Slinger’s Bot Battles to Victory

Post date: May 18, 2016 2:17:43 PM

By: Korey Alder, Photography Editor

Posted May 18th, 2016

A little over two weeks ago, on April 30th, Slinger’s BotsIQ club took a trip to Waukesha County Technical College for the Wisconsin BotsIQ competition. As promised in the article posted here on the “Nite Crier” back November, we have the results from the competition, which turned out favorably for Slinger.

Contrary to past years, Slinger took two machines to the competition this year, rather than the usual one. Matthew Benedum and Jacob Carpenter headed up the two teams, the former in command of the bot “Centroid,” and the latter doing much of the work on the cleverly-named “Carpe Diem.”

Results of the competition were close, but Centroid managed to take home the 1st place award, beating dozens of robots from other schools. Carpe Diem had lofty goals, with a high-rpm bar weapon, but technical issues and limited control prevented the bot from getting past more than a few rounds. Second place was “Brick,” a unique bot with an electro-magnet which adhered the robot to the metal floor of the arena, but the speed and accurate handling of Centroid kept Brick from 1st place.

It was an exciting event for all involved, and this was only heightened by a win from Slinger. If you want to watch some of Centroid’s victories, take a look at the video here.