BT Teams Take Top Spots at Robot Challenge

By Mr. Neville Jacobs, engineering teacher
Once again, Beth Tfiloh teams took top spots in the annual IEEE Robot Challenge. The judges score 28 metrics, some of which are the construction of the robot and its controllers from scratch; the 35-page written report, typically made up of six full-length essays; their track performance under manual control; the track run with open loop automation control; the track run with closed-loop-with-sensor-feedback automation; the oral presentation before a panel of engineers; the review of workmanship and soldering; the programming of the controllers for the automation runs; and the creativity and artistry of the robot body and shipping container.

Twenty eight 2-leg teams and eight 4-leg teams participated in the competition. Owing to our small class size this year, we were unable to enter any 4-leg robots, but I'm sure you will be pleased with how our students performed!

In the 2-leg Robot Overall category, Beth Tfiloh's Team Fast and Furious took first place with a score of 93 points out of 100. Ben R. ‘16 and Nina F. ‘16 came up with the idea of building a race track on top of their robot with two model cars that raced against each other as the robot tilted up and down as it made its way to the finish line. They were the only team that completed the course in both manual and automated mode.

Beth Tfiloh’s The Slaying Sleigh Team came in third place, tying with the Take-Off team from Charles Herbert Flowers High School in Prince Georges's County (a tech magnet school). The tie-breaker was the manual track run, where Team Take-Off did an incredible run, completing the course in just 4 minutes and 57 seconds! Despite an unlucky run (they had done much better at school), our team made up by Shiya B. ‘16, Nicholas P. ‘16, and Uri B. ’16 turned in the best written report and got the highest points for workmanship of the whole competition. They also tied for top points in the oral presentation.

Coming in at tenth place was BT’s Team Raphael, Hero in a Halfshell. This team, made up of Shua S. ‘16 and Sydney K. ‘16, had bad luck during the manual run — their robot just wouldn't walk properly despite many successful runs at school, but they thoroughly redeemed themselves during the complex closed-loop-with-sensor-feedback run, which, after struggling a bit during the first part of the track, they got to work flawlessly, completing the course in a little over a minute!

Congratulations to our BT students!
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Beth Tfiloh Dahan Community School

Learning together. For life.
Baltimore’s only Jewish independent preparatory school serving PreSchool through Grade 12.