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CAD for Robotics Competitions

Matt_ShieldsMatt_Shields Member, Onshape Employees Posts: 964 PRO
in Educator Discussion
Are you using our CAD for Robotics Competitions course?  We'd love to know how it's going.  Share tips, post pictures of your models, tell us your favorite unit, or let us know how you've expanded or extended it.  

Comments

  • billy2billy2 Member, OS Professional, Mentor, Developers, User Group Leader Posts: 2,129 PRO
    Go scan the public documents and search on robotics. There's a lot.
  • erik_orlowskierik_orlowski Member Posts: 2 EDU
    @Matt_Shields, the content looks really good. I'm running an FRC team and planning our preseason. Do you have any idea when the FRC version of these lessons will be available and if the FRC "assemble a robot" lesson will be using the MKCAD app that most FRC teams use?
  • Matt_ShieldsMatt_Shields Member, Onshape Employees Posts: 964 PRO
    @erik_orlowski, sorry I'm just seeing this but hopefully you saw that the FRC Assemble a Drivetrain lesson is out and it is using MKCAD!

  • kimberly_hoggkimberly_hogg Member Posts: 2 EDU
    Hi team - I'm just looking at it now for some post-season development of our students. 

    I'm in Intro to Onshape - VEX and am looking at the second part of the lesson, Navigating OnShape. In the subsection, "Teams and Designers Using Onshape", some existing robot models are shared, and the first instruction is "Move the scoop arm up and down," but I can't find any instructions on how to accomplish this. From my previous experience I understand this to involve animating a revolute fasten, but I don't see how to do this in the model, and I don't know how students will understand this from the directions so far in the lesson. Perhaps I sped past something important, but I don't want students who are self-pacing to be frustrated here. Any tips or help to guide a teacher and student here?
  • Matt_ShieldsMatt_Shields Member, Onshape Employees Posts: 964 PRO
    Good point.  We should add some clarification.  When you're in the lesson, you can click the "View their Onshape Document" link and that will open the robot.  It should open in the Assembly 1 tab.  You could scroll all the way to the bottom and animate one of the mates like Revolute 11.  Or, you should be able to just click and drag the arm.


  • wendy_stallings371wendy_stallings371 Member Posts: 2 EDU
    I'm looking through the intro to Onshape for FTC ti possibly use with my FTC team for training over the summer. Under the navigating the field page, there is no link to the FTC field and I couldn't find it by searching in Onshape. How do the students get to that activity?
  • Matt_ShieldsMatt_Shields Member, Onshape Employees Posts: 964 PRO
    If you go to the first unit, here:

    https://learn.onshape.com/learn/article/intro-to-onshape

    It's in the FTC document, here:

    https://cad.onshape.com/documents/659db894619b28d801f7dc93/w/167de2e3cb212f633992f140/e/da9f53fc2e50424b9a57b28e


  • tyler_heasleytyler_heasley Member Posts: 2 ✭
    I'm an FRC student who's new to onshape. I was taking your FRC drive train lesson and noticed that quite a few things where different in the MKCad inserter; Especially when I was doing the section on westcoast drive, there where many parts in the instructions that I could not find in MKCad.
  • Matt_ShieldsMatt_Shields Member, Onshape Employees Posts: 964 PRO
    Thanks for reaching out!  Glad you're using Onshape with FRC and that you're going through our CAD for Robotics Competitions course.  I think you will find the MKCad library invaluable. 

    Unfortunately, since we here at Onshape do not own the MKCad library, it sometimes updates without our knowledge.  Thanks for pointing it out and we will be sure to update our curriculum for the next release.  In the meantime, you should be able to make it through the curriculum with some substitutions. 

    Please reach out with any other questions and good luck with the season!
  • MikeReillyLHSMikeReillyLHS Member Posts: 1 EDU

    Does anyone have a classtime estimate on how these lessons take? Not critical, just planning. Thanks!

  • Matt_ShieldsMatt_Shields Member, Onshape Employees Posts: 964 PRO

    On the main page for the course in the Learning Center, each unit has an approximate number of instructional hours. It's pretty rough, hopefully helpful.

  • melissa_eker199melissa_eker199 Member Posts: 6 EDU

    Hello all-
    I have been working through the first two CAD for robotics units with my Engineering CAD classes.
    I have found that the estimated instructional hours is a bit more than necessary, but these Units are great for starting into robotics. I suppose it is always good to have too much time.

    FYI, there is a gif where the 15 mm metal brackets are not flush and in front of the channel in the assemble a drivetrain unit (right side). I love that my students caught this and that they realize it is a mistake. Still, excellent job preparing all these visual gifs. They are fantastic!!!

    My Engineering CAD classes have just completed Assemble a drivetrain 4-5 class periods and Creating Custom Components 2-3 class periods.
    I teach sophomores and they compete in FTC as part of their junior classes, so hopefully this will prepare them well for that.
    We will venture into the CAD for robotics - collaboration portion of this less next week, in small groups.
    Looking ahead, the document guides them through an FRC robot. I coach an FRC team and have coached a VEX team too, but am wondering if it makes more sense to have them collab on an FTC document? I am excited to guide them through some of the collab tools that Onshape has. I am even more excited for the CAD for Robotics Manufacturing course!
    THANK you so much for all your work on these materials. It has helped me take risks & make some changes in the department with Onshape.

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