This post brings back a flood of memories. I was on the robotics FIRST team for my highschool (Team 498) for two years and loved it. It was a great way for kids to learn a little bit of everything. Even a basic robot required some basic electronics, motors and gearing, programming and pneumatics systems.
I just watched some of the stream and smiled at the fact that the competition is very similar to my first year. There were many unique robots that had different ways to quickly balance on the bridge. We learned it wasn't really about the ability to balance, but how fast you could do it. Since its the last thing your robot will do in the round you usually have seconds to dash to it and balance it.
Friends of ours in FTC last season balanced on a bridge like that with an opposing alliance robot that accidentally got on their bridge, all in autonomous. They paused for a few extra minutes between autonomous and tele-operated period to let people take pictures of it. Pretty impressive for high school kids.
So both robots were programmed to balance on a bridge but accidentally got on the same one and were still able to pull it off? That is impressive considering they would have to know not to push each other off but stay on the ends and scoot just a little bit until they balanced and react to how the other robot is shift its weight.
No only one was programmed to balance in autonomous. They'd only ever done it with just their bot in the middle of the bridge, but they were able to balance with the other one on there because they just kept backing up until the gyro sensor was level. I love it when you get to see unexpected behaviors from something you built.
I just watched some of the stream and smiled at the fact that the competition is very similar to my first year. There were many unique robots that had different ways to quickly balance on the bridge. We learned it wasn't really about the ability to balance, but how fast you could do it. Since its the last thing your robot will do in the round you usually have seconds to dash to it and balance it.