FRC has many similarities to real-world engineering, one of which is the benefits of sticking to an “engineering process”. However, given the unique challenge that is FRC, the process that we go through can be summarized in 6 phases:
Phase 1: Problem Definition
The first step to solving any problem is to know what the problem is. During the first two days of the season, the main goal is to understand the game and to come up with a priority list.
On kickoff day, the team splits into smaller groups to look into the details of different parts of the game. At the end of the day, everyone should have a clear idea of:
- Game objectives and scoring
- Game field
- Game piece interactions
- Gameplay constraints
- Robot constraints
Once the team has a good understanding of the game, the next task is to create a priority list. We list every possible action that the robot can complete, then sorts them in order of importance and when the robot should be able to complete those actions. For example, the robot should definitely be able to drive and complete a simple autonomous at the first event, then have more complex autonomous routines and driver aids for later events.
Phase 2: Ideate
In the ideation phase, we try to come with as many ideas as possible.