In 2006, I got involved with Robotics by volunteering as a mentor at a local high school which was participating in a FIRST Robotics Competition. The competition is a wonderful opportunity for students to learn not only learn about math, science, technology and its applications to robotics, but also allows them to work in teams to create a robot which they will use to compete against other teams. Since the build season only lasts 6 weeks, the students, teachers and mentors spend alot of time working together to create a robot that can be used in a very fast paced game.

Just as the students have tons of fun during the build season, so do the mentors. This site shows some of the events in which I have been involved and includes quite a few pictures of the robots that students from around the country have built. It is quite impressive to observe all the creative designs that the students came up with. Take a look at the pictures and you too might get hooked. If you are a student, a teacher, a mentor or a potential sponsor, I hope some of what you see will inspire you to get involved.

Back in Jan 2007, Gar-Field high school sponsored a Vex robot scrimmage competition. A friend of mine and I built the playing field for the game by following the specifications from FIRST. During the game, I took photos of all the robots from all angles. I then stitched together all the images to create animated GIF images which allow you to see what the robot looked like. Take a look at the designs.

In 2007, the FIRST Robotics Competition was called "Rack N'Roll" and one of the first official regional competitions was sponsored by NASA and Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virgina. As a mentor for one of the teams, I had the opportunity to attend and visit all the teams in the pit area. While there, I took the opportunity to photographs many of the robots which I have. Browse through the designs and enjoy the creative approaches the students came up with.
The Vex robotics kits contains a microcontoller that can be programmed in order to make the robot do whatever one chooses. The software for programming the microcontroller is available for free from the microcontroller manufacturer, Microchip in the form of MPLAB IDE and the student version of the C18 compiler. However, a programming cable does not come free with the vex robotics kit. As a result, I have decided to try to make a home made version and here I show my results.