Unfortunately I have not had an incredible amount to log, and have not logged the little I have had to log. Over the past few weeks we have competed at the Central Valley Regional in Madera in order to practice with our robot Andromeda, and so that we were able to spend a last few hours working on her. We have upgraded/modified several systems, and I even designed and fabricated brakes at the request of our drivers after seeing several robots with brakes at the Central Valley competition. I designed the brakes as simply as I could, nothing more than a bracket to mount an air cylinder, onto which a rubber foot is to be threaded. This brake is screwed onto the inside of each drive-plate, and when pressurized, the rubber feet descend and apply force to the floor. According to my calculations, the cylinders will have just short of the amount of force needed to lift the robot, which means maximum braking power without the risk of the robot becoming unstable.
Wednesday we leave for Championships in St. Louis. As a part of the competition events, I have decided to design and fabricate a duct tape dress for a friend, who I will be accompanying to Roboprom. Pictures of the fabrication process to come.
More good news, I have received notice of receipt of my Provisional Application for Patent from the United States Patent and Trademark office. This means that I can now post all material regarding Project ÜberTank, as I have patent protection. I am hoping to win the FIRST Future Innovators Award presented by the Abbott Fund for that invention, which comes with free nonprovisional patent service with a patent lawyer, and the opportunity to meet with investors to help me with the project.