The robotics teams at Lapeer West and Lapeer East high schools are looking to the future after lessons learned during productive seasons and competitions this year.
East Robotics had a positive season and put together powerful sponsorship support with CCS Robotics, Cypress Securities and PNC Bank (formally National City Bank). Many other community businesses also provided financial support to the team through this season.
The team competed at Kettering University and while it did not finish high enough to qualify for the State Championship this year, the team is pleased with its progress and looks forward to the State Championship next year, said Lapeer East teacher and Robotics Team Mentor George Mavis. Student involvement has grown and student interest in the team is rising.
The team also has developed alliances with other robotics teams across the state, which is helping to advance East’s program and to achieve its goals for student learning in the First Robotics Competitions and Programs.
The team, which makes presentations about its robot to community groups throughout the year, finished 109th of all the teams in Michigan.
The Lapeer West Chrome Panthers Robotics team finished 91st of the 136 teams in Michigan despite several obstacles this season, said Cory Gutenschwager, Instructor of Industrial Technology & Head Robotics Mentor at Lapeer West.
This year’s team was comprised of Gutenschwager and 18 West students. The team completed its build without any help from outside mentors or parents. The team also experienced a huge material delay for three of the six-week build period, when it tried to order the Mecanum wheels – which move in any direction -- on which its design was based. The students were adamant they would wait for them to become available.
The first competition in week one offered a lot of observation of other teams’ machines, prompting West to realize it needed to adapt its machine and strategy to be competitive at its next competition at Troy Athens High School.
During that competition, the team was chosen during alliance selection to play in the final rounds for the first time and proved it was a versatile asset to any alliance -- a team of three robots -- whether it needed a good defender or a machine to complete a goal.
One of West’s toughest challenges was to program a 15-second autonomous mode to stop an opponent, who turned out to be the event winner, in match 80. Although West didn’t win that match, the team achieved its goal and ruined its opponent’s strategy with the help of an alliance partner. During the selection process, West was asked to join the Troy Athens Hammerheads and The Mech Warriors from Brother Rice. With that alliance, West passed through the quarter finals into the semi finals before suffering a 10-7 loss against another.
The Troy event has some of the toughest competition possible when it comes to robotics – one of them will be the national winner after the Atlanta, GA event.
To view all the State of Michigan team ranks:
http://www.firstinmichigan.org/staticpages/index.php?page=2010_Results_Overall
To learn more about the West Chrome Panthers Team or to watch one of its matches go to:
www.chromepanthers.com
