360H Half Circle | Pits & Parts | V5RC Push Back Robot

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:04]Hi everybody, it's Tyler here at VEX Worlds. We're checking with 360 HS half circle coming in from California. This team here, a lot of great features to their robot performing great here so far at VEX Worlds. Uh take a look at the different standoffs they're using on their robot. We'll be detailing that a bit more and also how they're implementing their color sort. Looks really good, too. We'll be diving into some other things from uh match and game strategy into uh different programming aspects with their optical [music] sensors and just how this team has really become well a full circle complete package as well too. Let's learn more about them coming up here on Pits and Parts.

[00:00:36]Odin, let's dive a bit more into some of your uh match and game strategy here.

[00:00:40]Your team has had uh some great results uh coming in the VEX World. So, how are you approaching this as you get the VEX Worlds? Kind of talk to me more about how that all comes together.

[00:00:47]>> Uh yeah, thank you for asking. So the number one thing going into world is that we wanted to be more dominantly uh towards match play instead of skills. Uh so which is different from how we did at states. And what was different about this robot from worlds is that we looked at a lot of scrimmages and we looked at a lot of stuff for game strategy first to decide how we wanted to build this robot and go along with it. And the number one thing that we decided is that we wanted to focus on what we call goal timings. And basically what goal timings is is we always want control of the middle goals before the last 30 seconds of the match which allow us into our game strategy. So we're able to pick up as much balls as we can and then dump at the last 10 seconds, 15 seconds. And this timing works out for us because of the amount of scrimmages and and match play we've had and that if we are able to get the uh mid goals and lo goals, we can fight for the long goals and we're able to get at least three goals per match.

[00:01:38]Before we get to our next segment, we'd like to thank the following. Ketaring University's cutting edge programs in their experiential co-op model seamlessly blend the professional and academic worlds, offering hands-on, future focused learning that empower students pursue new ideas and inspires other institutions to follow their lead.

[00:01:54]Don't just be ahead of the curve, create the curve. Get more information at ketarine.edu/vex.

[00:02:01]The Robotics Education and Competition Foundation provides fantastic programs for students from elementary school all the way through college. These include VEX, aerial drone competition, online challenges, JOTC, Grillpowered Scholarships, certifications, and so much more. To discover these exciting opportunities, visit recf.org and get connected.

[00:02:22]>> Coming into VEX Worlds, is there anything that surprised you in terms of how match play has been in your division so far? Um, I think the long goal play has been very aggressive so far and that uh we've had to focus a lot more on that, especially because if we're able to uh grab as much balls as we can, we're able to grab our uh possession of it and then we're able to fight for the long goal properly. So once we're able to get the middle goal and the low goal, we can decide from there where we want to do. So we already know that in terms of points, a dump is worth way more than the controls for mid. So, we decided that if we're able to dump and we're able to get control of the long goal at the last uh last possible seconds, that's more worth it than getting the mid goals, which is set up for us earlier in the match.

[00:03:05]>> John, let's talk more about uh this robot itself here. So many great aspects that come together from it from your standoffs to how your color short works and a lot of great things as well too.

[00:03:12]What do you want to start with?

[00:03:13]>> All right, so I'd like to start with our uh selection of parts. So the first thing that we do whenever we build a robot is we look at all the parts we have and then when we start in CAD we try to use all of those parts and then see how we can use them in new new and unique ways. So one of the things that we've been using a lot this year are nylon standoffs. Um you can see we use them uh some round nylon standoffs on our uh standoff axles which I'll get into in a second. But we also use them for a lot of non-structural components.

[00:03:36]So C channel boxing and then holding up plastic pieces like you can see here and here. And then another way that we use standoffs that we found really innovative is on standoff axles. So you can actually see here that this axle is actually a standoff. And additionally, the pre-roller is as well and our second to last stage roller on the top here. So um there's actually no high strength axles on our robot at all except for one that we added 3 days before worlds on our long goal liner because uh we found that it slid on the goal better and gave us um faster autonomous routines. So uh the most impressive standoff axle that we have on this robot is actually on the pre-roller. So when we make our normal standoff axles, we actually hammer a Versa hub onto a standoff. However, for the pre-roller, since there's so many wheels and um two uh sprockets, hammering all of those um versa hubs onto the standoff is really really timeconuming and actually near impossible. So what I realized is that we can u make our own custom Versa hubs to fit over the standoff axle that allow us to hot swap our flex wheels especially when they get dirty. And the way that we've done that actually is by laser cutting our own um Versa Hub out of a flap and then securing it to the flex wheel with zip ties. And even though that the flap is a compliant material because it's made of rubber, um it still behaves really really well and robustly when we're in matches.

[00:04:56]>> For a team that maybe hasn't experimented with laser cutting it or anything like that, like what are some of the steps to get started or how do you go about doing it?

[00:05:02]>> Yeah, so the first thing that I do is I start catting out the robot structure.

[00:05:06]So that would be for example uh all of the drivetrain and then these upright C channels here um which I do based on like a 2D sketch of the robot from the side and then from there I start to make all of our plastic pieces. So a good example of this would actually be our intake bracing gear. So it actually braces the structure and then also the gearbox. And we use Inventor for all of our CAD. And I make a sketch inside of the Inventor assembly of the part that I want. And then I export the after extruding it, I export the face as a DXF and then put that into a software called LightBurn, which powers our laser cutter.

[00:05:39]>> So let's talk a little bit more how your color sort works on your robot as well too. Can you talk about what stands out and let's get a demo of it too?

[00:05:44]>> Yeah. So as Odin talked about in our math strategy, we really want fast cycling of the middle goals and what we realized in scrimmages is that we can't spend time picking up balls. So, what we've actually done is we add a color sorder at the bottom of our intake, which is just a flap that opens up in the back and allows the intake to eject balls. Um, so we can give you a quick little demonstration if you want to intake.

[00:06:06]Oh, wait. It behaves differently cuz it's on the table.

[00:06:12]So, it's off. As you can see, all of the blue balls were ejected out the bottom and we only have red balls in the top of the intake. Um, what this allows us to do is actually when we're doing wing play as we're moving down the field, we can uh intake balls and that'll allow us to always have a full robot and especially set us up for the end of the match with the dump.

[00:06:30]>> And um, when we were talking earlier to uh, you mentioned one of the other aspects of your robot uh, was your reverse funnels as well too. Can you talk a bit more about that?

[00:06:36]>> Yeah, so coming out of states, one of the things we noticed was that since our robot was so skills focused and we were just solely going for skills, we struggled a lot with our wing alignments. So the what we've done actually is we made our robot two holes narrower. So, we're only 12 and a half inches long. And that allows us to have a longer wing. And we also added these reverse funnels. So, what this mean what these reverse funnels allow us to do is that if we hit the long goal here, um the robot will actually slide. For example, if the ball was a long goal, it will slide along the long goal and then it'll slide onto our aligner on the top here. Um which will allow us to get a perfect alignment of the way.

[00:07:10]>> With your different standoffs and everything that's gone together with this, did you have any packaging challenges like trying to get your COG low, that sort of thing?

[00:07:15]>> Yeah. So especially since our robot is is uh quite heavy by most people's standards which is 15 lbs um we needed to have a very low center of gravity. So one of the innovative things about our robot is that we don't use any uh odometry pods and that allows us to have uh things other things stuck in the drive. So for example here we've put our battery and our tank inside of the gap between the drive motors which gives us a extremely low center of gravity. And then on the back you can see that we've put the brain right on top of it.

[00:07:45]Speaking about uh not using adometry, let's talk about autos a little bit and how your team is utilizing uh we call adaptive autos uh for that as well too.

[00:07:52]So Derek, talk to me more about that and then uh also anything else from uh we were talking really about some of your optical sensory usage as well too.

[00:07:58]>> Yeah, of course. So as we mentioned before, we don't actually have any odometry pods on the bottom of our robot. But what we realized from states and all of our other competitions is that the speed of your autons matters so much in this game just to get control of all of the goals. So instead of odometry um we have actually eight different uh sensors for autons. We have three optical sensors and also five distance sensors. So first we have four distance sensors, one on each uh side of the robot, one on the back, left, right, and then the front. And we just use these to reset our position wherever we can since we have no pods and we drift sideways and forwards from wheel slippage a lot.

[00:08:41]And that's how we try to maintain consistent autos on all of all of our fields.

[00:08:47]And then for the opticals, we have one here for the match loader, one up here for the scoring, and then another another one down here, which is for our color sort. So the first optical is uh basically when we go into the match loader in autons, we can detect when we see the opponent's block, which means that we're now done match loading our blocks and we can go and continue with the rest of our autos and not waste any time. And that's the same uh with the scoring optical up here. We can see when we've scored all of our balls and then instantly move on to the next movement so we don't waste any time. [snorts] And another thing that we use our scoring optical for is adaptive autos. So basically, say if we run if we're if our auto is slower than our opponents and we can't score nearly enough balls in time on the long goals, what this optical will do is that it'll see that we still have balls left on our intake and then we can tell the program to go and score in the middle goals and try to get control there and that way uh we'll have the best chance of winning auto every single time.

[00:09:52]>> What was your biggest challenge as a programmer coming into VEX World? It's like trying to get things right.

[00:09:56]mentioned that, you know, you're definitely a big skills team uh coming into Vex Worlds and now you're focused more on uh match play and that sort of thing. What was like the biggest challenge that you faced personally?

[00:10:04]>> Oh, definitely because we were focusing on skills a lot and in skills uh you really need consistent autos across a really long period of time uh for skills autonomous. So, this entire season we've basically used tracking wheels uh especially a perpendicular wheel so that we can track our side movement. But since it's a match play bot for worlds, we don't actually have that since we want a lower center of gravity. So, uh just knowing what movement algorithms to use, like what if we're over complicating a movement, uh which we can't we can't really uh do anymore because we don't have pods, we have much smaller margin of error. Uh that was something that I really had to get used to coming into Worlds.

[00:10:49]>> Well, 36H, thank you so much for taking time to talk about this. as we're filming. Got one more match before playoffs. So, we're hoping for a very deep run, maybe even beyond as well too for your team. Wish you best of luck and thanks for telling us more about this awesome machine.

[00:11:01]Thanks for watching. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and click the bell to stay up to date on future fun videos.

[00:11:07]The Robotics Education and Competition Foundation provides fantastic programs for students from elementary school all the way through college. These include VEX, aerial drone competition, online challenges, JOTC, drill powered, scholarships, certifications, and so much more. To discover these exciting opportunities, visit recf.org and get connected.

[00:11:27]Ketaring University's cutting edge programs in their experiential co-op model seamlessly blend the professional and academic worlds, offering hands-on, future focused learning that empower students pursue new ideas and inspires other institutions to follow their lead.

[00:11:39]Don't just be ahead of the curve, create the curve. Get more information at >> ketarine.edu/vex to destroy.