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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.

[FIRST 2010] To Do (still)

 It's 7:30pm on Tuesday and Team 114 is working hard in Rm. 602 at Los Altos High School. They've been hampered by the weather, though. It's not that the weather is awful here, but it's been snowing really hard up in Oregon, and the UPS truck that was supposed to have delivered the track system by now is stuck.

(Photo 1: Make machine parts like crazy!!!)
  
 There's only 3 weeks left till the robots have to be completed and the team can't afford to wait long. One of the mentors from another local team has volunteered to drive up north to receive this backbone component for both of the teams. It's a great example of "Co-opetition" - the marriage of cooperation and competition - which FIRST strongly promotes.
 

 Another case of co-opetition: Los Altos High School is fortunate to have a "mill" which is used to shape all sorts of metal parts. Other teams in this area that don't have this kind of tool are free to come here and use it.

(Photo 2:Working with the mill)
 

 While the team waits for the track system, they've used the base from their robot from FRC 2008 to put the prototype on and drive it around.

(Photo 3: Team mentors Roy and Charlie. Charlie =left= was on the team for 4 years before he graduated. He explains about the robot that he built for FRC 2008.) 

 The team's 2 advisors, Ms. Karen Davis, who teaches physics, and Mr. Thomas Budd, science teacher, are trying to keep everyone focused. "What else do we need to do now?"

 

(Photo 4: Figuring out the design of the lifter)

(Photo 5: Mr. Budd in front of the mockup goal)

 (Photo 6: Parts finished and waiting.....)

New adult size humanoid class at RoboCup 2010

 The RoboCup Japanese National Committee announced the details of the  RoboCup Japan Open 2010 which will be held on May 2-4 at Osaka Institute of Technology.

 The goal of RoboCup is to develop a team of humanoid robots that can compete with humans playing soccer by 2050. Now that we have only 40 more years to reach that goal, the committee has decided to add a new category to the Humanoid League. (RoboCup does have other leagues such as the 4-legged soccer league and rescue competitions.)

 Starting this year, the humanoid league will consist of  3 divisions depending on the size of the robot - KidSize (30-60 cm), TeenSize (100-130cm) and AdultSize (130-160cm). It used to be that there were only 2 size classes and all robots over 100cm were considered Teen.

  Although looking at the rules, it seems that the Adults will not be playing games but will compete with their skills for dribbling, kicking, throw-ins etc. KidSize will play games 3 vs. 3.  TeenSize will also play games with 2 robots on each side.

 
  From left, Hitoshi Matsubara, Chairman of RoboCup Japanese National Committee, Masataka Inoue, President of Osaka Institute of Technology (the university is setting up a new robotics department this spring), and Minoru Asada who is one of the key figures behind RoboCup. In front is an AdultSize robot by former champion Team Osaka .

2009 Rescue Robot Contest Video

 An official video of the most recent Rescue Robot Contest is now up.

 In the long version below, from around 5:00 minutes you can see the various tactics that the robots use to handle the dolls.

 In the next shorter version of the introduction video, at around 50 seconds you'll get a glimpse of the wearable device that one of the teams used to control the robot.

 Thank you Prof. Masutani!