WEB EXCLUSIVE: Students jump into the manufacturing ring with battling robots

With the realization that technical and engineering talents must be improved in the U.S. to remain competitive in the global marketplace, members of the Northwestern Chapter of the National Tooling & Machining Assn. (NTMA; www.ntma.org) decided to get students interested in engineering in a fun way—a battle of the bots! On April 5, a sold-out crowd of more than 1700 watched as 26 student teams brought 15-lb robots they designed and built to battle in the second annual double-elimination RoboBOTS tournament.

Students were more than just interested. In addition to class time, the winning team Drought 6 spent 11 Saturdays and five evenings working on the victorious undercutter robot called Fabius. “When I look into it, I see 100 small pieces that make up the overall result of a great, destructive machine,” says Drought 6 team member Clayton Soltesz of Cambridge Springs High School. “It just goes to show that any complex problem can be understood by simply comprehending how each of the smaller parts work.”

Student and teacher program evaluations reflected a 100% favorable rating on the success of the programs, with the students remarking that they loved the hands-on experience, which helped them to gain practical knowledge of math, science, engineering, and manufacturing.

Tech Tool & Molded Plastics (Meadville, PA; www.ttmp.com) was a major sponsor of the event, and Mark Hanaway, director of marketing at Tech Tool said, “If you feel that kids don't have what it takes to make it in today's world, I challenge you to get in the ring with any of these students. This event has inspired a new class of innovators.”

Videos of the robots in action can be seen on Tech Tool's website. Highly recommended viewing, too.