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Bots Compete in Rescue Competition

 The finals of the 10th Rescue Robot Contest is happening in Kobe, Japan this weekend. Twelve teams and their robots that made through the preliminaries on July 4th will be competing on time and skill to "rescue" silicon rubber dolls from rubbles.

 GetRobo was fortunate enough to be in Kobe to see the preliminaries and wanted to share some photos.  

 The competition field is a 1/6 size mock-up of a disaster stricken area. (As many will recall, Kobe was hit by the Great Hanshin Earthquake in 1995 which claimed more than 6,000 people. The contest initiated to raise awareness of disaster prevention and the hope that robotics will be of help in future undesirable events.) At the preliminaries, one doll was laid under wooden pillars and another was situated inside a house. Each team was given 8 minutes for the robots to remove the rubbles, roof and/or walls of the house and then carry the dolls safely to the goal without causing too much negative impact onto their bodies.

 

(Photo1: A robot by Team Kobe City College of Technology pulls out the injured.)

 Since there are no restrictions on how many robots you can use, all teams had multiple robots which had different roles.

 

(Photo2: Two robots from Team Rescue Gorilla B of Osaka Electro-Communication University each carrying a doll)

 

(Photo3: Team Rescue Gorilla B's 3rd robot laid out a carpet over the bumps so that it can reduce vibration which may have a negative impact on the dolls while being carried by the other 2 robots.)

 The robots are remotely controlled using WiFi. Team members were allowed to look directly at the field to control the robots during the preliminaries.

 

(Photo4: Team Rescue Gorilla S, also of OECU tries to figure out how to rescue the doll inside the house.)

 Although, the finals will be more difficult because teams are only allowed to use the visions of the cameras on the robots and one set up from above by the contest organizer. So some teams practiced trying to set up an extra camera in the field to obtain additional visual data.

Kenta Maru wins Robo-Cup Japan Open

 Hello Houston! Remember the MARU Family?

 Well, they continue to work with enthusiasm on their robots and this year 14 year old Kenta Maru has made a major win at RoboCup Japan Open 2010. He and his teammate Yuma Kutsumizu were second place in the RoboCupJunior Soccer Challenge and No. 1 in the primary division for ages 14 and under. And they will be heading to Singapore next month for the international RoboCup 2010 as representatives of Japan.

 Congratulations Kenta!!!!!  We wish you the best at the big competition next month!!!

 Here are some photos that father Naoki Maru kindly sent to GetRobo.

  Kenta Maru in the middle with team mate Yuma Kutsumizu and father Naoki Maru.

 Since the Marus' humanoid robots are mainly remote controlled, it was the first time for Kenta to challenge himself building autonomous wheeled robots.

 The Soccer Challenge is a competition for youths to design, program and strategize autonomous soccer-playing robots.

  

Humanoid robots hustle and shuffle

 You've noticed that humanoid robots built by hobbyists kinda shuffle when they walk. That's because many of them use "parallel linked legs" which use frames that look like 2 parallelograms, one on top of the other. The merits of this structure is that it allows the robot builders to make larger robots that are not as heavy and that are more stable.

 This structure doesn't fit robots that play soccer, but at least for competing in the ROBO-ONE battling competitions, it's become a must if you want to win. That's because the builders want longer arms on their robots which can only be proportionate to the length of the legs due to ROBO-ONE regulations. Now that the rule has been changed so that the distance between the tip of the left and right arms when open must not exceed 240% of the length of the legs (used to be 340%), the builders are eying to make taller robots without adding the weight.

  Recently the ROBO-ONE Light Class Competitionfor robots under 3kg (7 lbs) took place in Yokohama. The champion robot Fantom (photo below) gets to go to the 17th ROBO-ONE. Both Fantom and second place Gargoil-mini use the parallel link structure.

 Check out the final match between the 2 robots.  (Written  by IKETOMU )

ROBO-ONE humanoid robots compete to become household helpers

 ROBO-ONE is holding it's second  Humanoid Helper Project this weekend. (For those that missed the first one in 2008, check out the articles here.)

 The finals are being held right this minute in Yokohama Japan, but GetRobo guest author IKETOMU has kindly sent us his report about yesterday's preliminary. 

 The purpose of the Humanoid Helper Project is to motivate individual robot builders to develop and show off their technologies that may eventually be used to commercialize household robots. Household robots meaning not the Roombas, but the Rosies.

 In this competition, robots are remotely controlled via WiFi by operators that are looking at the environment through a PC. This year, the preliminary consisted of the following 3 events.

 1) Pouring water from a plastic bottle into a cup

 2) Carrying a dish of ping-pong balls on a tray

 3) A 30 minutes endurance race

  Three robots entered the preliminary. Doka Harumi (Doka project), THKR-4 (CAP Project) and Musashi (MARU Family). All are HUGE. As of the end of yesterday, 1st place went to Musashi,  2nd place was THKR-4 and 3rd place was Doka Harumi.

 Enjoy the videos!

Pouring water with a bottle into a cup by Doka Harumi Pouring water with a bottle into a cup by THKR-4 Pouring water with a bottle into a cup by Musashi Carrying a dish of ping-pong ball on the tray by Doka Harumi Carrying a dish of ping-pong ball on the tray by THKR-4 Carrying a dish of ping-pong ball on the tray by Musashi Thirty minutes endurance race by Doka Harumi, ThKR-4 and Musashi

Dear Hershey, Wanna start a robot competition?

 

 If you do, here's something you can look into - a robot competition that involves lots of chocolate.

 The TIROL-CHOCO Robot Competition is an annual event where robot builders in Japan gather with their robots that look like a big piece of a TIROL chocolate, which by the way is very yummy.

 The robots compete in 3 events - foot race, knocking down paper cups and carrying chocolates.

 Below is a video of the foot race from the 4th TIROL-CHOCO Robot Competition that was held on Feb. 13.

 It's really a fun family event and the interesting fact is, the chocolate company didn't have to do anything to get this going. Robot builder MASAYUKI

 and others thought it was a fun idea, because one of their robots looked like a big piece of chocolate and yes the sweets happen to have this cute wrapping paper that come in wide variety so why not start a game? They send in a proposal to the chocolate company for approval and TIROL checks to make sure that the event will not damage their brand or anything.  Then TIROL just sends them a bunch of chocolate to be used in the games and as prizes. Robot shop RT Co. sponsors the competition. 

  The winning robot is decided by a combination of points they collect in the events and a popularity vote. What a great way to be able to market a product.

 
  If you're interested, you can read more on Biped Robot News Japan.