3:00 PM Sunday, November 11th
The Winston School

[Grade Groups Do Apply]
["Contestant" is defined as teams composed of two, three, or four students]

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(1) Contestants will build a Lego Robotics RCX battery-powered robot and program it to accomplish a specific task. The winner of the event will be the contestant that accurately accomplishes the task in the shortest amount of time.

(2) Contestants are required to have the following skills prior to entering this event:

  1. High skill-level in assembling Lego devices.
  2. Knowledge of how to program a Lego Robotics RCX device on a computer, and transfer that program to the RCX.
  3. Knowledge of assembling gears
  4. An understanding that tasks assigned to a RCX robot is a function of speed and time.

For example, if you want a robot to travel a meter and turn right, you must know how many seconds are required for the robot to travel this distance. The time factor can be altered by changing the robots gear ratio.

The Competition

(1) A contestant is defined as a team of two or three students. Each school can have only one team, without prior approval of the event organizers.

(2) The team will have two hours to build a Lego Robot and program the RCX to perform an assigned task. The race organizers will provide calculators, RCX Lego Robotics kits, PC computers, batteries, pencils & paper. Team members can not bring or use any extra Lego parts not supplied by the event organizers.

(3) After two hours, judges will stop all construction and programming and call upon the contestants to perform the assigned task.

(4) The team that successfully performs the task in the shortest amount of time will be declared the winner.
The Task

Teams could be assigned any or all of the following tasks:

  1. travel a precise distance
  2. make accurate turns
  3. travel another precise distance
  4. do task involving a sensor
  5. grasp an object
  6. push or shove an object
  7. drive around an object

Evaluation

(1) Teams will have two opportunities to run the assigned course. The best run time will be recorded for the team.

(2) Vehicles touching or crossing the lines that mark the race course will forfeit that turn.

(3) The team that successfully performs the assigned task in the shortest amount of time will be declared the winner.

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For additional information about Winston Science, contact Dr. Lehman Marks, Event Director.
Copyright (c) 2007 Lehman Marks/The Winston School. All Rights Reserved.