Robotics team prepares for competition

The Olney High School robotics team recently held a practice session to prepare for UIL competition.

The practice meet took place Saturday, Oct. 14, in Alan. The team consists of seniors Rodolo Arce and Angel Alvardo as well as juniors Anay Santibanez, Aidyn Bitner, and Ryan Conder. The coach is science teacher Sabrina Laurent.

“We got to test out how our robot would do events and actions on a replication of the actual game field,” Arce said.

The week before the practice, the team spent six hours working on the robot in addition to class time.

One challenge was programming the IR sensor.

“We have never used the IR sensor in past contests so this is very new,” said Laurent. “The IR sensor will allow the robot to move along the white line autonomously.”

Laurent said, “Challenge two has been fine tuning the wheels to be more maneuverable. It sounds easy but making two identical ‘perfectly’ shaped wheels isn’t that easy and is time consuming.”

Laurent noted that “the prototype wheels worked great on our carpet at home but not so great on the carpet at the practice field.”

Laurent said the robot needs to be finished by Friday, Oct. 27, in time for the UIL compliance test that night. “The robot has a few tasks that it needs to complete to be successful at the contest on Saturday Oct. 28,” she said.