RAGE Robotics

After 12 years located at 701 Main St., East Hartford, the award-winning robotics team that brought home a National Championship in 2002 and placed third in the world in 2005 and 2007 will have to find a new home. Thanks to the generosity of Mary Lee Stiegler, the RAGE team was given a home in the back of the old A&P grocery store on Main St. in East Hartford back in 1999. This approximately 9,000-square-foot donation allowed the team to build a full-size playing field to practice on when competing in the FIRST Robotics Competition. It also allowed us to hold our regularly scheduled meetings there, teach classes in C++ and SolidWorks (CAD program), and have fun.

We were able to impact the lives of hundreds of students through the years and promote the values of gracious professionalism as they learned how to master the intricacies of robotics, team building, cooperation, and engineering. These STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) fields are critical components in today’s society. We wish to publicly thank Ms. Stiegler for her generosity as we search for a new home.

RAGE is a legally incorporated 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization whose mission is to promote the importance of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math through participation in the FIRST robotics program (www.usfirst.org).

In addition to designing, building, and competing with large 130-lb., five-foot-tall robots, the RAGE team also fosters the importance of community service. Each year, the RAGE team hosts a FIRST Lego League Tournament that provides the opportunity for 24 elementary school teams to compete with their Lego Mindstorms robots. The team also sorted, boxed, and stored over 40,000 toys collected during the State Police Stuff-a-Cruiser program. These toys were then distributed to patients and families undergoing treatment at the Connecticut Children’s Medical Center in Hartford. We have collected toys for the KIDSAFE CT Christmas party and provided lots of baby items, blankets, and so forth for My Sisters’ Place, a shelter for women and children.

The RAGE team (http://www.ragerobotics.com) is actively seeking a new benefactor that can provide a donated home for this award-winning team. Ideally, we need space that would have several rooms that could be set up as classrooms: one for computers (6–7 workstations), one for spirit , and a larger room capable of holding 40–50 people for our team meetings. We also need a workshop space where we can use our several small tools (drill press, sander, table saw, band saw, etc ) that allow us to build our field and robot. Ideally there would be space to build a playing field (30’ × 75’) where we could practice throughout the season.

We meet typically all year round with a short break in the summer. Our meetings are traditionally on Wednesday nights at 6:30 P.M. to allow for students from all the different high schools to attend. Though based in East Hartford, RAGE currently has high school students from East Hartford, Rockville, Tolland, Bolton, Manchester, and Ellington.

Please contact the president of our Board of Directors, Maire Cusson (maire@ragerobotics.com) with any information. You may also contact team leader Chuck Nystrom (chucknye@msn.com).

For the second year in a row, RAGE’s robot and team members were pictured in the Journal Inquirer as part of its Suffield Shakedown coverage. Connie Eckstrom, Alex Arena, and Lindsey Davidson are shown working on the robot before one of the matches. The annual competition took place on February 19 and provides a venue for teams to try out their newly designed robots shortly before having to ship them to their first regional competition.

Join RAGE Robotics at Foster Farm and chuck a pumpkin using our trebuchet. We’ll be set up at the far end of the parking lot. For just $5, pick out your pumpkin from our pile, watch as we load it for you, then pull the release rope to send it flying down field. Try to hit the witch, spider, or ghost, or if you’re really good, hit the haunted castle at the other end of the field. We’ll be here October 9-11, 16-17, and 23-24 from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Foster Farm is on Foster St. in South Windsor just down the road from the mall and Applebees. While you’re here, check out Foster’s corn mazes plus lots of other activities.

RAGE Robotics, based in East Hartford, took silver in the recent Chesapeake Regional FIRST robotics competition held March 11–13 in Baltimore, Maryland. During two days of matches, RAGE (Robotics And Gadget Engineering) advanced through the qualification rounds with a 6-5-0 record and was selected to compete in the elimination rounds.

Working together with Vulcan Robotics from Philadelphia and the Robo Doves from Baltimore, the alliance won its way through the quarterfinals and semifinals to make it into the final round. Though they lost the best-of-three final, the alliance was a force to be reckoned with. Fifty teams hailing from New Hampshire down through North Carolina participated in the event.

Beside the Chesapeake Regional, RAGE will be competing in the Northeast Utilities Connecticut Regional being held April 1–3 at the Connecticut Convention Center in Hartford.

This year’s robot was prototyped, designed, and built by the students working side-by-side with seasoned engineers. The mechanical details were developed with the aid of a professional CAD system and fabricated by local machine shops who donated both time and materials to the team. The control software was also done completely by student programmers who were responsible for all of the robot’s motion and behavior.

Students designed shirts, buttons, backpacks, signs, and other spirit items for use by the team to cheer on the drive team and to pass out to other teams during competitions. The team’s bulldog mascot can also be seen raising a ruckus from the sidelines.

Funding for the team’s activities comes completely from corporate sponsorships and team-based fundraising efforts. Major sponsors include United Technologies Research Center (UTRC), CNC Software, Nerac, JP Fabrication & Repair, and Trumpf.

Be sure to check out page 3 of the February 22 edition of the Journal Inquirer for several photos taken at the Suffield scrimmage on Saturday. Our own Bruce Hockaday, Lindsey Davidson, and Emily Tunila are featured in one of them (Andy was robbed!). Too bad there was no accompanying story like there was in Rochester.

Congratulations to Aces High (team 176) and all the teams who participated in this year’s Suffield Shakedown Scrimmage last Saturday. Many of the early rounds were pretty shaky as teams worked last-minute kinks out of their new designs, but by the finals, most teams had things pretty figured out.

Here are a few things our team learned from the day:

• Make sure the pneumatics are fully charged before putting the robot out on the field.
• You can’t driver over the bumps with the kicker deployed.
• Make sure you tighten all the bumpers so you don’t kick one of them off onto the ground during autonomous mode.
• A roller meant to control the ball will suck the ball under the robot when the roller is built too high off the ground.
• It’s very possible to score goals during autonomous mode, even with minimal programming and from the far zone.
• The Field Management System (FMS) is capable of locking you out of your own driver station if it thinks you’re supposed to be on the field competing.
• Carabiners on the four corners do indeed make it easier to pick up the robot.

The winning alliance was unstoppable to the end, and was made up of Team 3125, Pirates of the Pythagorean from Hartford; Team 177, Bobcat Robotics from South Windsor; and Team 178, 2nd Law Enforcers from Farmington. Great job everyone.

Come meet Agawam High School’s Rosie Robotics team and see this year’s challenge. The cost for the all you can eat buffet is $8 per person and includes pasta, meatballs, salad, bread, dessert, juice, coffee, and tea.

Friday, February 5, 2010
4 pm – 7:30 pm
American Legion Post 185, 478 Springfield St, Feeding Hills, MA

Team 173 wishes to extend its sincere condolences to the team members and families of Team 3125, the Pirates of the Pythagorean, at the loss of their team member in today’s tragic bus accident. We can’t begin to imagine the what our brothers and sisters are going through during this difficult time. They were truly missed at the Farmington kickoff event, which is where the team was traveling to at the time if the accident. We want them to know that RAGE continues to be here as a resource going forward in this build and competition season, and we hope to see the team at the Connecticut Regional in Hartford.

The FIRST Student Team Members and Parents/Legal Guardians Information System and the Electronic Consent and Release Form are now available!  Keep in mind that students who choose to submit an Electronic Consent and Release Form and are attending a Kickoff Event must submit online no later than January 6, 2010.  For more details: http://usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc/content.aspx?id=15999.