Advice / Saying Elaboration Link
Fail Faster The robot is going to fail. Would you rather it fail on the field during a match, or at home, where we have time to fix it. Video
Steal from the best, and invent the rest. Dont reinvent the wheel. If we need an elevator for the robot, dont waste time designing one from scratch. Copy the design of another team with a good elevator. Then spend your time on the game specific part, like the end effector.
It’s not just drive practice for your driver. It’s drive practice for your robot.

Three phases of FRC robot life:

  • 1) Break-in. The “break” part of this phase should be taken literally. Drive the the crap out of it. When something breaks, fix it so that it won’t break again.
  • 2) Sweet spot. Eventually things kinda stop breaking. Enjoy the fruits of your labor.
  • 3) End of life. Things will wear out and start breaking again.

Ideally Phase 1 occurs in your shop before your first competition, and Phase 3 doesn’t start until after IRI (or Chezy if you prefer). Drive practice gets you through Phase 1 faster. Regular inspection and preventive maintenance keeps Phase 3 at bay. Building simpler robots gets you to the sweet spot faster and keeps you there longer, but it is not a requirement. Elite teams like 1323 are better at getting there and staying there. They move quick, have massive institutional knowledge, and put in the work many of us are unable or unwilling to do.

Context
You get out of this program exactly what you put into it. No more no less. We will not and cannot make you learn. The desire to learn, grow and improve must come from you. If you dont put in effort you will not learn.
K.I.S.S. Keep Is Super Simple
A jack of all trades is a master of none. It is better to do a few things well, then to do many things poorly.
Build within your means To have an effective robot it must be executed well in all areas.
Learn in the pre-season, execute in the build season. Its hard and takes time to learn how to build a robot. Learn as much as you can ahead of time. And you will be that much more prepared.
Touch it, Own it. When designing an intake, as soon as the robot touches a game piece, you want to have full control over it.
Make an accelerated schedule. We will fall behind either way. So make it accelerated, so its not as bad.
Low and centeral CoG Move the weight in - Good, Move the weight down - Better, Move the weight off - Best.
Aim for perfection, settle for excellence.
Your first idea is usually the worst. So come up with a few and analyze them.
Get enough sleep. Seriously. You. --> ZZZ
Fast is slow. Slow is fast. Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast.
Practice makes permanent. They say "practice makes perfect". Thats wrong. Practice makes permanent. So, practice the right thing.