competitions?

[limetime]

hi there, i just discovered robo-one the other day and i'm really impressed! unfortunately i cant afford a KHR-1 but i'm planning on having a go at building my own design from scratch as a (very) long term project.
anyway my main question is- are there any robo-one style competitions planned in europe or, more specifically, the UK?

cheers, limetime.

[limor]

Hello Limetime and welcome to RoboSavvy!

What has been discussed previously here was the idea of fabricating a humanoid from scratch based on some plans/model that would be shared. This could potentially save some money (though the main part of the cost are still the servos!). I haven't seen any 3D plans/models of a robo-one robot yet and I invite anyone who has seen it on the net or experimented with CAD/modeling tools to please share it on this forum. It is important to note that KHR-1 was designed by a famous Japanese designer and that's why it looks so cool. (compare KHR-1 to his mutant sister in law)
If there were 3D models, it may be possible to then fabricate the brackets in moderate quantities and price. You could even fabricate them economically using a home-built CNC machine like Meltdown has done.


Active international humanoid robot competitions are robocup.org, robolympics.net and robo-one.com.
As for UK humanoid robot competitions, there's a chicken-egg problem. I have been in touch with the Robo-One federation and an event can probably be organized with their blessing. However, there are hardly any robot clubs in the UK (excluding First Lego gatherings). The economics of setting up a competition are quite problematic without having at least a minimum number of humanoid builders that are guaranteed to participate and thereby get the media interested, which in turn will drive more people to build humanoids etc.

Japan has over 200,000 hobby robot builders!
Korea has over 30,000!

I wonder if in all of the EU states put together there are 100 walker robot builders outside of academia.

I'd love to hear what people in this forum think of this and if there are any ideas on how to improve the situation.

[limetime]

hi limor! cheers for the reply. wow, that sounds like an exciting idea, everyone contributing to a design! i'd be more than happy to contribute what i can, i'm no master robot builder, but i have a good imagination and a basic understanding of whats required so, yeah! awesome!
with regards to mutant sister- yes, KHR-1 is certainly a neater looking machine

competitions: what i thought would be a good idea is to get in touch with the 'post-robotwars' combat robot community that is thriving in the UK.
there are a few companies/ organisations that might 'foster' humanoids,
i'll give you an example to clarify my point:

you may be aware of the popular weight class of combat robots called 'antweights' (150kg weight limit has to fit in 4" cube) these have only been around for a few years but because of adoption by the rest of the combat robot community- small exhibitions at larger events for promotional purposes, antweights are now the second most popular weight class!

if we get the FRA(fightingRobotsAssociation) or a website like RobotWars101 to help promotion, we could run small demos at big events with just a couple of humanoids perhaps footage of robo-one from japan etc.
i think from a 'marketing' point of veiw this is where the most interest would come from. i think this would be a good first step to a larger community of builders. of course this may not be a popular way forward with some other users here so lets hear everyones thoughts!

peace out. limetime.

[EC]

Any idea that gets more robot builders is a good idea.

[limor]

Limetime,
your idea is great! i'm still pondering on it and looking into the antsize sites. I'll give my 2cents later.
in the meantime, I've uploadeda schematics of KHR-1 that should spice up your creative juices when you work on a robo-one robot design.. (Blender is a great public domain 3d design tool, more on this in anotherthread)

[limor]

competitions: what i thought would be a good idea is to get in touch with the 'post-robotwars' combat robot community that is thriving in the UK.
there are a few companies/ organisations that might 'foster' humanoids,
i'll give you an example to clarify my point:

Thats a good idea. Robowars fans will like seing something completely new like humanoid fighting robots.

you may be aware of the popular weight class of combat robots called 'antweights' (150kg weight limit has to fit in 4" cube) these have only been around for a few years but because of adoption by the rest of the combat robot community- small exhibitions at larger events for promotional purposes, antweights are now the second most popular weight class!

150kg into cubic 4" ? kg or gramms/feet or inches?.. 150kg into 4 cubic inches means using a material that's about(?) 100 times the density of iron so care has to be taken not to get exposed to extensive amounts of gamma rays and not to drop one of those on the floor in case it breaks thorugh earth's crust..
Jokes aside, I heard the antweights have had problems getting attention because they are literally so small.

if we get the FRA(fightingRobotsAssociation) or a website like RobotWars101 to help promotion, we could run small demos at big events with just a couple of humanoids perhaps footage of robo-one from japan etc.

I spoke with Andy Kanefrom the FRAand it seems RoboSavvy and FRA may be cooperating soon. One idea we discussed is to use robo-one humanoids as a "filler".. In a typical fighting robot event the matches take a couple of minutes each but charging up the robots can take ages.. hence in these periods we could have robo-one type events and project them on big screens so that the large audience can actually see the 30cm robots punching each other.
This would introduce humanoids to the British community of robot-wars fans.

[limetime]

thats great news! yeah, a 'filler' was excactly what i was thinking.
now all i gotta do is get some money and start building summink

p.s. i meant g not kg lol

[phillysteak]

Hey, i'm currently building my own robo one and it's alot cheaper than buying a khr-1. right now i'm using HS-311 servos (19), a BASIC atom bot board and a BASIC atom pro 24 pin module. As of now the servos cost 8.99 from towerhobbies.com , and the electronics together are about 120 from lynxmotion.com . I was a little disaapointed to find out that there arent many competions in the US (let alone NY). But there are the ROBO olympics which i hope to attend, eventually.

[DanAlbert]

We are holding a Robo-1 competition in Phila. on Sept 24th 2005 at the Franklin Institute.

Check out our website (www.sjrobotics.org) or buildersdb to enter.

So far, I have the only Robo-1.

The two R1 events are wrestling and stairclimbing.

Anyone else interested?


Dan

[limetime]

has anything come of the proposed robosavvy/FRA collaboration?
iv seen nuthin from FRA, in fact i posted a notice about humanoids and robo-one on their forums ages ago that noone replied to it .
if not im sure there are other ways we can get promoting...

[limor]

There's some work underway so that KHR1 will be shown at FRA and similar type shows around UK. The idea is that they will show some cool stuff during the waiting time while titanium monsters get recharged.