DEWBOT VII Ramp Riot

12-November-2011. Due to the late drop-out of team 1391 (Metal Moose), FRC Team 1640 had the opportunity to field two robots at Ramp Riot. DEWBOT VII Prime, our competition robot was fielded under the 1640 team number by our competition drive team. Deux entered the competition under the nom de guerre 1641 operated by drive-team trainees, giving them invaluable competition driving experience. We also ran two pits, providing training in this area as well.

This is the first time Sab-BOT-age had ever run two robots in a competition and my heartfelt thanks go out to all those who worked so hard to bring Deux from arm-less engineering test bed up to competition condition in the space of one short week.

1640 was selected by the 3^rd alliance, comprising teams 103 (Cybersonics) and 365 (Miracle Workerz). A terrific alliance. We won the quarterfinals and our first semifinal match. Alas, 103 broke down in the 2^nd semifinal match and our alliance was defeated by the 1^st alliance (2016, 222, 1403), who went on to become champions.

By a bizarre twist, 1641 was brought into the finals as a replacement robot for 2607. We lost, but ended up as Ramp Riot Finalist.

1640 has participated in Ramp Riot every year since the team's inception, making this our 7^th Ramp Riot.

The resurrection of Deux

Our 2^nd 2011 robot, Deux, had been reduced to a inert hulk before Duel on the Delaware. The arm and minibot systems were removed to convert it to a generic testbed chassis. Two pivots were pulled to provide spares for Prime. The line photosensors were pulled. The solenoid module was removed from the cRIO for another Duel team which needed it. Altogether, Deux was far from a competition-ready robot on 4-Nov when we learned of the 2^nd robot opportunity.

In addition, improvements made on Prime were to be incorporated in Deux as well, primarily the (3) photosensor line-following.