ROBOTICS COMPETITION

            I had another competition. I had another loss. But what matters most is --- I had another fun and rewarding experience.

            Last March 03, 2011, Holy Cross of Davao College - College of Engineering and Technology hosted an Inter-school Robotics Competition for their Techno Fair 2011. Luckily, I was one of the chosen students to represent our university, University of Southeastern Philippines, along with Michael Palacio (BSCS - 2), Ian Glenn Salce (BSECE - 5) and Jay Rell Vic Guy-ab (BSECE - 5). I and Michael were assigned to do the programming while Ian and Jay were assigned to assemble the robot. The competition was participated by the University of Southeastern Philippines, Holy Cross of Davao College, Ateneo de Davao University, STI Davao, University of Mindanao and John Paul II College. 

            Our task was, from a starting point, the robot will transfer the objects (plastic cups) from point A to point B one by one then after that it will halt at the designated end point. And the robot should not go outside the presentation area.

           It was a very hard task even our coach said it was a difficult task. Our first problem was we, the programmers, was not adept how the hardware parts function so we studied the parts one by one in order to   give them the right instruction in the program which took a lot of time. Next problem was due to the environment we did not expected that our sensor will not work as it was supposed to function on the presentation area because it was too bright so we had no other choice but to change our plan. We had problems on calculating the delay of the motor in order to make precise movements. Unfortunately, we lacked in time and the program for our robot was not finished and the troubleshooting for getting at least one cup was not also finished.

            During the presentation, all robots from the six participating schools failed to took at least one object from point A so the judges ended up with the decision to base the winners from their prepared criteria of judging.

The declared winners were:

            Champion – Ateneo de Davao University

            1^st runner-up – STI Davao

            2^nd runner-up – Holy Cross of Davao College

            It was a very fun event. I learned a little bit about hardware and I got to learn assembly language(the PL that we thought we would use) even though it wasn’t included in our curriculum and we were very FULL (LOL) because of the free snack and the delicious lunch that they ordered for the participants and coaches!! THANKS HCDC - CET :)

Pictures during the competition:

Photo Credits: Sir Mark Van Buladaco