Robot Squad Takes Show On The Road

The students of the Elm City Robo Squad (Team 558) spent the past weekend battling robots from all over the state and beyond.

Team 558, based out of Hill Regional Career High School, competed on Saturday and Sunday in the FIRST Robotics New England District Waterbury Competition at Wilby High School.

It was a grueling two-day set of meets. And the team made it to the quarter-finals.

I was honored to travel with the team — and kept a log while learning what actually happens at a robotics competition.

6:50 a.m. The last of the team of about 25 came aboard the school bus. Career science teacher Cynthia Scheetz did a headcount while collecting the last of the permission slips from the students.

“We’re ready to go,” Scheetz said as the bus driver prepared to pull away.

7:12 a.m. The two co-captains, Hailey Vaught, 17 and Krishna Patel, 17, handed out breakfast: donuts.

7:38 a.m. ​“We’ve got to get a good place in the stands,” said Scheetz five minutes before the team arrived at the Waterbury competition.

I learned some background on the FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC). Generally, matches would have three components to them: a ball toss, a climb, and a color wheel (though very few teams would attempt the color wheel obstacle this competition). Each team would compete in 10 to 12 qualification matches. Each match would run for two-and-a-half minutes — starting with a 15-second autonomous mode, during which the team would not be able to touch any of the robot’s controls; it would operate only on pre-programming. After the 15 seconds was up, the team would be able to take control of the robot until the end of the match.

During the game on Saturday, Team 558 would have a drive team of people controlling its robot: a driving coach, base driver Abdul Elrefael, operator Syed Ardhi, and human player Patel. All of them were new to the drive team— including the drive coach, Joshua Miller. Juan Boone would act as technician.

8:24 a.m. While suiting up its robot, the pit crew answered some questions from another team, which was pit scouting.

“Do you guys play defense?” asked one competitor. Team member Carlos Oyuel answered with a yes while going into detail about the robot’s sturdy design and weight advantage.

Team 558’s robot weighed 124.8 pounds — just under the limit of 125 pounds for the competition. It was equipped with eight heavy-duty wheels and two main game operations: aiming and shooting balls and climbing. Most of its parts were made of aluminum and polycarbonate. The team used four pneumatic wheels on each side after receiving from the FRC the layout and measurements of the playing field they would be competing on; the wheels would be needed to get over some 1 1/8 inch bumps on the field.

The big robot was a departure from previous years. ​“We usually aim for a smaller robot so it can be easier to maneuver and faster,” Vaught said.

This year marked the team’s 20th year participating in the FRC. Not long ago the team motto had been ​“from the basement beyond,” because when getting established, the team hadn’t had a robotics room to work in, so they were based out of Career’s basement. With the acquisition of a robotics rooms, the team motto became ​“family, school, robots.”

This year, the team worked on its robot after school on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, building it in six weeks. Team members equipped the robot with a climbing mechanism — although the school’s robotics room didn’t have a bar for the team to test the feature. Former Career physics teacher and senior mentor Ernest Smoker counted over 15 years working with the team; he still mentored the team even after leaving Career. 

Saturday would see teams compete in 54 matches; the remaining 26 would be played on Sunday. The top eight competitors would then go head to head in playoffs.

Qualification Matches

9:35 a.m. The team brought the robot on the field to calibrate its limelight sensor, which helped the robot aim and shoot accurately. ​“In the shop on Saturday, the shot was money,” said Smoker.

10:05 a.m. All drive teams met on the field. The FRC officials talked with the teams about the match rules.

11:25 a.m. Team 558 brought its robot out from the pit and into the waiting area for its first match.

11:55 a.m. The team started its first match and won, despite the robot’s climbing mechanism failing during the last 30 seconds.

During the qualifying matches, designated team members scouted other teams’ robots. A group of six watched each robot during the qualification matches, tracking the robots’ strengths and weaknesses.

Scheetz described Achievement First Amistad High School’s team, known as The Fun Gang (7869), as Career’s stepchild. Career and Amistad were the only competing teams from New Haven and helped each other regularly. Scheetz’s team also worked closely with the Milford Rookies, team 8085, from Jonathan Law High School and Foran High School.

Members of the Fun Gang and Team 8085 helped Career’s team scout during the competition.

12:05 p.m. Team 558 made adjustments to its robot in the waiting area, as the robot’s next match would be only three games after its first. The team switched the robot’s bumper and attempted to fix its climber.

“Someone go get the scotch tape,” said Smoker.

“It sucks that you guys have two matches back to back, but you guys are handling it. Before you go back out there, take a deep breath,” said former drive coach Andrew Morrison.

1:00 p.m. The team’s climber failed to release again during its second match of the day.

1:05 p.m. Two judges stopped by the team’s pit station to ask questions about what adjustments they were making to the robot and how their first two matches went. The team of seniors talked with the judges for 15 minutes before getting back to work.

2:41 p.m. Team 558 got its first climb of the day in its third match.

The robot’s climbing mechanism was equipped with two polycarbonate hooks that lifted into the air to reach a climbing bar when released by the operator. The hooks were Velcroed to a pole that also was supported by a strong wire rope. When the hooks attached to the climber bar, the velcro detached from the weight, leaving it to the rope to continue to hold the robot off the ground for a successful climb — and 25 points added to the team’s match score.

The team in the stands erupted with cheers and applause.

“We sacrificed the Velcro,” said Smoker.

2:58 p.m. The team won its third match and moved up to ninth place.

3:03 p.m. Vaught made a round to some team members with one of the team’s favorite snacks: cough drops. Each teammate picked a cough drop from the bag to see the fate of the team. Picking Pink grapefruit would mean good luck. Orange would suggest a 50/50 chance. Yellow lemon would mean chances were not looking so good.

On Vaught’s round, everyone picked either a pink or orange cough drop, leaving the team hopeful.

4:00 p.m. With the help of some scotch tape, Velcro, and zip ties, the team made some minor adjustments before its next match. The pit crew replaced the climbing hook, switched bumpers, got a fresh battery, and lowered the robot’s ball-collecting mechanism so it could pick up balls on the field more easily.

6:08 p.m. Balls fell out of the robot after it collected them during matches. The team added a rubber-like elastic to each side of the robot’s ball collector to create a basket for balls to stay in place when picked up.

7:25 p.m. The team took a loss for its last match and dropped to 17th place.

This competition was the drive team’s first chance working together. Miller said after the Saturday matches he gained confidence in the team’s prospects for Sunday. ​“We’re really using this competition to smoothen out our controls as a brand new drive team,” Miller said.

Before stepping up to be drive coach, Miller worked with the team for two years on scouting during competitions. He realized he was interested in coaching the drive team when he temporarily coached last year during an off-season competition.

Miller had first encountered Team 558 years ago, when he was a part of Southington High School’s Team 195. After graduating high school and while still attending the University of Connecticut, he decided to become a mentor for Team 558.

Day 2

Team 558 played its final three qualification matches to start day two of the competition off. All told, on Saturday Team 558 played in 12 qualification matches and finished with four wins and eight losses, ending up 25th out of the 35 competing teams. 

When the qualification matches ended. the top eight teams began alliance selection to make alliances of three.

1:41 p.m. Team 558 was selected by the sixth alliance captain — the Tornadoes (Team 7314) from Franklin High School in New Hampshire. To complete the alliance, the 2nd Law Enforcers from Farmington were selected.

2:30 p.m. Alliance Six began its first match but took a loss.

The quarter-final was a double-elimination tournament, giving Alliance Six one more chance to compete for the semifinals. Team 558 cheered for their rookie peers, Team 8085, chanting ​“Blue Alliance” while clapping along.

3:08 p.m. Alliance Six prepared for its last quarterfinal match. Team 558 didn’t have enough time to reset its robot’s climber, leaving it released while on the field. As officials made adjustments to the field, the team asked to get back on to zip-tie the released climber before the match started. The team’s question went from the referee to an event volunteer to the field inspector, who gave the team permission to adjust its robot on the field.

Morrison rushed to the pit to get extra zip ties, then handed them off to Miller to secure the released climber.

But the team was able to skip out on the zip ties altogether, as it was given the time to completely reset the robot and its climber.

In the team’s second quarter-final match, two of the three robots of Alliance Six climbed the obstacle, but only one robot was counted; officials determined that the second hanging robot was balanced on a ball. The alliance lost its final match, making it ineligible to move onto the semi-finals.

Despite the loss, Team 558 remained happy for Team 8085 of Alliance Two, which made it to the semi-finals.

3:40 p.m. As officials worked with technical difficulties, the commentators led the crowd in a rochambeau tournament. Pairs played rock, paper, scissors; then the winners faced off on the field until it came down to two. Among the final two was Ardhi, whose team cheered him from the stands. In two quick games, Ardhi was named the winner of the tournament.

“I got my win,” Ardhi said.

The playoffs continued. Team 8085 moved on to the finals to face the top-ranked alliance.

The first finals match was played, and Alliance One took the win.

4:35 p.m. The audience and volunteers took a dance break to groove along to the Cupid Shuffle.

The second finals match was played, and Alliance One took the win again, making them the champions of the competition.

5:15 p.m. An awards ceremony started with the recognition of the Woodie Flowers Award nominees, an award for impactful mentors of teams. This year the team nominated Scheetz to receive the award, which was said to be announced at a later FRC.

5:35 p.m. Team 558 was given the Gracious Professionalism Award for their consistent help with all other teams.

The next stop for Team 558: NE District Hartford Event, on April 3 – 5.