麻豆传媒

A large green robotic 鈥渙gre鈥� designed and built to look like the character 鈥淪hrek鈥� is receiving a lot of attention at this year鈥檚 Peter Gregson Robotics Design Competition.

The 10x11鈥� robot sits on a table amongst nineteen other robots designed by 3^rd year 麻豆传媒 engineering students enrolled in the electrical and computer engineering design II course. Its differentiating feature is a large 3D printed Shrek head it carries on its back.

鈥淚鈥檝e actually never watched the Shrek movie,鈥� jokes 3^rd year student, Mohammed ali Khalaf who built the robot along with his teammates Gregory Bowes, Vlad Chiriac, Roee Omessi and Nick Rockwell.

At the start of the semester, student teams in the course were provided with a base robot, a tool kit and a $300 budget to design and build an autonomous robot that competes at the design challenge.

鈥淲e had a robot and it kind of looked like the character 鈥淭homas the Tank Engine,鈥� says Khalaf. 鈥淏ut Greg had an old Shrek figurine sitting on his shelf, so we ended up going with that.鈥�



The team calls the robot, the Shrekinator. Now as they wait for their turn to compete at this year鈥檚 design challenge, they admit that the robot鈥檚 popularity has made them a little extra nervous for competition.

鈥淭he boys feel anxious,鈥� laughs Khalaf. 鈥淚 feel exactly how I would feel if I was in an NBA championship. This has been the most climatic moment of my life.鈥�

Peter Gregson Robotics Design Challenge
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Khalaf says he been anxiously waiting to participate in the Peter Gregson Robotics Design Challenge since the moment he signed up for the design II course.

鈥淓veryone who goes into this class knows about this project and we鈥檙e aiming for first place here today. Top honours.鈥�

The annual competition, which is taking place this year in the Atrium of the Emera Idea Building, is a full-day event that features automated robots competing in an obstacle course race. Their challenge: perform certain tasks while avoiding multiple obstacles.听The competition gives students the opportunity to test their engineering skills, creativity, stamina, and teamwork.

鈥淭here are no remote controls used in the competition,鈥� adds Khalaf. 鈥淭he robots act on their own. They don鈥檛 talk to any outside sources.鈥�

When the time comes for his team to compete, Khalaf carefully places the Shrekinator on the obstacle course. From there, it slowly navigates its way around the route. It gets stuck a couple of times along a wall, in the end completing the course on its third attempt. The team receives a respectable 90 per cent score.

鈥淭he hardest part of the obstacle course is navigation,鈥� says Khalaf. 鈥淚t鈥檚 unpredictable because it鈥檚 a very advanced system. It鈥檚 not like you hit go and it鈥檚 the same thing every time. There鈥檚 always a chance that the robot will do something that you didn鈥檛 expect it to do.鈥�

Rewarding Experiences
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Win or lose, Khalaf says the design challenge has so far been the most rewarding part of his academic career.

鈥淚t鈥檚 definitely the best experience we鈥檝e had building our teamwork skills. Both with our own group and between other groups as well,鈥� he says. 鈥淭here鈥檚 no way to get the robot working if you鈥檙e not working together.鈥�

鈥淎s we got closer to the test day, all the teams were sharing materials with each other, and we got a lot closer as a class.鈥�

Khalaf says the community spirit and positive energy made the long hours enjoyable and manageable. This despite doing a final test on their robot at 3:20am the night before competition.

鈥淭he 24 hours challenge was an experience. Frisbee in the field at 1:00am when we were waiting for our turn to test the robot on the obstacle course, then McDonalds, it was great,鈥� he enthusiastically says.

Proud of both his team and classmates, Khalaf says he feels grateful for the opportunity to have gained such valuable hands-on experience from his design course.

鈥淪omeday we鈥檙e going to be working with companies where we will have a project that we鈥檒l need to demo. If the CEO is watching, you need to be ready for that kind of pressure. This experience (robotics challenge) for me has been the best practice so far,鈥� he says.

鈥淥ur electrical engineering course really teaches you to be confident with your design and work. And if we鈥檙e talking about class quality and structure, this is a good as it gets.鈥�