Weekly Newsletter
2026 Season
Our build and design team has been working hard to test our new single-wide shooter, and last saturday we removed the dual-shooter from our robot base and began to put the new shooter onto the base.
Our lead programming mentor is teaching new students the ins and outs of Java, our chosen programming language, as well as giving out homework to make sure that our programming team is ready for the new season!
This season, the Quickstrike family is proud to welcome several new students. To build a strong foundation, our team is demonstrating last season’s robot to give new members a clear look into FRC operations. Combining experienced insights with new perspectives, students are actively collaborating to brainstorm ideas for the STEMley Cup on October 31st.
This past weekend we competed at the niagara college campus in Welland, our second competition of the season! We finished in 14th place out of 27 teams, and were selected for alliance five.
Just this past weekend, our team participated in the McMaster University competition, our first competition of the season! We placed seventh overall, fourth in playoffs, and we were the alliance captain of alliance four!
Our build team and programming team have been working together to build prototypes of our parts so we can practice with the robot, as well as calculate what distances and angles we can shoot from. The collaborative team effort has been making our progress swoft, so we have been getting lots of good practice in.
Over the past few weeks we’ve been working hard designing and programming our robot! While waiting for the design team to finish up, our programming team has been practicing on last year’s robot, and the drive team has been preparing parts!
Over the past few weeks, our team has been working tirelessly on creating some prototypes of the designs we’d come up with during Kickoff week. We made a shooter, and subsequently a feeder, based on our ideas and tested it with the field obstacles we’d built. We also built a prototype of the intake to see what tweaks our designs would need.
For day one of kickoff our team met bright and early to prepare for the upcoming season, doing last minute checks of inventory and general organization. After the new game, Rebuilt, was announced, we immediately got to brainstorming and sketching out concepts for a robot.
As we anxiously await the new season, Our CAD team has been practicing designing an arm with an adjustable joint, making great progress outlining their ideas on whiteboards and then transferring them onto Onshape.
2025 Season
Last week, our students participated in the annual STEMley cup, which is an off-season event that we attend to give new members an idea of what competitions are like, and what responsibilities they will have during competitions.
Our drive team kicked off the event by setting up our pit among fellow competitors. After a thorough inspection of our robot, they hit the practice fields to fine-tune performance. This included refining our newly developed autonomous code, ensuring we were competition-ready.
Qualifying matches kicked off on day two, and our drive team delivered an impressive performance! Since the Niagara College competition, we have made significant improvements—enhancing speed and accuracy and reducing weight. These refinements paid off, allowing us to contribute more points to our alliances. As a result, we even secured a victory against the team that would ultimately finish second in the competition.
In the week leading up to our competition at Niagara College, our coding team made significant progress in programming the robot, while the drive team rigorously practiced using the newly refined code. Meanwhile, other team members created a detailed scouting template, which was later utilized during the competition. They also sharpened their scouting skills by analyzing matches from events around the world.
To reduce the weight of our robot, we streamlined the materials used and discovered we could remove the dedicated algae pickup assembly. During prototype testing, we found that the coral pickup assembly could also collect the algae game piece, making the algae pickup unnecessary—an exciting discovery by the team! Additionally, we decided to remove the algae assembly to free up space for other components and ensure the robot stays within the 115 lb weight limit.
Over the past month, our team has been actively brainstorming and prototyping our robot design to tackle the game’s required tasks. Using Onshape, students have been developing these prototypes, while the students on the build team refine the design to maximize efficiency and performance. With just five weeks remaining until our first competition at Niagara College in Welland, we are focused on finalizing and optimizing our robot.
Welcome to Quickstrike Niagara’s 2025 season kickoff! Our kickoff was on Saturday when this year’s game was revealed. Like last year, we split up into groups and had each student learn a section of the game’s manual. Each student shared what they learned with the rest of the team, meaning we were able to efficiently gather the information needed to start work on a design for our robot. After discussing the manual, we shifted our focus to thoughts and ideas on designing the robot and how it’ll complete the tasks required to earn the most amount of points during our matches.
2024 Season
The STEMley Cup is an off-season competition that we participated in to gain experience on our new Swerve-Drive and for our new members to gain experience in First Robotics Competitions.
In the weeks prior to the competition we built new bumpers to protect the robot, reinforced the swerve drive and removed the robots ability to climb on the stage because it was not a necessity. We changed our programming language from Java to C++, which will make the robot more efficient and run code up to 200 times faster. We also traveled multiple times to our practice field to practice and teach driving to our more inexperienced drive team members.
During our competition in Waterloo, we encountered issues with notes getting stuck in a gap on the guarding on the robot. To address this, we modified our design. Additionally, to prevent our chain from slipping, we installed chain tensioners to ensure it stayed in place. With these adjustments, we felt confident in our preparation for the provincials.
As highlighted in our previous communications, our robot encountered unforeseen challenges during the Newmarket competition. In preparation for our upcoming event at Waterloo, significant adjustments were necessary. We incorporated automatic speaker and amplifier functionalities, enhanced the precision of our tracking system, installed new wheels, and bolstered the frame. With these modifications implemented, we are fully prepared for our forthcoming competition.
After analyzing all of the challenges we faced during our last competition, we have made numerous tweaks and improvement to the robot, ensuring its reliability and performance. First, we have added automatic speaker and amp capabilities, making travelling to both stations much easier. Next, we improved the accuracy of our tracking system and improved our sensor fusion algorithm. The robot also needed a durability improvement, so we put on new wheels and reinforced the climb frame and wheel base.
In preparation for the upcoming competition, there were some crucial tasks to complete on our robot. Just a week before the event, we integrated multi-camera support to enhance our vision system. Since we participate in both red and blue alliances during competitions, the final touches on the bumpers were also a priority.
Over the past weekend, we visited the practice field of Team 1114. Within just an hour, we managed to exhaust one of the motors on the practice robot. On the brighter side, our testing of the competition robot showed some progress, although there is still ample room for improvement.
We initiated the robot-painting procedure last week, and it proved to be a more intricate task than one might think. The initial phase involved dismantling the robot and subjecting its components to sandblasting for thorough cleaning. Subsequently, we applied paint using electrostatic powder coating. Following this, we placed the parts in an oven, allowing it to reach a temperature of 400°F, a process that typically takes up to an hour.
On Saturday, February 10th, Quickstrike welcomed a visit from Sam Oosterhoff, MPP of Niagara West. During his visit, students provided an overview of this year’s game and conducted a demonstration of the robot. The discussion delved into the intricacies of the robot’s construction and assembly process, exploring the diverse skills necessary to accomplish these tasks.
Quickstrike Niagara had an eventful weekend! Saturday was Kickoff, which is when the new game is revealed for competition season. During our meeting on Saturday, we reviewed the game manual and examined it carefully. We divided the manual into sections, assigned a group to work on each section, and then each group presented their section to the entire team. This ensured everyone understood the game. Afterwards, we talked about the different ways to play the game and different strategies we could use to play at competitions.