Your robot is a search and rescue robot. You have arrived at a site with a building that is about to fall down completely. Your robot will be sent into the building twice. The first time the mission is to assess the situation and find target object (people). You will be given a blue print of the building but this will not be completely accurate because there might be rubble. In a second phase your robot is sent in to rescue the target objects. In both cases you need to be quick and especially in the second case. 

The building (maze)

Walls

• The walls will be created based on white boards like this 
http://www.byggmax.com/se-sv/Prod/PID-09030.aspx
• The wall segments will have a minimum height of approximately 30cm. 
• The thickness of the walls might vary depending of the exact material, but it will be more than 1.5cm and less than 2.5cm. 
• Roughly 90 degree angle between the walls
• Any length of the wall segmets might occur
• Walls can be "disconnected" from anything else

Rubble 

• Anything that is not easily taken for wall or object. Minimum height 2cm

Clearance

There will be a path with a minimum clearance of 30cm (this does not have a 20% tolerance. we will measure this to ensure that it is not less than 30cm) from the start/end point to all objects. Note that not all paths might have this clearance though.

 

Opening / door

The building "maze" will have an opening in the form of a door through which the robot should enter and exit. The robot should know that it has exited the maze and show this in some way.

The door is opened manually (push a button) but the robot should declare when it wants the door open by saying "Starting". The door will close automatically after the a certain time. You should be out before that.

 

Tolerances

All of the measures given here are subject to a 20% tolerance given by differences in the materials and errors during the assembly.    

 

Assembly of the maze

The things used to connect the wall segments together might have a colour different from the walls.

 

Illumination

Illumination conditions might vary from completely artificial light to a mixture of natural and artificial light (incl. camera flashes).

 

Objects

The number of objects is unknown. The objects will be between 5-15cm in cube and typically made of plastic. The objects can be placed anywhere in the maze but no part of an object will be above 20cm.

 

The robot

Hardware

All of the robots should make use of the given hardware platform. If you need anything else in addition to what you were given you need to ask for permission.

Processing

The robot must be completely autonomous. This means that all of the processing must be carried out inside the robot and never with the aid of an external computer.

External communications

All that is allowed is to press a button when you start the robot. The robot is allowed to send debug information to an off board unit but that off-board unit cannot provide any information to the robot (unless it comes as task directives from the teachers).

Height

No part of the robot must extend over 29cm in height (including all sensors).

Other sensors and actuators

Participants who would like to use other sensors must consult with the teachers. Any not allowed aid during the contest might cause disqualification.

 

Task

Your task is to design the search and rescue robot that can go into the building (the "maze"), detect and identify objects and store their location, and later use this knowledge to plan a path and execute a fetch all objects mission as fast as possible.

The two phases of the task

Phase 1 : Exploration and mapping (5min)

• In the first phase your robot is supposed to explore the building (maze), detect and localize objects and novel obstacles. You are penalized for not exiting the maze at the end and for not knowing that you have exited but the time is not important otherwise.
• The time start when your robot says "Start" and you manually press the button to open the door into the maze.
• The output of the phase is the position and identity of objects marked plus novel obstacles which can be used in the second phase. The novel obstacles do not influence the score.
• The robot should report when it finds an object and give information about the identity and position of the object.
• The door will close after 5min.

 

Phase 2 : Fetch objects (3min)

• In this phase your tasks is to go into the building and fetch as many objects as fast as possible
• You fetch an object by positioning yourself in front of it. Some part of the robot needs to be at most 10cm from the object and the robot need to stand still.
• The time starts when your robot says "Start"
•  You are penalized for not exiting the maze at the end and for not knowing that you have exited and the sooner you get out the better (given the same performance inside the maze).
• The robot should report when it finds an object and give information about the identity of the object.
• The door will close after 3min.

A phase is considered finished when the robot is outside and signals (stopping and saying something like "I am done") that it is finished. If the time is up then the phase is also stopped.

The exact scoring scheme for the contest (not part of the grading!!!) will be released close to the contest so that you focus on the task and not the contest score.