Kick Off Event

  After two months of training and waiting, the 2016 FRC game was finally released today and the build season has begun! This year's game is Stronghold. The objective of the game is to capture the opponents' tower. This is done by shooting boulders(ten inch foam balls) into the towers' windows and "weaken" the tower for capture. During the match, robots must go through game obstacles called "barriers", which include driving across rough terrain, over ramps, opening gates and bringing down draw bridges. The game is explained in more details in the video below, check it out!

  After watching the live stream, students downloaded the game manual and immediately got to work! Students split up into three groups and spent the next five hours analyzing the game rules, arena, game objects, scoring, and coming up with strategies and designs. At the end, the team got a rough idea of what the robot should be able to do and the overall strategy.

  The Kit of Parts came in after the brainstorming session and the team was excited to open up the new shiny components. For the last hour and a half, members got into their work groups and began working on their specialized tasks. The mechanical team started assembling the chassis kit that came with the kit of parts. The electrical student team captain took the electrical team through the tools they will be using and the team prepared two batteries and started preparing the electronic board. The programming team downloaded and updated FRC programs for the 2016 season. They also worked on the website and put up more content.

  As a new team, we are very excited to participate in FRC this year. We hope to have a very fun and memorable experience as we spend the next six weeks building a robot together. We will be competing at Battle Creek Lakeview on March 10th - 12th, and at East Kentwood on March 31 - April 2nd.