1. The Engineering Notebook
One Team’s Perspective and Practices – Presented by FTC Team #4982, Café Bot

2. What is the Engineering Notebook?

3. US FIRST recommends some online research
An engineering notebook is a collection place for all of your design ideas. It should
(almost) be possible for someone to rebuild your robot based on your records and
your diagrams. Pictured below left is part of a page from Leonardo DaVinci’s
notebook. The photo on the right shows a tank built from his designs centuries later.
US FIRST recommends some online research
on what a professional engineering notebook should look like. Do this before you get started on yours.

4. We found these example pages from a professional engineering notebook on the ASU Polytechnic Engineering website.
your-notebook 4

5. Keeping an engineering notebook is a good engineering habit!
Here are some instructions from a company on how engineers
are to keep their notebook:
Write EVERYTHING down; even include a dentist appointment!
That’s what helps make it a believable legal document.
Keep the notebook up to date and have it witnessed often by those
whom you trust and who understand your work.
This can mean the difference between owning your patent rights
to your work or NOT!
We found this information on the ASU website, in an article on “Using Your Notebook” by Mark Henderson, ASU Polytechnic Engineering. 5

6. One of the goals of FIRST and FTC is to recognize the engineering
design process and the “journey” a team makes together.
Phases of this journey include:
The problem definition (the Kickoff!)
Concept design
System-level design
Detailed design
Test and verification
Production (the actual robot build) 6

7. will need to draw things out on paper. This is where you and your team
As you build your robot, you will run into obstacles, learn lessons and you
will need to draw things out on paper. This is where you and your team
will use an engineering notebook!
Your notebook follows your team from kickoff to competition.
Judges review your engineering notebook to better understand your
journey, your design and your team. 7

8. FIRST wants you to use your engineering notebook to:
DOCUMENT OBSTACLES THAT WILL BE FACED
HIGHLIGHT LESSONS LEARNED
SKETCH OR DRAW IDEAS FOR DEVELOPMENT AND TESTING
RECORD THE RESULTS OF DEVELOPMENT AND TESTING
DOCUMENT TEAM DECISIONS 8

9. ENGINEERING NOTEBOOK GUIDELINES AND FORMATTING REQUIREMENTS
General Guidelines for both handwritten and electronic notebooks 9

10. The FTC Engineering Notebook is a COMPLETE documentation of
DOCUMENT EVERYTHING!!
The FTC Engineering Notebook is a COMPLETE documentation of
your team’s robot design for a given season. A new notebook is to
be created for each new season.
This documentation should include…
Sketches
Discussions and team meetings
Design evolution
Processes
Obstacles
EACH TEAM MEMBER’S THOUGHTS throughout the journey 10

11. Sketches Pictures and sketches of Your robot design are
Recommended as part
Of a thorough documentation. 11

12. Team meeting 12

13. design
evolution 13

14. testing 14

15. obstacles 15

16. NEW FOR THIS SEASON: The Engineering Notebook
MUST be divided into multiple sections! The three sections
are as follows:
ENGINEERING SECTION (required)
- This section is for the robot design process
TEAM SECTION (required)
- This section is for team information, outreach activities, and team activites
(such as parties)
BUSINESS PLAN/STRATEGIC PLAN/SUSTAINABILITY PLAN (optional) 16

17. The Engineering Section
Start a fresh page in the Engineering Section at every team meeting!
The DATE and START/STOP TIMES should be recorded when starting
each new page.
EACH DAY SHOULD START WITH TWO COLUMNS:
1. TASKS COLUMN – What is your team doing and discovering?
2. REFLECTIONS COLUMN – Where your team records thoughts
on what is happening and any questions that need to be answered. 17

18. Two examples of Task and Reflections columns:
one handwritten and one computer-generated 18

19. All designs and changes to your robot should be recorded
Directly into the Engineering Section of your notebook.
The inclusion of all details and sketches are preferable.
IF YOU ARE USING A HANDWRITTEN NOTEBOOK:
Notes and calculations should be done in your notebook,
NOT on loose paper! 19

20. The Team Section
Start the team section of your notebook by introducing each team member
and mentor with a brief biography of their name, age (or school year),
interests, and reasons for joining your FTC team.
Photos along with the bios would serve as a great visual for the judges to
Get to know each member of your team.
The Team Section is also a good place to discuss and show team activities
that are done throughout the team’s season. This includes outreach. 20

21. 21

22. volunteering/ outreach page22

23. 3. Your team name and number must appear on the outside cover of your
Engineering
Notebook. 23

24. TEAM SUMMARY PAGE – new for this season
The summary page should be attached to the front
cover of your Notebook.
The summary sheet should give the judges an overview of your season
highlights. It should also contain your TEAM NUMBER and point the
judges to the pages in your Notebook that you would most like them to
consider.
Teams must tab/flag 6 to 8 pages of the Engineering Section to
Support entries on the summary page. 24

25. Your notebook should be organized. You want it to be
easy for an outsider to understand your team and your
journey.
Written entries must be in PERMANENT INK – not pencil.
Pages must be numbered. They should not be removed
or replaced.
In the case of an error, draw a single line through the
incorrect data. Do NOT erase or use correction fluid. All
corrections should be initialed and dated. 25

26. 9. Entries should be made by EVERY team member
9. Entries should be made by EVERY team member. All entries need to be initialed (or signed) and dated.
The notebook may be maintained by a single person, but this year the
rules are quite clear that entries need to be made by EVERY team member, regardless.
FIRST wants everyone to make a contribution to the notebook. This
provides each team member with at least some experience with documentation and creates a well-rounded notebook.
Entries should highlight the thoughts of all team members and mentors
of the team. 26

27. 10. Use both sides of a page. Never leave any blank space: “X” out or
crosshatch all
unused space, and
initial and date. 27

28. 11. We recommend a Table of Contents. You can purchase Blank Notebooks
with a table of
contents “built in”
to the front of the
notebook (more
on this in a later
section). 28

29. How to insert pictures/photos or outside information
into your notebook (handwritten version only):
Tape the picture into your notebook and outline it with
permanent ink. This lets the judges know that something
was there in the event that it falls out. If you insert an entire
page, be sure to put the corresponding page number
on that inserted page! 29

30. Insert a Bill of Materials (BOM) into your engineering
notebook (as required by the rules in the annual Game
Manual). Be sure to bring a second copy of your BOM for
hardware inspection. 30

31. Handwritten or Electronic??31

32. - This decision is entirely up to the team.
- No distinction is to be made between handwritten and
electronic Engineering Notebooks during judging.
So…the real question you need to ask yourself is:
What works best for me? Which format am I most
Comfortable with?
We’ve tried both formats here
at Café Bot. 32

33. Electronic Notebooks
Teams may choose to use electronic or online programs to
create their notebook.
For judging purposes, teams must print out their notebook
pages and place them in a binder – NO LARGER THAN
1 1/2” THICK.
All pages must be numbered and in order.
Only one copy is required per team. 33

34. Benefits of the electronic notebook:
Possibly easier to organize with the new rules (regarding separate
sections on the engineering and outreach pages)
Easy to keep a very clean, professional look
Easy to keep “backups” of your notebook (in case of loss or damage)
Easy to create a tasks/reflections template
We have found that many high school students prefer to type
out their thoughts rather than handwrite…you might find you have better
“notebook compliance” with this format. 34

35. US FIRST has a great example of an electronic notebook on their website: 35

36. Handwritten Notebooks
Spiral-bound, laboratory, or documentation notebooks are readily
available for teams to use for their Engineering Notebook. There
is also a notebook supplied to FTC teams (for free) when the
team registers each season.
As with the electronic notebook, all pages must be numbered.
Some of the notebooks already come with numbered pages.
There must not be any missing pages!
You may submit multiple handwritten notebooks if needed; be
sure to clearly label them “Book 1 of 2, Book 2 of 2” and so forth. 36

37. Benefits of the handwritten notebook:
Based on our team’s experiences so far, it seems the
handwritten notebook is what is actually used in industry.
- The handwritten notebook is a very “real” documentation of your
team’s journey. If handwritten, judges like to see the “real thing”
complete with misspellings, stains, worn edges and wrinkled
pages.
You can put photos, printouts, schedules and so forth directly
into your handwritten notebook…no need to scan things in. 37

38. Some Engineering Notebook resources: www.technoguards.org
-This is a website from a past FTC team that used
an online template for their notebook.
-This is a great place to purchase engineering notebooks for
handwriting. They have a large selection of notebooks with
built-in Table of Contents and pre-numbered pages. 38

39. sheet. This represents some of what judges are looking
Here is a judge summary
sheet. This represents some
of what judges are looking
for in your notebook.
Note that the Notebook is
extremely important for the
Think Award and the
Inspire Award.
It also plays a key part
when a team is being
considered for any of
the judged Awards! 39

40. Café Bot Notebook tips 40

41. Pictures, tables, CAD or other graphics are great:
Keep it real.
Keep it organized.
Stay on top of it!
Pictures, tables, CAD or other graphics are great:
the more the better. 41

42. The most important thing regarding our Engineering Notebook:
WHAT WE LEARN IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN
WHAT WE WIN!
Our notebook has shown us how much we have
learned and grown in a relatively short time
together as a team! 42

43. Questions? Presented by FTC Team #4982, Café Bot www.cafebot.org 43