A group of Chesapeake High School students are transforming wheels, drives and other parts into a robot that will compete in a regional contest where students will showcase their technology skills.
During the past four weeks, about 20 students have worked with engineers and parents to design, weld and assemble a 5-foot-tall, 120-pound robot from motors, electrical components and raw metal, said Michele Devine, a career connections facilitator at the high school.
“Every team receives the same kit of wheels, drivers and controllers, but everybody?s robots will be different,” she said, referring to all competitors in the Chesapeake regional contest of the 2008 FIRST Robotics Competition next month.
“They will all be designed to perform the same task.”
This year, robots are required to go around a large, basketball-court-sized oval track and move Trackballs, 40-inch-wide, fabric-covered rubber balls, during a game called First Overdrive, said Anne Shade, a mechanical engineer for Science Applications International Corp., a research and engineering firm.
“The students all started out unsure of themselves, and this year we?ve really seen them taking initiative,” said Shade, who is acting as the general manager of the Chesapeake High team.
Students now are finishing the robot?s drive train, the mechanical component that makes the robot move, and soon will work on the manipulator, the arm that will move the balls, she said.
The students have until Feb. 19 to complete the robot, when it will be shipped to the competition site.
Tenth-grader Aaron LeBlanc heard about the team through his computer science class.
“I?m looking for a career in computer science but always liked designing stuff, so this is fun,” he said.
