Oxford High School VEX Robotics Club
Introduction
What every robotics club should know – whether it be VRC or FRC.
Disclaimer – some of this material is pulled from VEX Robotics Curriculum and is not original
material.
What is Robotics?
A robot is a programmable mechanical device that can perform tasks and interact with its
environment, without the aid of human interaction. Robotics is the science and technology
behind the design, manufacturing and application of robots.
Basic Components of a Robot
The components of a robot are the body/frame, control system, manipulators, and drivetrain.
Body/frame: The body or frame can be of any shape and size. Essentially, the body/frame
provides the structure of the robot. Most people are comfortable with human-sized and shaped
robots that they have seen in movies, but the majority of actual robots look nothing like humans.
(NASA’s Robonaut, pictured in the previous section is an exception.) They are typically
designed more for function than appearance.
Control System: The control system of a robot is equivalent to the central nervous system of a
human. It coordinates and controls all aspects of the robot. Sensors provide feedback based on
the robot’s surroundings, which is then sent to the Central Processing Unit (CPU). The CPU
filters this information through the robot’s programming and makes decisions based on logic.
The same can be done with a variety of inputs or human commands.
Manipulators: To fulfill their purposes, many robots are required to interact with their
environment, and the world around them. Sometimes they are required to move or reorient
objects from their environments without direct contact by human operators. Unlike the
Body/frame and the Control System, manipulators are not integral to a robot, i.e. a robot can
exist without a manipulator.
Drivetrain: Although some robots are able to perform their tasks from one location, it is often a
requirement of robots that they are able to move from location to location. For this task, they
require a drivetrain. Drivetrains consist of a powered method of mobility. Humanoid style
robots use legs, while most other robots will use some sort of wheeled solution.
Examples of some real life robots
Robots in Education
The field of robotics has become an exciting and accessible tool for teaching and supporting
science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM), design principles, and problem solving.
Robotics enables students to use their hands and minds to create like an engineer, artist, and
technician does, all at once. It allows for instantaneous application of scientific and
mathematical principals.
In today's education system with its budgetary constraints, middle and high schools are on a
constant search for cost-effective exciting ways to deliver high-impact programs that integrate
technology with multiple disciplines while preparing students for careers in the twenty-first
century. Educators quickly see the advantages that robotics projects and curriculum provide by
linking in a cross-curriculum method with other disciplines. Additionally, robotics can provide
more affordability and reusability of equipment as compared to other prepackaged options.
Today more than ever, schools are adopting robotics in the classroom to revitalize curriculum
and meet ever increasing academic standards required for students. Robotics not only has a
unique and broad appeal throughout various teaching fields, but it is quite possibly the technical
field that will have the largest influence upon our society throughout the next century.
Why is Robotics Important?
As we saw in the uses and examples of robotics section, robotics is an emerging field with
applications in many facets of our lives. It is important for all members of society to have an
understanding of the technology that surrounds us. However, robotics is important for more than
that reason. Robotics provides a unique combination of the pillars of STEM: science, technology,
engineering and math. When taught in schools, it allows students to experience a true
interdisciplinary lesson while studying a cutting edge and exciting topic. Also, the aesthetics
which go into the design and creation of robots allow students to experiment with an artistic side,
while working through technical principals. This combination rewards participants on a plethora
of different learning levels (VEX Robotics Curriculum).
Oxford Robotics
We are a VEX Robotics team based at Oxford High School competing in many local competitions in which
we have won many awards including tournament champions and the VEX Excellence Award. Previously
headed by Greg Darin, the new mentor of the group is Kenneth Spinka both educators in technology. Some of
the games we have competed in were Gateway, Sack Attack, Toss Up, and Skyrise. Here are some of the
robots we have designed for competition. Check out our website for more information.
Your Future with Robotics
VEX Robotics is a great way to demonstrate an interest in STEM to colleges. I strongly recommend
participating in VEX for anyone interested in any science, engineering, math, or management career as it is a
phenomenal stepping stone as well as an educational experience that will help you with all of your future
endeavors.
The career opportunities in the STEM field are never ending and interesting. And if that’s still not enough, they
pay pretty well too.
What is VEX?
The VEX Robotics Design System offers students an exciting platform for learning about areas rich with
career opportunities spanning science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). These are just a few of the
many fields students can explore by creating with VEX Robotics technology. Beyond science and engineering
principles, a VEX Robotics project encourages teamwork, leadership and problem solving among groups. It
also allows educators to easily customize projects to meet the level of students’ abilities. The affordable VEX
platform is expanding rapidly and is now found in middle schools, high schools and university labs around the
globe. Robotics hobbyists also appreciate the advanced capabilities of the VEX System.
In other words, VEX is the company that issues a new game every year for thousands students interested in
math and science to compete in through robotics. They usually post the new game online sometime in March
every year during the VEX World Championships which feature teams from all over the U.S. and other
countries. These games have objectives and limits which teams have to follow in order to succeed in the
competition and move on to regional and national competitions. All parts are purchased from VEX in order to
construct your robot.
Positions
Build Season Positions
During the build season, members of the Oxford robotics team will be able to choose at least one area that they
are interested in: CAD, Mechanical Design & Building, Electrical & Programing, Finances, and Media. All
are categories that are critical to the success of a competitive VEX Robotics team. Without any one of these
sub-teams, it would be extremely difficult to function.
Depending upon the number of students in the club, students may belong to more than one sub-team or might
have to stick with only one. The work load will be spread out between these teams in order to build the
functioning robot and accomplish the difficult tasks and goals set by the team each year.
CAD Team – responsible for creating virtual models of the robot design and its parts, and allows the team to
make large design changes without wasting expensive materials
Mechanical Design & Build – responsible designing each subsystem of the robot, presenting their ideas, and
for prototyping and building the robot itself
Electrical & Programming – takes care of programming all aspects of the robot that the mechanical team
builds and uses strategy to determine how to create winning autonomous routines for the robot using sensors.
Also responsible for wiring the robot
Fundraising – raises funds for the team and makes it possible to buy new parts each year and pay for
registering for competitions (depending on the time of year more people will be focused on fundraising)
Media – responsible for keeping the team website up to date with information, pictures and video, CAD, etc.
Takes pictures and video of design process, building robots, presentations & major meetings, competitions,
etc. Also puts videos of robot on YouTube channel.
Each of these five groups will have an elected leader that will head their efforts and work with the other leaders
and student leaders to build the robot. Additionally, the leader of each subgroup should attempt to pass on
knowledge to the underclassmen while working with them to lessen any learning curve in future years.
These sub-teams are held together by the student leaders as well as the team mentor. This keeps the entire
engineering process running smoothly. Without constant teamwork and cooperation, the entire end goal will
not be achieved. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the leaders to fully integrate each sub-team and their ideas.
The student leaders – Chief Engineer, Treasurer, and Secretary – of the Oxford Robotics club will be elected
by the entire club and will also work to ensure that the whole process proceeds as it should. The Chief
Engineer is the main contributor and keeper of the engineering notebook which documents the design process
from the beginning of the year depicting all ideas, changes, and calculations. More information can be found
on the engineering notebook on the VEX website. Also, the notebook is used by judges during the competition
to determine the winners of certain awards. The Treasurer monitors the funds of the club and from all
donations, sponsors, and fundraisers. They also register the team for competitions and help in the ordering of
necessary parts. The Secretary is responsible for starting meetings with a sort of to-do list or itinerary in order
to make sure everyone is doing what needs to be done. They also take note of attendance in the beginning of
meetings.
Obviously there is some flexibility in all these positions and the team can decide how it will work best for them
and who will work best in what positions.
Competition Positions
During the completion there are also new positions to be filled. These include a driver and drive team, scouts,
pit team, among a few others.
 Driver/drive team – should be experienced with driving the robot and very familiar with the
rules and regulations of the current game and the teams strategy
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Scouts – find alliance partners to discuss strategy in upcoming matches, interview teams
about their robots in order to gain information on their abilities and autonomous routines,
looks for potential alliance partners for the elimination rounds
Pit team – fixes any problems with robot, charges batteries, replaces broken parts, etc.
Schedule manager – ensures that the drive team makes it on time to each match
Programmers – fix any coding/control issues and is in charge of driver and autonomous
challenges
Media – takes pictures of robot and competition as well as videos of some matches for
website and YouTube
Meetings and Schedule
Each meeting will be led by the Student Leaders and mainly the Secretary who will outline what needs to be
accomplished. In our experience, meeting once a week during build season was inadequate even when take
the robot home on weekends. I would recommend having two meetings a week during the build season
(usually the first two quarters of the school year). If this is impossible I would at least recommend having one
longer session as only a couple hours is barely enough to get everyone in the Tech Ed room after school get the
robotics equipment out and then pack it up. (Keep in mind that FIRST Robotics teams only have 6 weeks to
design and build their robot and they meet almost every day for those weeks.)
To start up a meeting it would be preferable to have the Secretary to outline what has to be accomplished in
order to stay on task. However, this should be brief as you cannot waste too much of the valuable time by just
talking to the group.
In the beginning of the year, the first week should be used to organized the club again and assign positions
each year according to the outline below. The next 2-3 weeks should be used by each of the new subgroups,
especially the mechanical design groups to do research, brainstorm ideas and test small prototypes. CAD
should also be used at this point in order to model the ideas. At the end of this period, each group should
present their ideas (ex. the drivetrain group makes a short presentation about all of their ideas and discusses the
pros and cons to the group). Taking this information, the leaders of each of the four groups should meet with
the Chief Engineer in order to choose which designs will work best together and produce a winning robot.
This is where a lot of cooperation will be critical and compromise will be necessary.
Next, once each team knows what design they will be testing, the build starts. Once again this should be
completed in 2-3 weeks so that the teams can start to test their components. This can be done through more in
depth prototyping. Then work to assemble them together in order to have the initial robot that can start to be
tested and improved even more.
Perhaps something won’t work right or there is room for improvement and the group can collaborate to fix
these issues. The team should take the next few weeks to tests and redesign and build the robot. This will be
the “final” build although it is completely okay and encouraged to continuously redesign and improve the
robot throughout the season.
So with one week for organization and three 2-3 week periods for designing and building, a decent robot
should take shape by mid-November. This is a great schedule because the first competitions are usually late
November or December and last until March. During this time the robot will only get better and the drivers
more experienced.
The Game
The game will be available sometime in March through VEX or on sites like YouTube. Each game is played
on a 12 foot by 12 foot foam tile field with foot high walls. Each alliance consists of two teams (two robots)
who compete with two other robots to score more points during the allowed time. The time consists of a 15
second autonomous period and a minute and 45 second period of driver control. At the end of the match, the
referees count up how many points are awarded to each team and a winner is declared. Normally, a day’s
competition consist of around 5-7 qualifying matches and then the top eight team choose two other teams for
alliances in the elimination rounds.
Here are some pictures of practice fields that we built at home, outside of school, in order to practice and test
the robot on the weekends.
How to Design
One of the best resources for learning about how to design a VEX robot is available on their website for VEX
curriculum. It details how different parts are used and how they can be combined to create subsystems such as
a drivetrain, lift, and object manipulator. They show you how to go through the Engineering Design Process of
Understanding the problem, Explore, Define, Ideate, Prototype, Choose, Refine, Present, Implement, Test,
Iterate. I would highly recommend reading through at least some of their information which can be found in a
link at the end of this document.
Autodesk Inventor
A helpful tool for designing your robot and testing out ideas without having to order new parts or cut down
existing ones is Autodesk Inventor, a 3D modeling software. If you have any experience with CAD or other
Autodesk programs you shouldn’t have a problem with using Inventor. Autodesk offers their software for free
to all students who make an account (link at the end to download). The software will take up about 15GB but I
would say it is worth it. Just make sure your computer can handle it. Higher level processors and graphics
cards really help here. And another thing that makes the whole process a lot easier – VEX Wiki and many
other sites offer all of their part files for download. And to make it even better, most of these come with imates.
If you are not familiar with imates, they are basically half of a constraint and when you go to constrain two part
files together in Inventor you can simply click on a part, hold down the ALT key and choose a imate (small
white dot) which will turn green and drag it to the imate of another part in order to constrain them. This often
has to be done twice to fully constrain the two parts but it saves a lot of time, aggravation, and effort as you
don’t have to constrain every surface yourself.
Now if none of what I have said so far has made any sense, don’t worry. There are many Inventor tutorials
online on YouTube just check out their channel in the link at the end of this document. And many people post
videos on how to use imates with VEX parts as well. This is what the CAD team will be doing.
How to Build
Now for the actual building of the robot. – the fun part. Or so you thought.
No it is actually fun, but things are bound to go wrong and you are going to have to solve these problems in
order to be successful. But hopefully you made some CAD models to avoid any major problems.
My advice in building a robot with VEX parts is to make your robot as robust as possible. Tighten all your
screws and nuts well and don’t leave anything to chance – you’ll thank me later. Also, look to other teams and
use resources online to see how others build robots and then add your spin on them. Do your research and
make prototypes. The only way to build an amazing robot is to have experience so work as much as you can
with the parts.
I can’t be too detailed here, but if you want, check out our video on how to build a robot when we build two
robots to have people fight in a fundraiser on Oxford Day. We will try to have more information and talk about
what we have learned over the years.
Robot Subsystems & System Integration
Once the design teams have presented their best solutions to their part of the design, the process of combining
these subsystems begins. This is accomplished by the cooperation between each sub-team leader and the Chief
Engineer.
In competitive robotics the robots are typically divided down into subsystems that perform different functions.
Some of these systems will stretch throughout the robot while others will consist of only a single mechanism.
An example list of subsystems is shown below:
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Power
Control
Sensors
Pneumatics
Drivetrain
Lifting Mechanism
Object Manipulator
Each of these subsystems could be designed independently, but each is dependent on all the others. In order
for the overall robot to function effectively, each of these systems must work together. In order to design any
one of these systems, one must have knowledge of the others. Each of these subsystems will have its own
individual design process as part of the overall design process; any requirements on the way the subsystems
interact as part of the systems integration would be treated as Specifications (design constraints) in Step 3 of
the design process described in Unit 1.
For example, if the robot has a maximum size requirement, each subsystem may need to nest together such
that the overall system “fits in the box.” In this scenario each subsystem may be given a specified amount of
“robot real estate” that it must stay within and specified ways they would interface with the others. For
example, the claw must start within an imaginary 3” x 3” x 5” tall box located at the very front of the robot. It
is 2” off the ground, and it attaches to the robot arm at the lower, rear center of this imaginary box using a
specified hole pattern (VEX Robotics Curriculum).
Testing and Reiteration
There is no such thing as the perfect robot, but if you want your robots to perform as close as you expect it to,
testing and redesigning is essential. When you test your robot you will find out what works well and what
doesn’t. You will find out what needs to be improved and you can go from there. One of the worst examples
of this was in with our first Toss Up robot. When we go to the competition we realized that we had designed
the arm to reach the cylindrical goals, but since the intake was mounted lower, we couldn’t even score in them.
Luckily we were able to fix this, but it would have been much easier had we checked for this beforehand.
Again in Skyrise, we designed a passive grabber for the Skyrise pieces, but only at the competition did we find
out that once we picked up the pieces, it was hard to get them off of the grabber.
Moral of the story, get your designing and building done early so you can test your design in the field because
not everything works out like you would expect it to.
Fundraising and Sponsors
If it didn’t sound hard enough already, then it’s about to get even worse. All of the parts for your robot cost
money. A lot of money – in fact, even entering a completion costs about $100. So get started with your
fundraising early and go track down some sponsors, they will rarely come to you.
In the past we have run a few fundraisers including a Beard Wars competition where we got a handful of male
teachers to agree to grow out their beards for a month while students deposited money (mainly their changed
after lunch) into buckets labeled with each teachers name. The teachers with the most money at the end of the
week were then entered into a raffle where the student with the winning ticket chose how the teacher would
have to style his beard. It was a great way to raise money and awareness of the robotics club.
Also, this year we are building two simple robots that we will allow people at Oxford Day to fight if they pay
us a certain amount of money. We will also be promoting our club and might even get sponsors from other
local organizations.
And if the last competition of the year is around March, why not use the rest of the year to get as much money
as possible to pay for next year’s parts and competition fees. This way, you can get right to work next year
when you have to build the robot.
Budgeting
The team Treasurer is the one who is in charge of budgeting. He/she must be able to judge how much money
we need and figure out how much we have. They should know to set aside around $500 just for competitions
in one year and more funds for new parts. The costs really add up when parts are constantly being used. The
Treasurer should also be active in the ordering of new parts and should be able to determine if the parts that are
being purchased are really necessary and would help the team win.
Competition Day
The day of competition can get pretty crazy, especially when the competition area is far away from the pit or
where your robot and supplies are kept.
Normally VEX Competitions start early in the day (around 7 a.m. when you are still trying to wake up) and
you have to have some way to transport the robot and all of the supplies to the location of the competition. And
when you get there and get set up at your table, you then have to get your robot approved and check in. Make
sure you robot is within specs and you should be fine. Next up is the qualifying rounds where in every game,
you are matched with one other team as an alliance and you have to compete with two other robots. The drive
team (1 driver and 2 coaches) is in charge at this point. After the qualification matches, the top teams choose
alliances and from there go the elimination rounds until the Championship match. After that, the judges give
out many awards that can be won. And that is generally how a competition day goes.
You can also enter the Drivers Challenge where your robot alone tries to score as many points as possible or
the Autonomous Challenge where the same objective is there, but the only thing driving the robot is
preprogrammed routines.
Check out the VEX website for a full list of awards that can be won in competition and check out
RobotEvents.com to see the dates of all local competitions and register ahead of time or you won’t get a spot.
Scouting
Scouting is something that isn’t critical but could help your team advance through the competition easily and
yield better results. Generally, anyone who isn’t driving, coaching or fixing the robot should be scouting to see
what the other teams in your future alliances want to do strategy wise and which starting square to start from.
They can also find out what the enemy alliance normally does in order to gain an upper hand.
There is an example for a scouting form from the Toss Up competition on Oxford Robotics’ Google Drive
account that can be modified for future use. It can be used by phones to update a central spreadsheet on the
Drive if shared with all of the scouts.
Of course this is not the only way and if you find it easier to simply write things down or just talk to teams, it is
up to you.
Here is what VEX says about scouting:
Scouting:
The best way to gain an advantage over an opposing robot is to know its strengths and weaknesses, as well as
being able to predict its behavior. How can a team learn all this information? By a simple process known as
“scouting.” Scouting consists of watching the matches of the other competing robots and recording the key
information about their design and behavior. Things to look for include:
 Robot Functionality
 How well does the robot move?
 Does the robot have the capability to pick up the different types of objects?
 How does the robot score the different type of objects?
 Robot Behavior
 How many points did they score in each match? (An exact number)
 How many of each type did they score?
 What do they do at the start of the match? At the end of the match?
 What is their general strategy?
 When do they like to score?
 What is their general match flow?
By knowing what an opponent typically does in a match, a team can choose the appropriate strategy from their
playbook based on what they expect to see in an upcoming match. This will allow a team to maximize the
potential of their robot.
During a competition teams should be scouting all of the matches, including their own. An exercise to be done
before competition would be to have the teams each make up a “scouting sheet”. Each sheet would be a form
to be filled out for each match, with fields to capture the data that team feels is most important. During the
competition, students on the team would fill out a sheet for every team in every match. These sheets could
then be used for quick reference when preparing for matches.
To take things to the next level, teams can compile the data they have collected to calculate statistics to
determine which robot is really the “best”. For example, “Team X is the best football scoring robot, scoring
4.3 footballs per match.”
VEX Awards and Engineering Notebook
Here is a list of awards that are given in most VEX competitions:
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Tournament Champions
Excellence Award
Robot Skills Champion
Programming Skills Champion
Tournament Finalists
Amaze Award
Build Award
Create Award
Innovate Award
Think Award
Judges’ Award
One of the most important things that will help your team win these awards (other than your robot doing
extremely well) is having a detailed, well-kept Engineering Notebook.
Check out some examples online, but an Engineering Notebook should include all information from
brainstorming ideas to the final product. And each entry should be labeled with a date and signature along with
any other pertinent information. This is one of the biggest jobs of the Chief Engineer who much keep track of
all of the ideas of each of the subgroups. But he should not be the sole contributor to the book. If any of the
groups or individuals have ideas, they should be free to add on the book.
Here’s some advice from VEX:
Design Award
The Design Award is presented to a team that demonstrates an organized and professional approach to the
design process, project and time management and team organization. At the 2014 VEX Robotics World
Championship only teams that have previously won an Excellence or Design Award will be eligible to sign up
for an interview time slot. Teams eligible for this award at World Championship will be assigned a 10 minute
time slot during which the team will set up and deliver a presentation to judges. The winning team will be able
to describe how they implemented an efficient and productive design process to accomplish the project goals.
Teams may sign up for interviews beginning February 1st at: http://www.robotevents.com/vexawards/.
Engineering Notebook
One of the primary missions of the VEX Robotics Competition is to help students acquire real world life skills
that will benefit them in their academic and professional future. The Engineering Notebook is a way for teams
to document how the VEX Robotics Competition experience has helped them to better understand the
engineering design process while also practicing a variety of critical life skills including project management,
time management, brainstorming and teamwork. The Engineering Notebook requirement of the Design
Award has no specified format; each notebook should be created through a concerted effort by a team to
document their design decisions. Throughout the season, many larger events will send their Design Award
winner to a state or regional Championship, and as a result, teams should start their notebooks early and update
them often. At the 2014 VEX Robotics World Championship, only teams that have kept Engineering
Notebooks will be eligible for the Design Award. Engineering is an iterative process. Iteration requires a
student to recognize and define a problem, brainstorm and work through various stages of the design process,
test their designs, continue to improve their designs, and continue the process until a solution has been
identified. During this process, students will come across obstacles, encounter instances of success and failure,
and learn many lessons. It is this process that students should document in their Engineering Notebook.
Additionally, the Engineering Notebook is an opportunity to document everything a team does so that it can
serve as a historical guide of lessons learned and best practices.
Students may include a plethora of things in their Engineering Notebook including: team meeting notes,
design concepts and sketches, pictures, notes from competitions, biographies of team members (students,
teachers and mentors), team members’ observations and thoughts, team organization practices, and any other
documentation that a team finds useful. The team should also document their project management practices
including their use of personnel, financial, and time resources.
Judging Engineering Notebook
Creating and maintaining an Engineering Notebook is in no way “required or mandated” for teams
participating in the overall VEX Robotics Competition. Although the Engineering Notebook is not required,
maintaining an Engineering Notebook is highly recommended because the process can have many benefits for
the team. For instance, the development of technical writing skills is a valuable tool to acquire. There are two
awards given at the VEX World Championship (and some local events) which requires teams present their
Engineering Notebook to the judges - the Design Award and the Excellence Award. All teams are encouraged
to create an Engineering Notebook and bring it to events to show and discuss with Judges. If an event has
scheduled judging sessions teams should bring their engineering notebook to the session. Judges are always
interested in learning and seeing the various skills students acquire and demonstrate through their participation
in the VEX Robotics Competition. Teams are welcome to bring support materials, flyers, team promotional
materials and items such as an Engineering Notebook to events to share with judges. It is encouraged that all
members of a team contribute to this project throughout the season.
Key Criteria:
1) Engineering Notebook is a clear, complete document of the team’s design process
2) Team is able to explain their design and strategy throughout the season
3) Team demonstrates personnel, time and resource management through the season
4) Teamwork and interview quality
Media
Media is necessary to keep our website and YouTube channel up to date which will attract new participants,
inspire others, and contribute to our team for awards during competition. Additionally, in future years when the
robots are taken apart we still have some record and information on how the others were build which could be
helpful later on. Plus who doesn’t want to take pictures of the awesome robot you just made. They will last a
lifetime.
So take as many photos of the robot, of the team, of the team with the robot, of the team building the robot and
record those epic autonomous routines and innovations with a couple videos. You will be glad you did.
Outreach
Lastly being part of the VEX program it is also your job to inspire others around you – especially those
younger than you. So show off your hard work and maybe try to mentor a younger team. Inspiring others is
just another benefit of the program. Let them enjoy the same enthralling experience as you have and help them
reach the same success that you have.
Links
VEX Curriculum
http://curriculum.vexrobotics.com/curriculum
VEX Robotics Website (parts)
http://www.vexrobotics.com/vex?ref=hometile
Robot Events (Competition Registration)
http://www.robotevents.com/
Oxford Robotics Website
http://oxfordrobotics.weebly.com/
Oxford Robotics YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCR8Cc_EH-EkTezJiPvLivtQ
Autodesk Inventor Student Download
http://www.autodesk.com/education/free-software/inventor-professional
Autodesk Inventor Tutorial
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0y73dD7p4gjV2x9etIeL4w
Have Fun!