2006 Season | 2007 Season | 2008 Season
Rookie Year -- 2006 Season
In 2006, Edina High School junior Chris Miller, with a nucleus of friends, formed a robotics team at the high school for the purpose of competing in FIRST Robotics competitions. Chris, who served as the team’s captain, applied for and received a $6,000 grant from NASA as seed money for the team. This provided enough funding to attend the kickoff meeting outside of Milwaukee, WI in January and to receive our initial kit of parts and instructions about the competition game for the year, “Aim High.” The Edina team, one of 1,025 teams from around the world competing as part of the FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) in 2006, was assigned the team number 1816, which will be the team number as long as there is an Edina team. The team adopted the name “The Green Machine."
During our rookie season (2006) about 16 Edina students from Edina’s high school and middle schools collaborated to design, build, and field a 5-foot tall robot. Lacking a workshop space, the team built the robot in the newly remodeled kitchen in the home of Chris Miller’s father. Besides NASA, our major sponsors in 2006 were Medtronic, Inc., and the Edina Education Fund. Their support helped us to have a memorable rookie season. At the Wisconsin Regional Competition in Milwaukee our robot’s strong consistent defense helped us get selected to be an alliance partner of two strong teams, Team #111 Wildstang and Team #1625 Winovation – and together we were winners of the Wisconsin Regional Championship in mid-March. This victory qualified us for the Championship Competition, and after scrambling to raise money for the registration fees, the team was on its way to Atlanta, GA! There, we finished the qualifying rounds as the 6th seed out of the 85 teams in the Archimedes Division and were able to advance to the quarterfinals. Although suffering a hard-fought defeat there, we did win the Highest Rookie Seed Award, as well as several peer-to-peer awards including Best Alliance Partner, Most Creative Design, and Best Rookie Team.
2007 Season
In 2007, it was all about building upon our rookie year achievements. The team had greatly expanded since the end of the last season, growing to include 33 Edina High School students, grades 9 – 12. In contrast to the previous season, when we scrambled to find robot construction space, this season we had the privilege of building our 2007 robot in a dedicated workshop space provided by Honeywell Inc. Community outreach and expansion of the FIRST program to other high schools in Minnesota also became a very important objective of our team. While there were only two FIRST teams in Minnesota in 2006, that number grew to a total of 16 Minnesota FIRST teams for the 2007 competition season.
In late-September 2006, our team exhibited at the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) Summit for High School Students hosted at the Science Museum of Minnesota by Governor Tim Pawlenty. There we showcased our robot and our machine vision system, as well as talked extensively with students, parents, and teachers considering starting a new FIRST team. As a follow-up, we visited many area schools with our robot, answering questions and encouraging them to form teams. From those initial visits, we were invited to mentor two new rookie teams: Team 2129 “Ultraviolet,” Southwest High School, Minneapolis, as well as Team 2052 “Knightkrawlers,” Irondale Senior High School, New Brighton, MN. We also helped with advice via email and visits to other team’s forum pages.
In January 2007, the tremendous growth of FIRST in Minnesota allowed our state to host its first-ever Kickoff event announcing the details of the 2007 game “Rack 'N' Roll.” Our team played host to a total of 22 teams from Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota at the Coffman Memorial Union on the University of Minnesota campus.
Only a couple weeks later, in the heart of the build season, our community outreach efforts extended to devoting a day to showcase our build season. Approximately 60 guests toured our Honeywell-provided build facility during the first-annual “Edina Robotics Education Day,” which took place on January 27, 2007. Coming at the midpoint of the six-week build session, corporate sponsors, representatives of the Edina Board of Education, Edina High School Site and Parent Councils, teachers, school and district administrators and parents had a valuable opportunity to see our progress, to watch demonstrations of our machine vision system, and see firsthand how a FIRST Robotics team prepares for competition. The Green Machine also strutted its stuff for another audience that following Monday. A crew from KARE-11’s “Whatever Show” filmed the team in action and interviewed team members for one of their shows, which aired in late February 2007.
Adding to our second-year build experience, the team was selected as one of 30 FIRST teams in 20 states to participate in a pilot project involving hydrogen fuel cells as an alternative to standard batteries and energy sources. Coincidentally, the program was called “The Fuel Cell ‘Green Machine’ Pilot Program.” A special bonus to our participation was that all teams involved in this four-part challenge were invited to take part in the 2007 Championship competition in Atlanta, GA.
The fuel cell pilot program (www.FirstFuelCells.com) required teams to research and explore what fuel cells are, build and test a fuel cell system, design a game that can be played by fuel cell hybrid robots, and to insert the hybrid fuel cell system into a competition-ready robot. Each team received two 10-cell hydrogen stack kits to build into either one 20-cell stack or two 10-cell stacks. We very quickly discovered the challenges involved in using these fuel cells to power a competitive FIRST robot, as the power provided by them proved very minimal.
In March, The Green Machine competed in the Wisconsin Regional tournament in Milwaukee, WI. There we vied with 51 other teams from various Midwest states. After eight qualifying matches, we earned the position of third seed. In the elimination rounds, our alliance advanced to the semifinals where, unfortunately, the robot’s transmission failed, leaving it unable to move, much less compete. On a brighter note, we won the DaimlerChrysler Team Spirit Award for showing “extraordinary enthusiasm and spirit through exceptional partnership and teamwork,” and our team’s Website received a FIRST Website Excellence Award.
Due to The Green Machine’s participation in the FIRST Fuel Cell Project, the team attended the FIRST Championship in Atlanta, Georgia. On April 12, 2007, 344 FRC teams, comprised of approximately 8,600 students from five countries (Mexico, Canada, Israel, Brazil, and the United States), gathered in the Georgia Dome. During the qualifying rounds of the Championship, The Green Machine had some bad luck, did not make it to the top eight (of the 86 teams competing in our division), and therefore was not guaranteed to participate in the elimination rounds.
Our team stayed up late, creating marketing flyers that promoted the end-game capabilities of our robot, Zarthan. We successfully pitched our robot’s ability to lift two alliance robots at the end of the scoring period to the third seeded team, Team 1124, The Überbots of Avon, CT. We were selected to join their alliance with Team 1592, The Bionic Tigers of Cocoa, FL. The combination of the awesome offensive abilities of these two teams and our team’s amazing defense and ability to score bonus points, made for an extraordinary alliance. Our alliance went so far as to become the Division Finalists in the Newton Division; the alliance to which our alliance lost in the division finals ended up becoming the overall 2007 FIRST Champions, defeating finalists in the other three divisions. Along with being Division Finalists in Atlanta, we also won a silver award, coming in second place in the FIRST Fuel Cell competition for our “Lazer Maze Craze” game design involving hydrogen-fuel cells. All things considered, it was an extremely successful season for The Green Machine.
In 2007, our sponsors and donors included Honeywell Inc.; Medtronic, Inc; NASA; The Edina Education Fund; Schwegman, Lundberg, Woessner, Kluth; Geek Squad; Dunwoody College of Technology; Hennepin Technical College; Honeywell Retiree Volunteer Program; Student Council of Edina High School; Artistic Productions; Queen of Cakes; Accumet Materials Co.; Barr Engineering; Home Depot, and WSB & Associates. The Green Machine extends a special thanks to all of our 2007 sponsors and supporters, you helped make our second year a winning season!
2008 Season
A FIRST team stays busy year-round, and The Green Machine is no exception. With the 2008 build season finally shifting into full gear, now is a good time to review what exactly the 33 members of Team 1816 have been doing since the 2007 competition season wrapped up.
During summer 2007, team leaders looked to provide some hands-on experiences and develop spirit among the many newcomers joining the team. This goal took shape through a number of activities members participated in throughout the summer, with both technical learning and bonding occurring at fundraisers and outreach activities. The major technical learning that went on happened during a few field trips the team took to the Dunwoody College of Technology. There, demonstrations and hands-on learning occurred in such robot-useful areas as machining, welding, computer-aided drafting (CAD), and electronics. These sessions gave participating team members a chance to gain in-depth knowledge and training than could be provided solely by reading how-to books.
Getting to know each other (otherwise known as team bonding) between veterans and rookies came during several team fundraisers and service projects, including a morning spent packing meals at Feed My Starving Children. Our team’s annual car wash fundraiser took place one sunny August Saturday, when veteran members were joined by many of the team’s 17 rookies, scrubbing and polishing cars. The team also increased awareness of FIRST in the community by answering questions about robotics posed by motorists stopping by for the car wash. Team members also had the bonus of becoming acquainted with each other and even raising some money!
Several Team 1816 members also worked through the summer as participants in the FIRST President’s Circle. Along with nineteen other FIRST teams, Team 1816 was tapped to help identify and list resources that could help reduce barriers to entry among rookie teams. Among other things, our team’s handbook was posted as a helpful resource, with FIRST noting its excellence covering “team structure and functions, including sponsorship levels, team travel information, and adult mentors and their roles” (http://www.usfirst.org/community/frc/content.aspx?id=7022).
As autumn came around, efforts shifted to a more prominent emphasis on outreach activities. After learning that Medtronic, Inc., had renewed its financial support of the team, The Green Machine turned its attention to participating in Edina School’s East Campus Open House. During the October event, visitors were able to page through the photo album/scrapbook submitted by the team for the 2007 Chairman’s Award competition; watch team-produced videos of the robot in action, and learn about FIRST Robotics from members present. Another fundraiser followed, this one at Noodles Restaurant, with our 2007 robot, nicknamed “Zarthan” providing another excellent opportunity to promote awareness about the team and FIRST Robotics.
Many of our team members and leaders helped plan and organize a morning of activities designed to help young teams “jump” into FIRST and get their feet wet, appropriately at a pre-season Minnesota Regional event named the “Minnesota Splash.” At the event, held at the Lockheed Martin facility in Eagan, Minn., FIRST teams participated in a wide of variety of learning activities, ranging from seminars about programming and pneumatics to actual robot demonstrations. A number of seminars, put on by student veterans and mentors alike, conveyed valuable information relevant not only for building a robot, but also for organizing and running a robotics team. Topics such as what to expect and do at competitions, fundraising, and game strategy were also covered during the seminars and workshops (presentations are on the Minnesota Regional website). Several teams, including The Green Machine, also brought their 2007 competition robots and provided demonstrations of these robots in action to complement the seminars.
By December 2007, the team also wrapped up much of its marketing and corporate fundraising efforts. The Green Machine in 2008 is powered by Medtronic, Inc., Ecolab Inc., Honeywell Inc., Wanner Engineering, FWR Communications Networks, and Barr Engineering. Without our sponsors, our team would not be able to move forward confidently. Their support allows Team 1816 to compete in two regional tournaments this spring: the Wisconsin Regional in early March and the new Minnesota Regional in late March.
Even with all the emphasis on outreach and corporate fundraising, it is not to say that the technical development of team members had ceased. Each of the subteams had a variety of projects to work on to improve their skills before kickoff.
The manipulator subteam focused on designing and building a small tabletop arm. They began work on this device in September, designing (on paper and on CAD) a manipulator with an elbow, wrist, and three-pronged claw. They succeeded in constructing simplified version of this manipulator. Using a specially-ordered pneumatic cylinder, they were then able to complete a two-pronged gripper and elbow joint. The team’s programmers also used this small arm to test their “C” programming skills to control the grip.
The CAD subteam busied themselves mapping out the robot from last year on computers. The programmers took the opportunity to become familiar with the “C” coding language and interface, working with a VEX Kit as well as the tabletop arm. Hopefully, all of the pre-build season activities will prove to be useful, because now the team is logging tremendous numbers of hours building an actual competition robot!
And if team members thought that they were doing a lot of work leading up to the start of the build season, things really shifted into gear once the game was unveiled on January 5th. With only a short six weeks before the deadline to ship the robot, The Green Machine quickly got to work brainstorming possible designs for a robot capable of playing the year’s game, FIRST Overdrive. Two weeks -- and many ranking tables later – a four-bar linkage arm design won out. A hurdler it was! With the robot design now set, the build teams got to work. It was definitely a challenge to get the robot working, but the build teams managed to finish with even a few days to spare.
Even with the build season in full swing, the team continued its outreach efforts. Indeed, one of the most important outreach events for The Green Machine is “Edina Robotics Education Day,” a daylong event right in the middle of the build season. Throughout the day, educators and community members had an opportunity to see a FIRST team in action actually building their robot. The team also was invited to take part in the Edina Education Fund’s Luncheon, presenting news about the FIRST program to attendees.
With the 2008 robot, “Zerkit,” finally built, the team did have one chance to test out the robot before crating it for shipment: At a scrimmage hosted by Team 2518-The Spartans of Simley High School, the team saw the robot perform its functions on a life-size playing field, alongside robots of the five other teams in attendance. While watching Zerkit go through its moves, it was clear some additional tinkering by the build and programming subteams was needed, including downloading the hybrid mode programming codes to Zerkit. Yet considering the strenuous build season, the robot’s performance was a big inspiration and raised the team’s hopes for doing well in the regional competitions.
In mid-March, the team packed tools and bags and piled all into a coach-bus with Team 2129-Ultraviolet, Southwest High School, Minneapolis, for the FIRST Wisconsin Regional in Milwaukee. Three intense days of competition pulled upon every resource of the team. Hours of frustration fixing broken parts, combined with a few disappointing, matchless during which Zerkit remained stubbornly motionless, the team finished 5-3 in preliminary round seeding. Yet the team’s efforts to reach out to other teams paid off when The Green Machine advanced to the elimination rounds as part of an alliance with Team 2606-Rosemount Robotics, a rookie Minnesota team from Rosemount High School, and Team 74-Team CHAOS of Holland High School, Holland, MI. Even with an exit in the quarterfinals, The Green Machine emerged knowing they’d ironed out most every setback. With (hopefully) many of Zerkit’s problems fixed, the team turned their eyes toward competing in the inaugural Minnesota FIRST Regional at the end of the month!
During the preliminary seeding matches in Williams Arena, Zerkit performed better than expected. Zerkit began the qualification rounds on Friday morning with two losses in a row, but the team rebounded and won each of the remaining seven matches to finish the qualification rounds with a 7-2 record. This made Team 1816 the number four-ranked robot out of 54 robots at the conclusion of the qualifying rounds and eligible to pick two additional teams to form a competition alliance. As it turned out, those initial two losses were at the hands of Team 525-Swart-Dogs, Cedar Rapids, IA, a team that qualified as the number one seed and the eventual head of the winning alliance at the Minnesota Regional. Sadly, our team’s alliance was eliminated in the quarterfinal rounds, due in part to a mysterious power loss suffered by Zerkit at the beginning of a match. Despite the elimination from the competition, Team 1816 wasn’t done for the day. The most exciting news came at the end of the awards presentation, when it was announced that the team won the prestigious Chairman’s Award. This award is presented to the FIRST team that best-exemplifies the mission of FIRST. By winning the Regional Chairman’s Award, Team 1816 was invited to the FIRST Championships in Atlanta, GA, April 17-19 to compete against 40 other Regional Chairman’s recipients for the National Chairman’s Award.
The 2008 FIRST competition season came to an exciting finale with the World Championships in Atlanta, and Team 1816 was right there in the middle of the action. During the tournament, The Green Machine competed with 350 other teams for the robotics title of World Champions. The Green Machine was placed in the Galileo division for the qualifying rounds, and the competition there sure was fierce. Combined, the teams facing off in Galileo possessed 36 regional wins! With all the competition, the team gave it everything they had, finishing a respectable 4-3, ending in 40th place out of about 80 in the division. Surrounded by remarkable robots from which to choose, The Green Machine was not get picked by any of the top-seeded teams to advance to the elimination rounds. Yet, there were other bonuses to take away from Atlanta: For the first time, in competition-conditions, Zerkit actually worked properly in virtually all of its matches!
In addition to entering Zerkit into the competition, Team 1816 considered it an honor to be considered as one of 41 teams eligible for the Championship Chairman’s Award. All of these Regional Chairman’s Teams presented strong programs of outreach and enthusiasm for science, technology, math and engineering. The Green Machine did not take home the top Chairman’s award; however the team members who went before the judging panel felt their presentation of the team’s hard work on outreach events, such as Minnesota Splash and FIRST Lego League Mentoring, was received well by the judges. Other FRC teams had done so much more for the community in their many years of existence that it was clear that 1816 has more work that needs to be done to rise to the level of a Championship Chairman’s team. Rather then being discouraged though, the team was inspired by the enthusiasm and dedication of other FRC teams. The Green Machine didn’t even wait until getting back to Minnesota to start brainstorming ideas for next year’s outreach efforts!