TV BEST Robotics Competition

On September 15th,

Austin started a six week project with several

other students from his school.

They competed in the 

Tennessee Valley BEST

(Boosting Engineering, Science and Technology)

Robotics competition.

Six weeks ago they were given a box of parts and shown

a "playing field" of objectives that they needed to design a robot

to be able to accomplish.

Last Saturday, October 27th was their competition...

There is a lot more involved than just building a robot.

In order to compete for the BEST award,

they have to prepare an Engineering Notebook,

a CAD/Solidworks Notebook,

an Oral Marketing Presentation,

a Marketing Book with also includes an

Interview from the judges

The picture above is of our marketing booth.

Kayla and Ashley were all dressed up for the 

theme of the competition...

Warp XX

The inside of their booth looked like the inside of

a Space Elevator.

The kids named their robot ASTRO.

It is an acronym for something, but I can't remember 

off the top of my head what it stands for.

In the picture you can see the 10 foot pole that the

robot had to climb.  There were "game pieces" on the floor that

the robot had to pick up and carry up to the top and

put in the bucket on top.

Here is another shot of ASTRO trying to make the bottle

exchange.  Overall the kids did an outstanding job!

There were a lot of robots that could only climb up and 

down the pole, but not play any of the game pieces.

Some robots never even made it off the ground.

At the end of the day the kids racked up with awards.

Here is a list of their accomplishments:

1st Place Oral Marketing Presentation

1st Place Mascot Dance Off

2nd Place Project Engineering Notebook

2nd Place SolidWorks/CAD Design Award

2nd Place Game Day T-shirt Design

3rd Place Exhibit and Interview

3rd Place Most Photogenic Robot

3rd Place Most Robust Robot

4th Place Overall Robot Performance

and the big one of the day

2nd place BEST Award

All of their hard work paid off and the kids

were so excited!

They will advance to the

regional South's BEST Competition

at Auburn University in December.