OverviewThe IEEE Southeastcon 2017 Hardware Competition is based on scenes from the Star Wars sequels. Each team must battle the forces of evil by creating a robot that will autonomously navigate an arena and complete four tasks thereon. The robot is given four minutes to accomplish these goals, and can score up to 1010 points per round.
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Robot RequirementsThe rules state that the robot must operate autonomously; no wired or wireless remote control is allowed. The robot must fit within a 12 inch cube at the beginning of the match, after which it can expand or even split into multiple tethered robots. The robot must have a specific start button to initiate each round of the competition. It must also have a stop button in case of an emergency during the match.
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Scoring
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Task 1 - Discovering the UnknownR2-D2 must keep the team's score from being crushed by probing the arena's Death Star and disabling the garbage compactor! This task requires that the robot probe a pentagon shaped set of contacts and deduce which electrical components are connected to which contacts. This generates a code that will be displayed on an LCD and used later on in Task 3.
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Task 2 - Lightsaber DuelThe Force will help our robot defeat Darth Vader's lightsaber! In this task, the robot must detect the magnetic force field that emanates from an electromagnet embedded in the stage. When the magnet turns on, the robot must strike the arena's lightsaber to gain points. Any lightsaber strikes that occur when the magnet is off result in a point deduction.
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Task 3 - Bringing Down the ShieldsR2-D2 has not yet finished disabling the Death Star's garbage compactor! The code generated from Task 1 is entered into a combination lock knob that will unlock more points for our robot. The robot must rotate a knob left and right according to the numbered code.
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Task 4 - Launch a Proton TorpedoIt's time to destroy the Death Star by firing proton torpedoes into its reactor core through the exhaust port! The robot must launch three Nerf darts into the portal at the end of the arena. It can also simply drop the darts into the portal, but it must first climb several steps of increasing heights.
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Arena Layout
The arena construction details are provided so that each team can construct their own for testing. The arena is constructed of a 4' x 8' sheet of plywood, with walls and task staging areas on each side of the arena. It is painted black and white for high contrast to help the robot navigate using a vision system. Below is shown a drawing of the arena. The robot starts in the square shown in the middle of the arena. Each side of the arena has the staging area for a certain task. The Task 1 staging area is the on the long side of the arena towards the top of the image. It consists of a square piece of wood with 5 copper contacts arranged in a pentagon around a sixth. The Task 2 lightsaber is on the right side of the image, and while not visible, the electromagnet is mounted directly beneath it. The Task 3 staging area is at the bottom part of the image. The knob for it is on the reverse side of the arena wall, facing into the arena. The Task 4 portal and the steps leading up to it are on the left side of the image.