FIRST LEGO LEAGUE 2018-19 SEASON: Into Orbit
Into Orbit Challenge Guide:
https://firstinspiresst01.blob.core.windows.net/fll/2019/FIRST-FLL-2018-19-ChallengeGuide-Letter.pdf
TOURNAMENT DATE: TBA
First Lego League
First Lego League is a world-wide annual robotics competition. There is a First Lego League Canada, First Lego League New Zealand, etc. (http://www.firstinspires.org/robotics/fll/what-is-first-lego-league)
West Bayfield now has two FLL teams that both compete at the regional tournament.
An FLL tournament team consists of 10 students. The 2016 theme was ‘Animal Allies.’ Therefore, our field table was outfitted with that year’s playing field and mission models as shown in the photo below.
Students code an EV3 robot to begin in base (inside the curved lines in the photo) and move objects into certain areas of the table for example for points.
The following clip shows our team completing 2 missions (barrier down and pig moved into base area): Video,
Each year the theme will change, and so our table will have a different playing field. Last year the theme was Hydrodynamics. This year it’s Into Orbit.
EV3 ROBOTS
Basic EV3 Programming
Here’s a simple program. The robot is programmed to travel from a start position, to the paper, drop off the marker and return. The photo below shows the robot waiting at the start position.
The program starts when I press the central key on the Lego brick.
The entire program video was too long to post on this blog, so the action parts are shown in the following: Video
The EV3 programming software is on designated school iPads and laptops. The software comes with the EV3s so it’s possible to put the software on any of our school computers.
Here’s a screenshot of my program that made the robot travel to the paper, drop off the marker, turn and come back:
To make a longer and more complex program, I would just decrease the size of the program blocks on the screen using ‘zoom’ on the menu so that I can fit more blocks on the screen.
Program breakdown:
Here’s Block 1 of my program ‘blown up’ so that you can see it in the screenshot below:
Block 1 is called ‘Move Tank.’ ‘Move Tank’ appears when you put your mouse over the icon at the bottom of the screen. You just click (or touch if you’re using an iPad), drag-and-drop the program blocks into your program above the menu. In my program, Block 1 is set so that the left and right motors, connected to the left and right wheels of the robot respectively, will each run at 50% power. So my robot will travel in a straight line. The 2 axles, one connected to each motor, will both rotate 10x. The check mark at the end of the block shows that I’ve selected for the robot to stop at the end of the block (momentarily before doing what the next block says). I’ve selected Ports B and C because I have the motors plugged into those ports on the Lego brick.
The two ‘Large Motors:’
The single ‘Medium Motor’ can be seen tucked under and to the front, to operate the lift:
Block 2
Here’s the second block of my program, again isolated and ‘blown up’ so you can see it in the screenshot:
This selected ‘Medium Motor’ block operates the lift on the front of my robot. The motor is plugged into Port A on the brick. It’s set to rotate backwards (lowering my lift arm) at 10% power and drop 45 degrees from its initial position when holding the marker.
Block 3
This ‘Move Tank’ block is set to move the robot backwards (negative values) at 25% power with 1 rotation of the axles. This moves the robot off and away from the paper before it makes its turn to come back.
Block 4
I again use the ‘Move Tank’ block but this time to make a turn using differential steering. The left wheel is set to rotate backwards at 5% power. The right wheel is set to rotate forwards at 5% power. The axles will rotate 1x. Through trial and error, I found this to be enough for the robot to turn around.
Block 5
The robot travels back to the start in a straight line but this time the axles only rotate 8x. Some distance towards the start point was gained when the robot backed up in Block 3.