By Mia Hanuska
Sliding into the lineup as the team’s 13th official robot, Artemis showed the amazing hard work, skill, and improvement of Westmont’s Arrowbotics Club. From March 14-16 and April 5-7, Artemis competed toe-to-toe (or bumper-to-bumper) with 38 and 60 other robots, respectively. Performing at Sacramento Regional and East Bay Regional, Team 3482 watched as their robot excelled in this year’s FIRST Robotics challenge. With the fast-paced season, it can be easy to miss details, so here’s a little recap of everything robotics-related at Westmont High.
Meet Artemis
Artemis demonstrates the insane improvement the team has undergone since last year. Under the supervision of advisors Eric Hsu and Alfonso Garcia, the team made incredible changes, leading to the creation of an amazing bot. Artemis completes the 2024 challenge of shooting large foam rings, known as “notes,” into a “speaker” to score points. With a swerve drive, Artemis races across the field to pick up new notes from a human player dropping them into the arena. An over-the-bumper intake pivots to keep all mechanisms inside the chassis while driving and two Limelights allow for automatic note detection and collection. RGB LED underglow shows the drivers when a note has successfully been picked up and two lasers detect when a note is in the bot. A pivot allows Artemis to shoot notes from many locations on the field. If you’re interested in more information, check out the team’s Technical Binder found here.
Sacramento Regional
Sacramento Regional, taking place March 14-16, was the team’s first competition of the year, and they truly played a melody. Despite running into small problems with the bot, Arrowbotics quickly mastered the art of Gracious Professionalism™ in helping other teams, scouting, and making on-the-spot alterations. Placing 27 in qualification matches and then getting picked by teams 1662 and 7667 for Alliance 8, Artemis played two rounds of playoffs before elimination. Her best match was Quals 52 with a speedy cycle time and impeccable accuracy, along with a win of 56-42. The team is incredibly grateful to the FIRST volunteers at Pleasant Grove High School for not only hosting the competition but also for offering half of the official field to the team.
East Bay Regional
April 4-7, Arrowbotics competed at East Bay Regional against countless of the most competitive teams in the world. The bot ran into some problems during inspection but these were quickly fixed without much hassle. Artemis placed 19th out of 60 robots in qualifications and played amazingly with a record of 5-4-0 (wins-losses-ties). The match to remember was Quals 76 with great speed from Artemis and a win of 74-36. Team 3482 greatly appreciates the hard workers who judged, ran, and organized the FIRST competition at Berkeley High School, along with team 5419 Berkelium for helping them install polybelts on the robot and team 1678 Citrus Circuits for supplying them with spare parts from Citrus Service.
*Artemis on the field before a match.
*The 2024 Drive Team posing with Artemis (left to right): Alexis Habouzit (Operator), Yash Chitambar (Coach), Luke Hanuska (Driver), Beckett Wilder (Technician), Knox Friedman (Human Player).
*The team with Artemis after competing in Sacramento Regional.