It was an exciting week of robotics competitions at the Greater Kansas City Regional!  Winnovation was awarded with the Excellence in Engineering Award, for our six wheel swerve drive (a first in FIRST Robotics), powerful kicking mechanism, and arm system that allows the robot to be suspended from a tower in the middle of the playing field. 

The tower is in the process of being welded and the frame has been returned from welding. The auxiliary is being attached to the frame. The end game piece construction has been started. In trials, the auxiliary has been successful. Halfway through build season our goals for week four are to have a completed tower, and to have a moving bot! Thanks to everyone for bringing great food!

Parts were sent out to be water jetted and the frame was welded for the chassis. The auxiliary was prototyped and the field bumps and goals were completed. The team went out to assist the Oregon RoboHawks, team 2364, with programming and design ideas. We also checked on the Boone County 4-H Robotics, team 3352 (rookies to FIRST Robotics) that we are mentoring this year.

This season's game will be played with two alliances of three teams each. The game is played on a field that is separated into three sections by two bumps. At the end of the field are two goals. The object of the game is to utilize the robots to score goals using soccer balls.

The January issue of Servo Magazine has just been issued and features members of the Winnovation Robotics team, John Ratzenberger, and Snuggles the Robot.

The following is an updated calendar of events for the Winnovation Robotics Team 2010 Season:

January 9th: Build Season Kick Off

February 19th: Parents work basketball concession stand

February 20th: Students present FIRST Robotics information at SIT Conference in DeKalb

The primary goal of this year was to manipulate track balls that are 40 inches in diameter and inflatable. The game was played on a track with an overpass over top of it. The track balls started on top of the overpass.