Great weekend! Despite a lack of sleep after our Friday meeting that lasted until 2am, we were able to compete respectably at Snow Day Showdown with our brand new robot, Aviator. We started a little shakily, but were able to iron out problems and help our alliance win the scrimmage!   We thank our friends the Nanogurus for picking us as an alliance partner.   We also won the PTC design award. A big thank you to the ridiculous amount of volunteers and to the scrimmage host, Team Mercury!

We want to thank all the people who helped pull off the Frozen Frenzy, but especially our friends the Lancers. We were able to host an event with 24 teams, versus the 8 – 10 that we were going to be able to do at DeVry, and the Lancers’ help and graciousness made the event much better than we could have done on our own (especially the fog machine).

We want to congratulate the Lancers for being the captain of the winning alliance and our old friends the Landroids for winning the Inspire award.

We were also really glad that so many of the rookie teams we have helped were able to attend and qualify, like the Onions, Mad Scientists, Mount St. Mary, Nanogurus, and Timothy Tigers. It made it a very special for us when they got into the State Championship at our tournament (except the Tigers who qualified at an earlier event, but would have gotten in again).

I also want to officially thank Watt the Hex. This was really put on by three teams, Lancers, Say Watt?, and Watt the Hex. They were out there, setting up, decorating, volunteering, and I forgot to credit them as well.

Today marked the first of the Pennsylvania State Qualifiers for the 2010-2011 FTC season. Both Say Watt and their sister team, Watt The Hex, attended and competed for a handful of spots in the Pennsylvania State Championship in March. After five matches per team in qualification rounds, Watt The Hex stood as the only undefeated team (1st place), while Say Watt tailed close behind with a single loss (3rd place). Watt the Hex chose Say Watt as their alliance partner.

During the second round of the finals, the alliance realized that they would quickly fall behind if they did not attempt something radical. Right before trying to balance in the end game with only two robots and a single rolling goal, the Say Watt robot backed off to retrieve the second rolling goal, completing the set of four items. After several painful seconds of nudging and small movements, and fear of the board breaking as we got further and further from the center, the team succeeded in their goal and took the win.

Shortly after the match’s conclusion, it was announced that this was the first time all four objects were balanced at the same time during any of the qualification events. Finally, during the third round of the finals, the two teams even succeeded in accomplishing the same task again, bringing them to another victory.

Watt the Hex left with the Captain of the Championship Alliance award and the Think Award. Say Watt left with the Championship Alliance award and the Inspire Award.

It has been a busy few weeks. On Nov 6, we were at North Brunswick for the Brunswick Eruption. Say Watt teamed with the Landroids to win the mini-scrimmage. Watt The Hex lost to the Timothy Tigers and their alliance partner, so no matter who Say Watt went up against, it was one of the teams we were helping. Watt The Hex had the most dramatic match with a three-robot autonomous pile-up in the elimination round that cost the Tigers a motor. Watt the Hex and their partner graciously donated their timeout while the Tigers were frantically trying to replace the burned out motor (their timeout was insufficient). Unfortunately, when the Tigers had their robot working, they beat Watt the Hex and advanced to face Say Watt? Good job Tigers!

Last weekend, Watt the Hex participated in the CT Robot Rally. We had a 5:30AM departure time and a long road trip, but we had fun. They have very different robots in Connecticut. The trip up was a lot of fun. Watt The Hex again had the most dramatic match of the event. After their autonomous mode failed, the robot was able to score in the rolling goal despite an opposing robot trying to knock the rolling goal away and hitting Tankbot. In a blow against the early balancing that has been happening in many matches, they went up and pushed the two opposing teams off the bridge (before the final 30 seconds). The other robots were unable to get back on the bridge and after dispensing a few batons (but dropping them) Team 4311 just barely made it to its bridge for balancing. It was tremendous fun to watch, versus the matches where the two teams balance and drop their controllers for the last 90 seconds.

Two of the rookie teams we are helping were at the Ambler PA event. Congratulations to Team 4080 and their partner for winning the event and an invitation to the NJ State tournament!

Now we are getting ready to face Pope John and the other teams at the Blue Bell, PA qualifier on Saturday. Old times – Pope John versus Say Watt?… We will see if it happens again.

Last Sunday, October 24, Say Watt attended the New Jersey Science and Engineering Festival at Clifton High School. This was the first actual qualifying event in New Jersey. In addition to helping new teams with their code and hardware, Say Watt managed to win first place as the captain of an alliance, with much help from its partner, Team 248, Fatal Error.

Two judged awards were also given out at the event (Motivate and Innovate). Say Watt won the Innovate award.

You can find out more about this event in the newspaper article posted here.

Last Saturday, October 23, Say Watt visited a local group of Boy Scouts to discuss FTC robotics. The Boy Scouts are adding a new badge that is related to robotics, so we decided to show them what it’s all about. We let them drive our competition robot from last season, while one of the FLL teams we mentor demonstrated one of their FLL robots.

More information on the event can be found in this newspaper article.

Say Watt went to the first practice day of the year on October 16, right along the Delaware River.  We had a ton of fun teaching classes on the PTC software system, and hardware design, in addition to assisting in the RobotC programming class.  We also assisted with mechanical engineering for teams that didn’t help throughout the event.

We particularly enjoyed seeing Team 4080, The Robo Kings from New York, at the event.

We look forward to this upcoming weekend, with another FTC Scrimmage at the NJ Science & Engineering Festival.