Two teams of undergraduate students formed by the Robotics Team of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) School of Engineering (SENG) altogether sweep four out of six awards in the Robocon 2013 Hong Kong Contest, which was held in Cyberport on 23 June.

The awards include the Championship won by the team “War Dragon”; First Runner-up, Best Engineering Award, and Best Artistic Design Award won by the team “Fiery Dragon”. This is the third time that HKUST students receive four awards in a year (first time in 2005) and the fifth time that they are crowned Champion since the inception of the contest in 2004. HKUST is also the only university that received as many as four awards in a year so far. HKUST has once again achieved the best ever result of any single university in a year since the launch of the contest.

The Champion team will represent Hong Kong to compete in the Danang-Vietnam ABU Asia-Pacific Robot Contest this August. Vietnam has chosen the theme THE GREEN PLANET for the ABU Robocon 2013 with the message of “Each nation is a piece of the puzzle that forms the world; the responsibility to protect the earth thus lies on the shoulder of each person living on it” to promote people’s awareness and actions on sustainability.

A total of 10 teams from six higher education institutions participated, including CityU, CUHK, HKUST, IVE, PolyU and HKU.

The two HKUST teams were formed by 29 undergraduate students, in which 12 are from the SENG 4-Y program, 3 from Computer Engineering Program, 6 from Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering, 6 from Department of Mechanical Engineering, and 2 from School of Science. The students are supervised by Prof Tim Woo, Director of the Center for Global & Community Engagement (GCE) and Associate Professor of Engineering Education.

HKUST’s “War Dragon” and “Fiery Dragon” were the only two teams which were able to complete all the required tasks to achieve the ultimate mission of “THE GREEN PLANET” in the game. The robots of the HKUST teams can multitask effectively such as grabbing as many “leaves” (polystyrene objects used in the game) as possible at the same time. The teams’ new controller systems like Xbox controller with LCD monitor and motor control system which integrates both the controlling algorithm and the circuitry have drawn great attention of the referees. It is the first time that the students implement the speed control and current control for the motors as well as the PID controller for error correction to provide a safe, accurate and precise motion control. The team members equip their robots with high accuracy sensor as the feedback system and pneumatic actuator ensures high speed and reliability in accomplishing the tasks. These features display distinct advantages over the competitors.

An inter-institutional contest for higher education students, the Robocon Hong Kong Contest encourages the design and construction of robots. The contest was organized by Radio Television Hong Kong and Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU) and co-organized by The Hong Kong Computer Society and The Hong Kong Institution of Engineers.

Student list

Related Link:

• Danang-Vietnam ABU Asia-Pacific Robot Contest 2013