we do a parts spreadsheet to keep track of each part we have to make to ensure we don't make duplicates or miss something. I'm in charge of that this year! I still have some more stuff to put in, but for the most part it's complete! After the meeting was over, myself and my boss went over to Micro to finish the intake side plates finalllllllly. They're taking forever just because of all the pocketing, I wish we had the software to generate the tool paths, then it would be cake! Soon enough. I also picked up the drivetrain parts from the powder coater, they look sooooooo sick! I love it when the coating comes out so glossy it still looks wet. Mr. Powdercoater is defiantly a master of his craft. Tomorrow we head into the shop around 3:30 after work to start cutting parts! Here's the media!

Father and son setting up the mill!

Remember that if you're using sprutcam, the trial version will only
run 5000 lines of code, and then stop!

3rd cup today 

CNC mill in action! 

Beautiful

 

Bossman making light work of the intake side plates.

Day 29

IT'S ALL TOGETHER! The cnc mill went together flawlessly, we're going to do the test cuts tomorrow, but other than set up and wire the machine, we put the chassis together, worked on machining the intake side plates and I brought the sheet metal to the powder coater! Mr. Powdercoater out of Bristol is an awesome, dedicated, and super smart guy, this is second year doing powder coating for us and I couldn't be happier! His dedication to our team is one you rarely find, he even comes out to the competitions to check out the completed robot! If you're in CT, and want some stuff coated, go to this guy. He's the man. Here's the pictures from today!

Pockets!

It's a dream come true!

I know some people will, under their breath of course, give us some flack for the CNC machine. But this was not given to us. Although the $10,000.00 for the machine was from a donation, we recieved the donation because of all we do for the city, and state. No one should think this machine was given to us, and every team can get to where we are now. You just have to work for it. It really grinds my gears when people complain about the teams that, "have it all". Suck it up, stop complaining, do some work, and you'll get there too. It took us 15 years to get to this point, it doesn't just happen overnight!

Day 28

IT HAS ARRIVED!!! I got a call about noon today saying the machine was at Maloney, we stopped by to put it all together! It's mechanically completed, Mr. Dutra just needs to wire 220 and 110 over to the machine, tomorrow we should be cutting parts! Also worked on the CAD a little today, it's starting to look like something!

#Dense

#Tormach

#MadeinChina

Day 27

Progress! I stayed after work today with my boss and we started machining the intake side plates for intake, we're about half way done. Pictures will be shown! We got half the drivetrain put together today, we had a little problems with our shaft not being captured in the gearbox shafts. I just machined a longer shafts and we pressed a bearing into the bottom of the ball shifts. It worked gloriously! We also started putting together the linear shooter! My dad also send me some pictures from the practice field in Southington, it's looking good! CNC MACHINE IS IN TOMORROW! PARTS GOING TO POWDER COAT SATURDAY, COMING BACK SUNDAY!

Orange for GUS! 

Pockets!

Mmm, CNC!

It looks the same, Saturday it'll be complete!

Day 26

Time's flying, but guess what?! SHEET METAL IS HERE! Our 3 sets of drivetrain sheet metal were dropped off around 3 after Dave from R&D came in! We spend today working on getting all of the spacers and standoffs machined so we can get this all together! We dry fitted everything today. We also started working on making our prototype straight shooter, I'm very hesitant, I don't think we'll get the speed we got with the round shooter, but if it's accurate, then I'll be happy. Here's the pictures from today! ALSO, I LOVE THE VEXPRO BALL SHIFTERS!

Day 25

Ahhh, my phone broke today. :[ My beloved iPhone has kicked the bucket, and unfortunately it isn't covered under warranty. Oh well, pay day is tomorrow, iPhone 5 here I come! Tonight we sat down and discussed changing our shooter. We were pretty set on having the, "half moon" shooter, but that is big, and lunky. We've cadded and are building a prototype linear shooter. It will give us a ton more room. I'm not totally convinced until we build it. It's getting late in the build season, so I think we're becoming our own worst enemy by changing stuff, but sometimes you have to do what you have to do. Iteration is everything.

I believe we have also figured out a way to set us apart from the majority of other teams and really give us a set up above everyone. When we are going to shoot we will drive up to the pyrimid, either go to the front of back rung with our hanger hooks up. We will grab or just push up against the tower to line our selves up, then fire. If we have buttons for preset heights, then it's just slam, bam, shoot. I like it, we need to work out the hanger, but it's getting close! We've also had an idea for a first stage gripper. It's just a cam the pinches the first horizontal bar and lifts us up, we have to play with it, but it's looking promising. I'll have drawings tomorrow! That's all for tonight, no phone, so no pictures. Sorry!

OH, THE CNC MILL IS COMING THIS FRIDAY!!! YAYYYYYY!!!!