the 411

What's the Dilly-o with the project?

Why did we make this project?

That is a question that we have asked ourself since we began creating it a week ago.
Indeed, we had grandiose visions of a robotic masterpiece when we began, and started to scale back about three minutes later.

Our vision: a fully functional and working snowboard race, complete with robotic lift, sensor triggered contraptions, and three trails. The first idea we scaled back was the THREE trails... why have three when indeed all we needed was two? Much love to Lyn for talking us out of that idea. The next aspect that we disposed of was the working lift- we weren't sure of how the snowboarders could get on or off the lift, and it seemed to be putting too much pressure on a project that already looked to be challenging and difficult to complete in the time alloted. Finally, the sensor triggered contraptions that were supposed to impede the snowboarders were abandoned AFTER they had been completed- the two we created werejust not durable enough or compatible with the mountain we had eventually created.

What we were left with: four randomly popping out contraptions, and a sensored finish line. Despite the fact that our vision was reduced to much, much less, and our project is not particularly durable, we are both very proud of our accomplishments. Our robot is fun and well created, and we hope that it will run successfully during the exhibition. To see pictures of our robot, click here.