jaBOTron

Versión del blog en Español aquí

This year, I went with a couple of friends to Alcabot 2013 and participated in three of the competitions:  tracking, sprinter and minisumo, as part of the GoShield team.

Out of the three robots, I assembled and programmed the tracking robot, always with my team's help and support, and I named it jaBOTron.

I based the design of the robot on my old Lady-Bot and used the following components:

• Arduino Due for the processing.
• Motomama for the control of the motors.
• Two 20:1 motors with their wheels.
• CNY70 sensors.
• LEDs so I can show information to help me debug my code.
• LiPo batteries.

I had some problems with the code in the first round and the robot didn't work as good as I was expecting, but in the previous hour to the final rounds, I got time to debug my code a little more and, in the end, the robot showed and incredible improvement in comparison to the first round.

I got seventh out of thirteenth in this category, but keeping in mind that I only had two weeks to assemble and program the robot, the result was very positive. Also, the experience has been really good and the most important thing, I learned a lot and I'll be back next year with new ideas.

I will update this post with the videos of the competition as soon as the organization publishes them.