DARC SIDE (6502) Robotics

“Under strict rules and limited time and resources, teams of high school students are challenged to build industrial-size robots to play a difficult field game”

FIRST Robotics Competition

DARC SIDE is a student run, nonprofit robotics team with a “work hard, play hard” mindset. Every aspect of the team is driven by students, from design to finance.

Rapid React | 2022 FRC Game

GOAL: Score as many points in 2 minutes and 30 seconds. Two points for every cargo (ball) in the hub. Points for climbing monkey bars separated both vertically and horizontally.

1 | Brainstorming

January 8th: The challenge for the 2022 season is released.

The next week is spent at whiteboards and with cardboard, brainstorming and building rough prototypes.

Fail fast and fail forward, a motto of the team, is the driving phrase of the week.

2 | Designing

After brainstorms have produced initial designs, the designs are transferred to Onshape, the CAD (Computer Aided Design) software we use. This process takes a couple weeks, during which proof-of-concept tests, prototyping, and iterating on previous designs continues to happen.

3 | Constructing & Testing

As soon as a subsystem is in CAD, it can be cut, constructed, and tested. In addition to mechanical assembly, electrical is added to the system and the robot is programmed.

Not everything goes smoothly. A week before the first competition - our spring break - the shooter is finally installed, and utterly fails at it’s task. A new one is designed, built and programmed, entirely over spring break.

4 | Competition

8 weeks is up, and it’s finally time for competition season. The competitions are electric - a mix between a sporting event and a hackathon.

Competition 1 | UNC Ashville:

  • Awarded Excellence in Engineering

  • Our alliance finishes second overall

Competition 2 | Guilford County:

  • Awarded the Spirit Award

  • Our alliances finishes second overall

Competition 3 | States @ Campbell University:

  • Awarded Innovation in Control

  • Finish 11th team in the state (out of ~70)

SpinShot

The Shooter
A 360 degree rotating shooter which both aims, spins up, and shoots at the press of a button. Using vision, an adjustable hood, and a fully rotatable turret, Spinshot was one of the top shooter in the state and after the first competition, was in the top 50 teams in the world when it came to scoring points by landing cargo in the hub.

The Drivetrain
Custom designed and built. This drivetrain utilized a West Coast layout, where each side is driven by two gearboxes. The gearboxes are belted to the wheels: three on each side.

The Intake
Intake is responsible for obtaining the pieces of cargo. It is driven by two pneumatic pistons and relies on a rubber roller and two rollers of mecanum wheels to grab the cargo and transport it into the robot.