Video courtesy of members of the Paly robotics team.

The extensive programming and building that the Paly robotics team has conducted over the past several months to design a robot for the Silicon Valley Regional competition will be put to the test from March 12-14.

The team will face off against other teams from around Silicon Valley in a competition hosted by For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology. FIRST holds a series of annual robotics competitions across the country to “help high-school-aged young people discover how interesting and rewarding the life of engineers and researchers can be,” according FIRST’s Web site.

Every year, the rules and objectives of the robotics competition change. This year, each team has to design a robot with a small trailer attached to it. The teams have to program their robots so that they fire balls into opponents’ trailers and simultaneously prevent opponents from firing balls into their own.

The moving targets are a significant change from previous years’ competitions, in which robots aimed for stationary targets.

In addition, the material used for the floor has been changed to reduce friction. This change came about because in previous years, many teams were re-using their drivetrains, which is a group of parts that generates power and delivers motion, such as the engine, transmission, and driveshaft. The friction reduction renders the old drivetrains ineffective, which forced the teams to redesign them, according to senior Sarah Stone, a senior member of the build team.

Unlike other teams’ robots, the Paly team’s robot uses a three-wheel, as opposed to a four-wheel, drivetrain.

“Most teams have a four-wheel drivetrain, so when it turns, the back wheels turn in opposite directions,” said Stone. “We’ve got a three-wheel drivetrain, one in the front and two in the back. That reduces the chance of slipping.”

Another difference between Paly’s robot and its competitors is its level of autonomy. The robot’s turret automatically targets and fires by tracking colored stands in the trailers.

From that movement, the robot predicts short-term location and movement speed to create an accurate firing path, according to junior Nick Clayton, captain of the programming team.

The robot’s firing capability proved to be one of the most difficult aspects of the robot’s construction.

“At first, we just programmed the physics [formulas] in,” said Clayton. “When we did that, the equation you get [to input into the robot] is a page and a half long. We put into [Microsoft] Word, single spaced. Then we used Newton’s Method [a method for approximating mathematical functions]. It gets accuracy to four or five decimal places. It’s about one tenth of an inch of error.”

Most of the robot has been shipped to San Jose for the competition, except for the turret, which the team is still testing.

From March 26-28, the team will compete at the Las Vegas Regional, and later at the Championships, which will be held from April 16-18.