Students show the nuts and bolts of robot building

Each winter, 15 high school students and seven MIT engineering students spend six straight weeks drilling, sanding, sawing and bolting to build a robot fit for competition.

This year’s Cambridge Rindge and Latin team has only a few weeks left to finish its robot, but 16-year-old junior Aaron King is confident they’ll finish in time to meet the deadlines for the Boston FIRST Regional Robotics Competition on March 23 and 24 at Boston University’s Agganis Arena.

“It’s coming along well. We should be done in a few more sessions,” he said. “We want to have time to practice driving.”

The robots’ mission is different each year, and once team members are told in January what the game will be and receives their basic kits, they have six weeks to design and build their robot. This year’s mission is to hang inflated colored tubes on pegs that are arranged in a 10-foot-high grid. Teams can also earn points by lifting another robot, which can weigh up to 120 pounds, more than 4 inches off the floor during the 135-second match.

“We’re building an arm to put the tubes on the poles, and a platform that unfolds so two robots can stack on top,” said King, describing the team’s design strategy. “I think building the arm is going pretty well, and the ramp system should work.”

During the first 10 seconds of the match, the robot must function autonomously with no human instruction. The team must preprogram the robot to move on its own.

“It’ll probably be something defensive,” King said. “You can’t ram other robots, but last year we tipped over a few, and one of the teams awarded us ‘Best Defense,’” he said.

The team is based in Cambridge, but includes students from Whalen, Everett, Medfield, Chelsea and South Public Charter high schools. Students travel to Cambridge to participate because their schools do not yet have similar programs.

Adviser Shane Colton, a senior at MIT, was involved in the program in high school and decided to stay involved through college. Being on the team was the one thing that turned his general interest in science in technology into a passion for engineering, he said.

“Some high schools have engineering classes, but most of the time you just take your basic physics bio and chemistry, and no one really knows what engineering is,” he said. “This program shows you how to apply the stuff you learn in physics to actual engineering.”

Colton said what’s special about his team is that almost all of the construction done on the robots is done by the high school students.

“Some teams send their designs out to GM, who manufactures all the parts for them, and then they just bolt it all together,” he said.

His team is one of the most hands-on teams, which makes the experience a lot more valuable, he said. The MIT students act only as mentors, helping students guide their designs and showing them how to make their ideas work.

“It makes it so that we’re not going to have the prettiest robot and we’re not going to have the nicest parts,” he said. “You can still build something very great with just very basic tools.”

Last year, the team placed in the top 24 out of 60 teams in the regionals. Regardless of this year’s outcome, the Rindge and Latin team has already secured itself a bonus spot in the national competition at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta in April. The team got the bonus spot by signing up early and raising money to fund its trip.

“I like competition the best,” King said. “It’s like a sports game. Some teams bring their whole school, and all the parents and all the teams have T-shirts and buttons. Plus they have a big screen and an announcer.”

Beth Lerret, 17-year-old junior at Cambridge Ringe and Latin, is one of the only girls on the team. It’s her first year on the team.

“It’s fun,” she said. “Electronics are great, but I’d rather be drilling or hammering something.”