Robots in Vegas
The Utah State University chapter of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers showcased their robot last week at the Student Professional Development Conference in Las Vegas.
The students spent time outside of class building the robot, which is capable of carrying items through an obstacle course.
“It’s pretty cool to see it all come together and work,” said Matt Schuman, vice president of ASME. “We had a team of about 10 guys, and some people had different qualifications that they could bring to the table.”
In past years the chapter has sent two students to the conference but hasn’t competed. This year they sent 12 with students taking part in multiple competitions.
It took the students three months to build the robot. They were constantly making changes and tinkering with items such as the motor, gearbox and door.
“Nothing really went as planned, but we looked at the problem, analyzed it and found some solutions to fix some things,” said Tim Brenner, a junior.
Despite spending many hours on the project and changing the robot several times, the students said they felt satisfied with their work.
Students were asked to build a robot that could carry food to survivors in the aftermath of a natural disaster. Some said that was the thing they enjoyed most — creating something that could serve a real world purpose.
“(It was) a scaled-down version, obviously, so (it) wouldn’t make it through 10 feet of a tsunami area, nor does it have the battery life for it,” Brenner said. “But I definitely think making a full-size vehicle would be pretty beneficial, especially for nuclear power plants like the one in Fukushima.”
To simplify the building process, small aspects of the project were delegated to different students. While some students were concerned exclusively with the robot itself, others took on complementary tasks.
“They needed somebody to put together something to try out the robot on,” said Nick Carr, a junior. “I just made the maximum heights and shortest distances to make it the hardest possible course for that robot to go down.”
But the students made it clear that the creation of the robot and project as a whole was a very detailed process.
“It’s a lot more than people think at first glance,” Brenner said. “There’s a whole bunch of stuff beneath the skin that you don’t see and take for granted, just like with your car.”
The students hope to compete in the Student Professional Development Conference again next year.
— levi.henrie@aggiemail.usu.edu