Good Luck Supernova!

Good luck to Supernova at the IL State tournament this evening and tomorrow.  Your coaches and parents are very proud of the great work you've done this season, including extensive project research, helping other teams, introducing FLL to others, and showing some tremendous teamwork.

I'd like to share a little bit about how they've used teamwork to improve their robot's reliability.  The last 2 robot practice sessions were typical of how they've been working in small groups and handing off their results and issues to the next group through the use of their log book.  For full disclosure, the hand off in this example was verbal (BAM really had to leave by the time they figured it out!), but the log book has been their primary means of tracking robot errors and fixes for the last couple of months.

They had originally planned on last Jockey practice on Sunday, but 2 of the teams decided to do a little more practice.  BAM (Bridget Andrew Michael) did some minor reliability tweaks and were rewarded with consecutive 390, 390, 390, 400, 400 runs.  Their final run of the day (with Mr. Naughton watching!) was a 340.  The "falling arm" in mission 2 was back.  They figured out what was wrong (and why previous attempts to fix didn't work) but didn't have time to fix it.

Danny Patrick and Nate practiced the next day and did the fix.  The Stop and Wait my-block was disrupting a parallel path meant to hold the arm up.  Patrick suggested replacing it with a modified "Stop and Wait BC", which leaves the arm motor (A) undisturbed in the main path while the parallel path keeps it from falling.  This way, the navigation using B&C motors would run identically while still fixing the problem.  Danny did the changes.  They got a 400 on their last run and the arm was definitely holding during mission 2.

Great job!

Reliability - Looper-Scooper or Looper-Lopper?

The team has had limited time since their late regional to make any major changes.  After Batavia, we had a brainstorming session to decide on what should be done to prepare for State based on our robot performance and the feedback forms.

So far, they've revised the script, re-shot and edited the "present ghost" video, brought to mind their teamwork skills, and have worked in small teams to incrementally improve robot reliability while each of the three 3-man teams have continued to practice.  At this stage, the failures are less spectacular (that's a very good thing!), but that makes it a challenge to say what caused missed points on the board, since a failure may not recur with any regularity.  I've been coaching them on the importance of careful observation and it really paid off today.

Example: Joey, Paul and Alex were practicing and found Mission 3's implement was often hammering the first tall loop.  Joey noticed that their "ramp" was not long enough, hitting the first loop end-on, missing it and throwing off the rest of the run.  They increased the length - but then it was out of base.  So they relocated it further back - but then the implement was lopping the first loop in half.  Everyone was watching it, run after run, until finally Alex saw that the top of the implement was now hitting before the ramp - it was happening so fast it was hard to see.  They shortened that part and it then started scooping loops every time.  Now, it works every time.

The 3 jockey teams have done an exceptional job of tracking changes and passing on information to the next team using their collaboration tools.  I'm really looking forward to observing their reliability in Arlington Heights this coming weekend.

Congratulations, Supernova - Off to State!

Great job by the team today at the Batavia regional competition. Their coaches and parents are very proud of their hard work, extensive research and preparation that went into this years challenge. They earned the Technical Award, were 3rd place in robot performance points and earned an invitation to the State tournament.

We're especially proud of the way they handled a misunderstanding with the 1st round Ref. They asked him to remove the truck, which must happen for mission2 to succeed and the Ref did not do it, causing a rescue and loss of items collected. They did get the benefit of the doubt and were given back some points. We have 3 jockey teams and they had agreed ahead of time that the team with the highest score would get to run the 4th round unless they all agreed otherwise. After out teamwork judging we huddled to firm up who would run and they had already talked amongst themselves that they wanted the team with the truck collision to get a chance to run again. This showed great teamwork and gracious professionalism.

Way to go Supernova!

Mount Prospect Regional

We're very proud of the group of Supernova students that helped out at the Mount Prospect tournament yesterday. Thank you Bridget, Patrick, Michael, Andrew, Joey, Paul and Danny.

Our Project Coach, Mrs. Naughton has her own team, Scrap Metal, that competed and it was great to have Supernova there to cheer for them and the Rams, a team coached by her brother-in-law Mr. Dan Naughton. Scrap Metal did very well for a rookie team and took 2nd place in robot points. Great job!

A Perfect Run!

Congratulations to the team for their first ever 400-point run in their 3 years as a team. 2 of our 3 jockey teams were practicing today and on the last run, Michael, Andrew and Bridget had a perfect run.
Congratulations to everyone - this was a real team effort. Each time they practice, they've been refining and improving reliability. This isn't a routine score, but it was exciting to see everything run as right as it can, all on the same run.
The team is still working on handouts for the judges, team information sheets and practicing the project presentation, but tomorrow we're taking a break to go to Scrap Metal's regional in Mount Prospect. Some of the team are volunteering while others are just going up to encourage and cheer them on. Good luck Scrap Metal!

Getting Close!

We did video taping of one sequence of the project presentation yesterday. Paul was the videographer, Michael was the son and Alex was "the dad" with a tie on.

Bridget, Patrick and Andrew worked on other team tasks during the "taping" and they all worked together for a couple hours afterward. Danny came down for a while too. It was like a mini-meeting. Paul and Danny's little brother Scott is in the foreground in the shot. He likes to help out with field setup and hang out with the team.

Chicago Technologies Sponsors Supernova

Supernova is pleased to have Chicago Technologies as their new sponsor.

Thanks to the Toennies family for introducing us to them through Mr. Chris Fuller. We hope to be able to promote FLL even better with this new relationship.

Thanks for your support, Chicago Technologies.