FIRST 2003 Kick-Off

Odaeus writes "Happening now (1630 GMT) is the US FIRST Robotics Competition kick-off programme. Every year teams across the US, Canada, and other countries such as the UK (where my team started last year) composed of high school/college students and adult mentors have six weeks to design and build a robot that will compete in a friendly competition. One of the founders is everyone's favourite inventer of a over-hyped toy, Dean Kamen [Dekaresearch.com]. This is not Robot Wars."

From What I know...

[HRbnjR]

I take part in autonomous robotic Sumo [fsi.co.jp] competition, and from what I hear on the mailing list from people asking about FIRST, is that it's not all it's cracked up to be.

Apparently it's outrageously expensive for the materials kit, $8000 Canadian (over $5000 USD). And you have to pay for all team transportation and lodging yourself - which if you make it beyond the regional competition can be /really/ expensive.

And being that the robots apparently aren't autonomous, you aren't really learning a whole lot about robotics, which is compounded given the time frames involved.

The conclusion on the list was that our local regional robotics club, which is happy to work with teachers or schools, would be a vastly more cost effective means to learn robotics, and you still get the excitement of competition. And by starting with an RC Sumo (junior high school), and working up to autonomous Sumo (high school/college), you will learn a whole lot more about robotics in the end.

Re:From What I know...

[David F.]

Apparently it's outrageously expensive for the materials kit, $8000 Canadian (over $5000 USD).

It is expensive, however nearly every FIRST team is backed by a corporate sponsor that usually covers most or all of the cost.

And being that the robots apparently aren't autonomous

There is a period of each match this year which is autonomous.

you aren't really learning a whole lot about robotics

Learning about robotics is not a goal of FIRST. Not really even a minor goal. The goal of FIRST is to promote interest in science and technology among high school students with the hope that they will choose to pursue a career in the field after college. You should probably visit a FIRST competition before you say kids aren't learning alot. They learn that working in science and technology is fun, and they learn about what it's like to work on a "real world" type project with real deadlines, limited budgets, and limited resources.

Its really fun

[jon787]

I did it for two years while I was in high school. I've met Dean Kamen twice now at our regional competition and met some of the people who helped design last year's game when I helped set up the field at our regional.

http://robodawgs.com/ is my team's site.

I just came back from the remote kickoff in SJ...

[djcapelis]

This year the game is completely different. It has changed wonderfully to make the game much more challenging this year. First of all, after the first 15 seconds in which human players are allowed to distrubute boxes as they will. This is immediatly followed by 15 seconds in which the robots must act on their own, after this (*lunges for controls) you may control the robot. The scoring system is also quite interesting this year. For any boxes in your scoring zone you take the tallest pile and take the height (in boxes) of the pile, that is your multiplyer, you then multiply all the other boxes by that, plus 25 per robot in the center, and that is your teams score. If you win a match, you get the other team's score times 2, plus your own score. The other team get's just their score unaltered. This game is unlike any before it, I think they are really trying to get these games better. Especially the autonomus part... should provide a challenge.