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September Meeting
Announcement: The September meeting will be held on Wednesday the 13th at 5:00 PM in person at RCL and online via Google Meet. Visitors are welcome to attend in person and online. If you want to attend online, contact Bruce at president@circpeoria.org to get an invite. Standard meeting format will be followed: 1) Show and Tell; 2) Tech Talk- Initial Review of Pictorus; 3) Planning and Business; 4) Socialize. Details and directions to River City Labs (RCL) are on our meetings page.
Summary:
Show and Tell:
Bruce – 1) Ubuntu version best, LTS or Latest Version? Mike trusts LTS more because it is Long Term Support. Bruce had installed the latest version on his laptop over the weekend. He started the meeting using the latest version Linux distribution on his laptop to host the online portion of the meeting. Fairly quickly the video and audio kept disconnecting from the Google Meet. He switched to the Windows installation on his laptop to host the meeting online. That eventually crashed too. 2) For the Udemy online drone class, he has ordered copter pieces and watched some of the videos. He’s now waiting on the main package of motors and ESCs to arrive.
Peter – 1) Ordered a Photon 2 microcontroller that was on sale for ~$8 with no specific project in mind. He’s had good luck with a Photon 1 in the past and hopes the Photon 2 works well for his next project. 2) Subscribed to Midjourney for one year. Midjourney is an online tool similar to DALL-E. One difference is that one can upload images of themselves and use them. He’s just starting to learn this service.
Tech Talk: An Introduction to Pictorus Online Visual Programming Tool – Bruce
Shared FAQs and the basics of working with Pictorus programs in simulation mode. The tool is in beta mode, is intuitive, requires users to have some familiarity with controls engineering, is geared towards controlling micro-controllers that are running Linux at this time, and holds a lot of promise. Due to not having a specific cable, he was not able to show the flashing process.
Discussion:
Started discussing the possibility of running a Bot Boogaloo in the Spring of 2024. Nothing was decided and the club will continue the discussion online.
August 29, 2023 at 1:50 pm | Monthly Meeting Recaps, Uncategorized | No comment
October Meeting Will Be Online Only
We will be hosting tonight’s meeting online only, October 12, 2022. There will be no in person meeting at RCL for this meeting. Email the club president if you would like to attend online, and he’ll send you a link. We should be back to having the in-person option for meetings in November.
October 12, 2022 at 3:18 pm | Uncategorized | No comment
July Meeting Postponed Till the 20th
The July club meeting is postponed till Wednesday, July 20th. It will start at 5:00 PM. You can attend the meeting in person at River City Labs (RCL) or online via Google Hangouts. If you wish to attend online and are not a regular attendee, email president@circpeoria.org for an invite. Click on the Meetings tab to get a map to RCL and to learn more about our meetings.
July 12, 2022 at 9:33 pm | Uncategorized | No comment
Meeting Update
We’ve been meeting online throughout the COVID-19 pandemic using Google Hangouts. We’ve held regular monthly meetings and build sessions. The monthly meetings are held on the second Wednesday of the month. The build sessions are generally held on the fourth Wednesday of the month. Both are open to anyone. Details on them can be found on our Meetings page.
December 8, 2021 at 7:48 pm | Uncategorized | No comment
February Meeting Rescheduled
Due to the weather, we rescheduled the February meeting to Wednesday, 2/19/2020. We’ll meet at Germantown Hills Library meeting room at 5:00 PM. The meeting room is to the left as one walks into the library. Agenda: 1) Show and Tell, 2) Tech Talk: Mike will talk about PID Control, and 3) Beloved Business Stuff. There will NOT be a build session due to lack of time and being in a library instead of a shop. We will need to be out by 6:45ish at the latest, though the library would like us out by 6:30. (They close the building at 7:00). Hope to see you there.
February 12, 2020 at 3:41 pm | Monthly Meeting Recaps, Uncategorized | No comment
December Meeting Canceled
Due to our schedules becoming more congested and conflicted than normal, we have decided to cancel the CIRC December meeting. The January meeting is on Wednesday, 1/8/2020, at 5:00 PM at River City Labs. See directions on the Meetings page.
December 16, 2019 at 8:59 am | Monthly Meeting Recaps, Uncategorized | No comment
December meeting date moved to the 18th
We moved the December meeting date to the third Wednesday, 12/18/19. It will still start at 5:00 PM and be held at River City Labs, 7916 N.Hale Ave., Peoria, IL. The new twist we will add to the meeting is to have a build session after the meeting. This means that our general meeting agenda will be
- Show & Tell
- Tech Talk
- Business
- Build Session
Hope to see you there.
December 8, 2019 at 7:50 pm | Uncategorized | No comment
Bot Boogaloo Fall 2019 Announcement
We will host our second Boogaloo of the year, Bot Boogaloo Fall 2019!! It will be similar to our Spring event with the addition of a RoboMagellan contest. The date is set for Saturday, November 9, 2019. We will have it at Illinois Central College in East Peoria, Illinois, in room 212/213 of the Academic Building, same place as last Spring. Parking will be in Lot V. If it is full, Lot C will work well. Note that College Drive is a one way road going counter clockwise.
The competition will start around 10:00 AM and finish in the early afternoon. People can arrive as early as 8:30 AM. Contestant check in is from 9:00 AM to 9:40 AM. The order of events will be weather dependent. We will have the indoor events when rain and/or snow is most expected and the RoboMagellan outdoors when rain and/or snow is least expected. If there is snow, we’ll shovel or get clever or go inside. The final decision will be made Saturday morning.
What is a Bot Boogaloo? Last Spring it was a lot of fun and with the addition of RoboMagellan, it should be better. The events with links to their respective rules are listed below. Two of the events are of our own making.
We will accept mail-in entries. If you are mailing in an entry, email me so we can anticipate your robot(s).
Registration via BuildersDB is closed. Walk ins are welcome Saturday morning during the check in time. Please email me if you plan on entering Saturday morning. It’s not mandatory, but will help us plan and get better organized. president@circpeoria.org
Events
Sumo: Autonomous sumo bots (example video):
Mini Sumo (500 g)
Mega Sumo (3 kg)
Line Course: Autonomous line following bots (example video):
Line Following
Line Maze
Cone Stalking: Autonomous indoor cone touching bots Cone Stalking rules
Art Bot: Something fun and free form. Art Bot rules
RoboMagellan: We’ll use Seattle Robotics Society’s RoboMagellan rules
Schedule This schedule is approximate.
August 19, 2019 at 4:32 pm | Brawls & Boogaloos, Uncategorized | No comment
August Meeting Canceled
The August meeting is canceled. We will resume our monthly meetings on Wednesday, September 9th, 2019 at 5:00 PM at River City Labs.
August 11, 2019 at 6:10 pm | Monthly Meeting Recaps, Uncategorized | No comment
Bot Brawl 19
Bot Brawl 19 will be held on August 10, 2019 at the Peoria Civic Center in Peoria, IL. This event will once again be part of Ignite Peoria and the Midwest MakerFest. This is our fourth year of teaming up with these great groups and we are excited to be a part of it. The Midwest MakerFest is the largest MakerFest in the Midwest, and the Bot Brawl is one of the premier RC combat contests in the Midwest! There will be art & craft exhibits, dance performances, maker demonstrations, and maker exhibits going on all day long in addition to the Bot Brawl. This event is a great blend of all sorts of creative energies. Entry is free.
As of May 6th, registration is full for Bot Brawl 19. We will not be expanding the number of robots to compete. If you would like to be on our notification list, please contact Bruce Stott at president@circpeoria.org. I will notify people on the list if I notice any changes to registration. We can’t reserve spots. People drop out at all times of the day. I suggest that you monitor the registration at Builders Database. The filling of the vacant spots will be on a first come first served basis. Three spots are open for Beetleweight!!
Bot Brawl 19 will feature the following events:
- Antweight (1 lb) RC Combat
- Beetleweight (3 lb) RC Combat
Each event class is limited to 24 bots.
Rules for the events are available on our website, here. We encourage all competitors to ask questions beforehand that they have on the rules. This prevents competitors having to make rushed repairs on the day of the competition and/or getting disqualified. It is the competitors responsibility to know the rules. We will do our best to apprise people of changes made to rules, but we do not guarantee it. IMPORTANT: The rules were tweaked already this year regarding the size limit.
Maps and directions. Parking information is available here. We will be in Exhibit Hall C. Fulton parking lot works well. The Marquee parking lot works well also with a little bit more walking.
Competition Schedule: Once the competition starts, we will do our best to maintain this schedule, but flexibility may be required. It is all competitors responsibility to monitor the competition and be ready when it is their time to compete.
A BIG thanks to this year’s sponsors helping us to make Bot Brawl 19 more fun than it should be humanly possible!!
May 4, 2019 at 9:20 am | Brawls & Boogaloos, Uncategorized | No comment
