Notebook Guide

An engineering notebook is a collection of ideas, thoughts, trials, experiments, people, and time put onto paper. It keeps track of your past, present, and possible futures for your robot, code, and team. It is space for everyone to keep track of what they do and want to do in the future in robotics.

In your notebook, you should use a design process: This is the set of steps that you go through to design each part of a robot; code, mechanisms, team techniques, and all. Here is the design process we recommend to use in your first year notebook:

1. Decide what the problem is:

What are you going to work on next? The problem can be something as broad as “we don’t have a lift mechanism on our bot” or as detailed as “some of the spacing is irregular between the wheels.” Just pinpoint what you want to fix.

2. Determine what the solution must include or work around:

Does the mechanism have to fit in a specific space? Does it need to be light or heavy? Does it need specific qualities to be successful? What are the most important qualities that it needs? What are traits you want to avoid?

3. Brainstorm possible solutions:

Write down ideas, draw rough pictures, and throw any idea down on the page. DO NOT just write down the ideas that are realistic or easy- don’t shoot down ideas. Brainstorm with teammates and write down EVERY idea, not just the “good” ones. Now is not the time to decide what a good idea is vs. what a bad idea is.

4. Decide on a solution to try and prototype:

Look at what you brainstormed and decide on your approach. Maybe two ideas from the brainstorm will work together, maybe part of one and part of another idea, or maybe just one idea you brainstormed will be the most appealing to try. Use step number 3 to help you decide on what you will try.

Build or code a rough draft. Focus more on the concept before working on the details. Write down how the prototyping goes and what exactly you did. Pictures and drawings are usually very helpful for future work, so those are definitely recommended.

5. Decide if the solution works:

Does it run okay? Was there anything you didn’t expect to happen that happened when you were creating it? Test the solution out and record the results. Does the solution work with what you wanted in step 3? If it does, go to step 8. If it does not, repeat step 5 with your new insight and work forward from there.

6. Use the final product:

How well did it work in matches and in tests? Is it quite what you wanted? Is there anything that could be improved? Are there future design ideas you would like to keep track of based off of this design?

Now that you have an idea of what a logbook is and what to do with it, here’s where you start:

(As you clearly title every page of course)

If you have a team that you’re sure you want to be on and is working out well, fill in the “meet the team” page. Include a picture, who’s who, and a small paragraph about each person. Include what their position on the team is, their grade, and when they joined the team. Try to leave space at the bottom for any late joiner to your team.

Next, write a game analysis: look at the rules for the game, things you find interesting, what the overarching point of the game is, then write about it. Try to write as if you are explaining the game to someone who knows what robots are but hasn’t become familiar with this year’s challenge.

Then, write a “Bot Brainstorm” page. Write down a few ideas of what kind of bots you want to build to best suit the game.

Then, write down a goal for the season. This should be no more than half a page, but you can include specifics like “this season, _____ wants to focus on improving their building speed, while ___ wants to learn the coding languages better than they did last year. As a team overall...”

And then you can get right in to the design process! Write down each step with your work like this:

“1.Decide what the problem is:

The problem that we want to start working on is the base of the robot, also called the chassi, because we need to decide what type of chassi best suits our robot.”

Include lots of pictures and drawings of what you do. It’s better to have an extra picture or two than to not have enough.

Some things NOT to do:

Don’t include any profanity- you can say things like “it was very frustrating that the build didn’t work out, so we decided to take a break for a few days.” but not “the @&*#$ idiot builder *$#&@ it up again so now we have to wait.” If a judge sees profanity, they will likely put your book to the side and not give it a chance. Yes, people have done it. Don't think judges will find it funny.

Don’t do massive blocks of text- its visually unappealing and judges will get bored. Include pictures, lots of different team members thoughts and ideas, drawings, or anything else you feel should be included.

Backdating or restarting a logbook is a big no no. If you must go back to change something, then add “Edited on _____” next to the original date.

Don’t have the logbook written by one person. It’s much more interesting to hear from lots of team member’s perspectives. If someone is reluctant to write their fair share, that is a big problem.

NEVER write in pencil. Write in blue or black pen ONLY or you will be docked points. If you need to, then just cross things out and write next to them.

Some things to aim for:

Keep things simple- this isn’t one of those essay grader bots online. If you can say it in one sentence, say it in one sentence.

Use color! Unless you like staring at black and white constantly, you should try coloring drawings or highlighting things that you feel should be highlighted.

Have each page dated, signed by those who wrote on it, and checked off by someone. If you would like me to check off pages, I’m happy to (but I would prefer you come to me every five or so pages, not every single page to keep things efficient and get it done together)

Write down topics and pages in the table of contents with their dates. It becomes incredibly helpful later on in the season.

Write about team dynamics! Did someone join the team? Did someone quit? Is everyone communicating well? Write it down.

Write down what happened at competitions. It shouldn’t be a play-by-play of every single little thing, but write about patterns, how you felt that you did, and how you could do better, as well as what awards you won.

Write goals down if you think of new ones! Always be working towards something in the far future, whether that is at the end of the next competition or by the end of the year.

Don’t stress about perfection! Even Usain Bolt wasn’t fast until he practiced. You’ll do great.