Line Following Contest Rules and Regulations

CONCEPT:

The goal of the contest is to design an autonomous robot that will follow a black line on a white background

DESCRIPTION:

This event is intended to showcase basic sensor design and robot control systems in the form of a small autonomous robot which must follow a black line over a white surface. There will be three different courses of varying complexity. The exact details of the course will not be known before the day of the contest (but will be seen the morning of, before the competition). Sample courses, similar to but not the actual courses will be available at the campus starting one month before the competition.

PLAYING FIELD:

The playing field shall be 3 ft by 6 ft surface, made of white drafting paper with no border. Each of three fields will have a pattern similar to the examples shown below.

The line to be followed will be an approximately 3/4 inch black line drawn on white paper.

RACE COURSES:

There will be three different race courses. All participants can choose to compete in one, two or all three events.

COURSE ONE:

This course will consist of straight lines and easy curves. Curves will be at least 5 inches in radius. No lines will cross or be closer than six inches of any other line. This is a tycipal Course One:

 

COURSE TWO:

This course will consist of straight lines and curves. Turns can be any angle up to 90 degrees. Lines will cross at close to 90 degree angles. This is a tycipal Course Two:

 

COURSE THREE:

This course will consist of straight lines, crossings and sharp turns. Some turns will exceed 90 degrees. Lines will cross at any angle. This is a tycipal Course Three:

 

ALL COURSES:

All courses will be closed. i.e. the line will form a complete path allowing each robot to complete two or more laps around the course.
All lines will be black, 3/8ths inch wide.

CLASSES:

There are three classes in this competition.

CLASS "A":

1. Participant must be an enrolled student in good standing.
2. Participant must design and build an autonomous robot that is microcontroller or microprocessor controlled.
3. Robots must use hardware equivalent to or nearly like the equipment included in school curricula.
   Example Hardware: PIC18Fxxxx Microcontroller, 68HC12 or 68HC12 Microprocessor
   Example software: Assembler language, C, or Some form of BASIC or Visual Basic

CLASS "B":

Participant must design and build an autonomous robot that is microcontroller or microprocessor controlled. There is no restriction on the type of hardware or software used.

CLASS "C":

Participant uses any technology short of a computer program in a chip, such as comparators or other electronic methods to detect and follow a line.

STARTING ORDER:

Contestant starting order will be chosen by random drawing.
When it is your turn: place your robot on the beginning of the black line.
Activate it and step back from the playing field.

ROBOTS:

All robots shall be Autonomous Mobile Robots. "Autonomous" means that once started - the robot proceeds without external equipment. External equipment includes humans and electronic devices. The robots must be able to operate without cues or input from the owner/operator.

 

Robots must fit inside a 9 inch cube and must not extend any part of itself outside that 9 inch cube while operating.

Severe penalties may be awarded to robots which are fundamentally unmodified retail kits. Robots determined by the judges to be essentially kits, may compete, but cannot be scored or win awards.

Robots built from robot construction kits, like Lego MindStorms or Meccano, are NOT penalized.

PROHIBITED ITEMS:

Other than following the black line, nothing may be used to guide the robot. No externally-controlled device (i.e., by the operator or another computer or external sensor) that transmits, receives, or reflects any energy, such as acoustic/sonar, microwave, radio wave (HF, RF, UHF, etc.), light, laser, or infrared energy may be used.

CALIBRATION PERIOD:

There will be a practice/adjustment time before the event. Competitors must share the line following course with other competitors who wish to practice. At the end of the time period, contestants are responsible for making sure the course is clean and ready for the next contestant to the satisfaction of the judges, or the contestant who produced the mess may be disqualified. This includes debris, fluids, or marks remaining on the course.

PERFORMANCE:

After your trial begins, the only interference allowed is to pick up your robot, return it to Start and restart. The clock is not stopped, and your robot must negotiate the line again, in a continuous path, from the start to where it left the line, before you will accrue more points for successfully negotiating the course. The evaluation of what constitutes "following the line" will, in some cases, require a judgment call. Judges' decisions are final, so if in doubt about your robot, ask a judge before the competition to check your robot's performance.

SCORING

A contestant has 5 minutes to complete the course. This is the maximum amount of time for a robot to complete the course. If hung up, robots may be restarted at the entrance (beginning a new time measurement for that run) as many times as necessary within those 5 minutes to complete the course. At the end of the 5 minutes, or the successful completion of the course, the contestant shall be removed from the tiled area.

Winners are determined by the shortest time to complete three laps around any course. In the event no robot finishes, the robot that has gone the farthest wins. In the event of a tie, winner will be determined by a "sudden death" round where the robot travelling the shortest distance or completing the course with the slowest time is eliminated.

 

JUDGES:

Judges will be staff or faculty personnel or employees from local electronics and/or robotics companies. Judges decisions are final.