ROBOCON Workshop at KKTM Balik Pulau, Penang

ROBOCON Workshop at KKTM Balik Pulau, Penang

Another ROBOCON Workshop has been successfully conducted in KKTM (Kolej Kemahiran Tinggi Mara) Balik Pulau, Penang. They are the first-timers in ROBOCON, so please welcome them!

The workshop started on 24th Feb 2009 (Tuesday), there are around 12 students and 10 lecturers involve in the workshop. After collecting all necessary components, materials, and people, the workshop begins at around 10 am. The venue is located at Microcontroller lab in KKTM Balik Pulau.

The history of ROBOCON sounds like a good topic to start the Workshop. Therefore, Ober shares ROBOCON's history with participants. After the history, we started to talk about autonomous robots and manual robots. Going deeper into elements of robots which include controllers, mechanisms, and more. This should be a good introduction to our participants.

While waiting for the preparation of the connector and hardware for building the robot, we enter the C language zone. I have to admit is a bit boring, but we try to keep the concentration by sharing the experience in ROBOCON! During that time we went to Thailand, Korea, and China. It was a great feeling to share.

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OK, now the first project using IFC (Interface Free Controller). Of course, we will start with the steps to create a project using MPLAB and C18 Compiler and load it into the IFC.

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Before they started to use IFC, MPLAB, and the C compiler; the participants were so confused. All the doubt has been cleared once they try to write a program and loaded it into IFC. Look at the picture, there is a simple message on the LCD panel. All those are being written by them. Great start right?

 

Now, is the time for a real robot. Mounting motors and tires to the Robot base + IFC + Sensors + Batteries, they get a simple line following the robot. Lecturers in KKTM are very good in technical skills including mechanical, electronics, and software. And what amazed us is most of them did the workshop from the beginning until the end. They even did the programming themselves. The 2nd person standing from the right is Mr. Kamil, the head of the department which is Mechatronics department. He is very supportive of the team. He always seat at the front role and asks questions.

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Take a look at another picture, their lecturer is actually tuning the sensor after our demo on the method to calibrate the sensor for line following.

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Students gathered around to study the correct method and also to have a group discussion.

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After writing a program for the control panel, Digital input, brushless motor, and PS2 Controller, we started to explore the possibility to integrate sensors and brushless motors for line following. The coming picture shows students checking battery voltage before they start to try their program. The student sitting on the right is the leader of the student. They have a good leader.

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Most of the time is used for discussion about line following algorithms, writing and improving programs, debugging, and creating functions. Here you go, another picture showing discussion during the line following debug. The person standing on the left-hand side is Mr. Yusri, one of the trainers in KKTM, very good at programming.

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There are more to show which cover the discussion on the mechanism, ROBOCON rules, review of previous ROBOCON games, the spirit that we should have, preparation needed, and many more. We will share this information in the coming ROBOCON Workshop.

Is a great experience that we gained during the ROBOCON Workshop in KKTM. The lecturers and students are happy and motivated to enter ROBOCON 2009 on 10th May at Stadium Melati, Shah Alam.

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We hope KKTM has gained the knowledge and get prepared for ROBOCON. Welcome to the big family of ROBOCON.