As you guys know, I have been doing vex iq for a couple of years already, but next year is my last in iq. I have been given the opportunity to join the davis high teams, which I am told are very good. I dong have any experience with vrc, and dont quite know what to expect as i move up. How different are the two part systems? What is different about comps? Any random tips and tricks? And most importantly, does knowledge gained doing iq transfer over easily?
The competition are 2v2, so don’t make too many strategies based on working with everyone on the field
A lot of knowledge moves over from IQ, but don’t rely on it too much/ think you know it all.
What’s nice is that robots don’t break when you drop them
USE SHAFT COLLARS AND BEARING FLATS!
Also tighten screws a lot and never use regular nuts as they unscrew from the vibration of the motors, use keps nuts (edit: or nylock)
you can use nylon nuts to keep the screws loose for hinges, and not fall off.
You can bend and cut parts however you like, but ALWAYS file sharp edges.
Building takes a lot longer than IQ, so plan accordingly
Edit: also use locking screws with standoffs to keep them from unscrewing
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You should have the mechanical parts down, VIQ and VRC share the same 1/2" spacing. Gears, shafts, etc are all the same. Motors are lighter and smaller in VIQ so your designs may change to allow for that spacing. V5 is more power so there is that on your side. Where in VIQ, finesse and rubber bands were standard, brute force is often employed. Try to keep the clever engineering that you’ve done in play.
Code is the same, and the controllers are similar so you have a boost up on that.
Part shaping is now a thing, so you can cut and bend metal components to fit what you want to do.
Your biggest asset may be that you can prototype a base/arm/some other function in a very short time with VIQ parts vs V5 cutting and fitting. I know of FIRST FRC teams that have done protos in VIQ before taking out the plasma torch. Leverage that skill with your new team.
Good luck, sorry to see you leave VIQ, I’ve seen some of your builds. I look forward to seeing your new creations.
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A lot of the knowledge carries over, and 7996B covered most of the building side of it.
I would say that besides that, the game itself is the difference. You say you are joining high schoolers, who have probably got it down, but don’t forget to consider the differences in strategy, and don’t forget to scout for alliances who work well with your bot. People who moved up from IQ can forget that.
Like @7996B said, much of the knowledge carries over, but you don’t know everything.
Hope this helps.
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I found moving from VIQC to VRC pretty easy, but there are 3 main things you want to watch out for.
It is a competitive competition. Unlike iq, you actually have to beat your opponent rather than just trying to score as many points as possible. Take this into account when making your strategy. Think not about how to score the most points, but how to win. You also have to think about what you can do to counter other robots (such as a stronger drive base or mechanisms to keep other teams from stealing what you have.
You have to be constantly improving. In iq, designs that are good are usually figured out pretty early in the season and then people stick with them the whole year. In VRC, robot designs often evolve and change over the course of the season (take this year with park bots and ring bots).
You have more access to parts. While a lot of VRC parts are similar to VIQC parts, VRC brings in some interesting things that IQ doesn’t. This is mainly basic part manufacturing. You can cut, drill, and bend parts to your advantage. This allows for interesting mechanisms to be created, because you aren’t limited to just what is presented in what kits you have, but also anything you can make by bending or cutting those parts. There are more things in VRC such as different sized wheels, pneumatics, screws and nuts, etc. that are not found in IQ but otherwise the parts are similar.
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Like was said, some knowledge transfers over easily, but not too much. One main thing I would add is that when you are building a VIQ robot, you have connectors. In VRC you don’t. I found this very hard to work with at first, but you get used to it.
The main thing is the building techniques are different. In VIQ, you always use skinny washers when putting a moving part next to a static one. In VRC, you use bearing flats wherever there’s an axle.
You think of mechanisms differently and instead of “Where am I going to get a motor to power this?” it’s “Can I use pneumatics for this?”
It’s mostly thinking about things a little differently.
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Just to be clear, lots of teams put bearing flats on the opposite side of the metal. That means a metal to gear interface. In these cases gear / wheel ↔ washer ↔ metal ↔ bearing block ↔ shaft collar is what you want.
Yes you are absolutely right. My reply was unclear. I was not comparing the two things to each other, but rather saying there there are building techniques in VRC that are not in VIQ, and vice versa. I guess I chose some pretty poor examples. Thanks for clarifying.
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Never too many washers. I’m happy to see that VEX builds of the hexbug line have now started using more washers and the VIQ hero bots have more washers too.
But I applaud your efforts around bearing blocks. It’s really hard for beginning teams to get the mantra of “there is no such thing as too many bearing blocks”. 
(Well when they are three deep, you might want to consider what you are doing)
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If you mean the Davis Teams in Utah you will be just fine! Dane(the coach) is the best! There are a bunch of really good teams in Utah and we are often visited by outside teams! You would do great at Davis.
I’m from Bear River and we all try to make each other better in Utah by bouncing ideas off of each other.
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Yes, that’s what I mean
I would personally disagree with this statement. Our team uses nylocks for pretty much everything. We only use keps nuts for prototyping. I don’t know if this is a common practice, but we’ve found that keeps nuts tend to fall off pretty easily during a competition. Although nylocks take more time to screw in, I think it’s worth it.
If you do use nylocks very frequently, it might be worth investing in a small screwdriver. Our team uses this, which we bought from a local hardware store for like $20. You might also need to buy a bit, depending on what screws you use.
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I was meaning the regular nuts that are not nylock or keps, I will specify that in my response
I too prefer nylocks because they don’t mar up the metal as much and dampen vibrations better, but I will say that keps nuts are a completely valid option to use in place of nylocks. They don’t fall off unless you’re tightening them poorly- and for many teams, hold a place in the build workflow beyond prototyping.
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