Day 1 Recap 2021 Season

Hello and happy Sunday! Full Moon Robotics hopes that everyone had a productive and wonderful Day 1 of Ri3D!

Although I'm sure many wished it could've been in person, FIRST's Kickoff stream was still a blast! Along with the introduction of this year's challenges — the FIRST Innovation Challenge, Infinite Recharge at Home, and the Game Design Challenge — the stream included an interview of Qualcomm engineers, videos from SpaceX and the US Air Force, and an inspiring speech from Dean Kamen. FIRST also showcased both FRC and FTC teams from around the world and announced new YouTube content and a video series titled Beyond the Bots.

As soon as FIRST ended the Kickoff stream, the Full Moon Robotics stream began! Our hosts, Emma and Sam, introduced the team before diving right into the plan. This season, we're going to be modifying our robot from last year. Since we hadn't looked at the robot since last January, our first task was to do a live robot analysis, during which we discovered several issues. We launched into a two-part brainstorming session. The first part of the session focused on prioritizing issues and creating a programming plan. After deciding that the shooter mechanism design should be our first project, we ended the session and took a much-needed mental health break.

The second part of the brainstorming session lasted the rest of the day, but we were able to come up with solutions for the main issues our robot faced as well as create a solid foundation for the next two days. The programming team started working on cleaning up some of last year's code and re-mapping the PlayStation controller. At the same time, the build team began to work on the robot's wiring, along with making plans for a more reliable intake method and a shooting mechanism that can aim for the high goal.

Overall, we had a really strong start to this season and can't wait to see what the next two days bring!