RoboGames: RoboMagellan 2008
by Camp Peavy
Photos by Tim Craig
It was a chilly June day above the
Ft. Mason Center, San Francisco at
the Great Meadow: 14 teams entered;
eight took the field; five touched the
goal; three touched the goal plus two
bonus cones. “Zippy” and “Intrepid”
traversing over 500 feet touched both
bonus cones and the goal in exactly
five minutes: 28 seconds ... a tie for
the gold medal.
RoboMagellan robots usually take
a long time to build. One generally
starts in the fall building for
RoboGames in June. “June” arrives
and it’s a series of frantic all-nighters
focused on software, overall behavior,
and fixing blown circuits. Many times,
the first year is a bust ( 14 entered)
but after a year or two the robot
comes together. This year there was
an exception in a robot named
“Zippy” created in a few short weeks
by FIRST alumni Ben Filippenko and
Sergiy Nesterenko. In the end, Zippy
and Intrepid (built by RoboMagellan
veteran Mark Curry) tied for gold with
a goal-plus-two-bonus-cone run of five
minutes and 28 seconds exactly
<shaking head>. The rules currently
have no procedure for breaking a tie
... who would think with a total
distance of 550 feet there would ever
be a tie? In the future, I think using
one’s previous fastest time should be
used as the tie-breaker.
For the uninitiated, RoboMagellan
is an outdoor contest where one is
given the GPS coordinates for a “goal”
and an 18 inch orange traffic cone is
placed at that coordinate. The starting
point is no less than 300 foot away;
the length of a football field. Bonus
cones are placed which give a
fractional multiplier (between 0.9 and
0.1). One may elect not to go for the
bonus cones but you must touch the
goal for a score.
We handed out the course map
in front of the Ft. Mason Center at
76 SERVO 10.2008
Mark Curry’s
“Intrepid”
was the only
robot to
touch both
bonus cones
and the goal
on all three
runs. On its
third run, it
tied for gold
with a real
time of five
minutes 28
seconds.
noon and agreed to meet at the park
at 12: 30. This year’s map was basically
last year’s map turned upside down.
The start became the goal and the
goal became the start ... bonus cone
#1 became bonus cone #2 and vice-versa. The fractional multipliers were
increased from “x . 25 and x . 5” to “x
.1 and x . 25” because last year the
bonus multipliers weren’t enough.
First up, “WolfNav” after a few
minutes of stopping and starting
called it quits; total distance eight
feet. The second run wasn’t much
better. It was a gallant attempt but
as mentioned these robots are
challenging to build; Cody and John
still needed considerable troubleshooting to navigate the entire course so
they elected not to try a third run.
Our second contestant was Zippy.
True to his name, Zippy zipped from
bonus cone to bonus cone to the goal
in less than six minutes. On its second
run Zippy improved to the five minutes
28 seconds which would tie Intrepid
for the gold medal.
“Beaver One” from Pasadena, CA
headed by Tony Wu managed an 85
foot run the first time in four minutes
11 seconds. The second run got closer
but still could not make it to the first
bonus cone. On the third run they did
touch the first bonus cone at three
minutes five seconds.
Intrepid was the only robot to
touch the goal and both bonus cones
on all three runs.
“Zippy” tied with
“Intrepid” for
gold with a goal-plus-two-bonus-cone run of
five minutes and
28 seconds.
“A3” by Jim McGuffin and Doug
Coral were up next. On the first run,
they had trouble getting out of the
crater. After a series of wheelies and
almost falling over, A3 recovered nicely
and went 300 feet in six minutes 15
seconds. The second run didn’t go as
well, but the third run was the charm ...
five minutes 39 seconds ... both bonus
cones plus the goal ... good for silver.
Next up was “GURU,” an RC car
based robot built by a group of aerospace engineers known as the Robot
Doctors. After one attempt to reach
the bonus cone they went straight for
the goal on their second and hit it
with a one minute 23 second straight-shot run; good enough for bronze.
“Red Dwarf,” an RC car-based
rover, had three good runs but could
never make it to the goal.
The last competitor was a track-based entry from the University of
Waterloo named “Marauder.” On the
first run our northern neighbors
touched the goal but no bonus cones
(close) in five minutes and 23 seconds.
We are at the dawn of a new age
... an age with machines as different
as plants are from animals. The future
has begun and you are watching it
unfold before your very eyes. If you’ve
finished a table-top robot and are
looking for that next project, consider
a RoboMagellan robot. A robot that
can get from one place to another in
a cluttered environment is a useful
device and a lot of fun. SV
