As the 2017 season ended, we wanted to pursue an offseason project that would both increase our robot building skills and our robots’ performances. We talked with mentors and alumni then found a common problem throughout our 18-year history: our robots are perennially overweight. To fix this problem we decided to build a “West Coast Drive Train”. Our preliminary calculations show that this will drop 5-10 pounds off our overall weight!!! However, to build the drive train we first had to design it, and to do that we had master CAD. Fortunately, we had alumni Jake Duesk and help from Graeme Wilson to teach us CAD. Under Jake’s leadership, we created our summer and winter CAD Academy. These classes taught us Solidworks which proved vital in our drive train design process. Once we learned the basics of Solidworks we moved into designing the drive train and now have a somewhat functional prototype.

Our FTC season has wrapped up. We were happy to house St. Charles team 10342 into the lab as well as our own two teams 360 & 3860. They all did really well and made us proud.

Finally, we would also like to thank everyone who has generously contributed to the Robotics Endowment and to all donors. The team recognizes how much these donations help sustain our program. Furthermore, we have recently received considerable grants from Grainger and Best Buy that will help to support new tool acquisition and robot kits for summer camps.