The Oneida Daily Dispatch (Oneida, NY)
Robotics team has strong showing
The Chittenango High School Robotics teams wrapped up the 2017Vex Starstruck Competition at the Northern New York State Championships on Saturday, Feb. 18at the SRC Arena.
SYRACUSE >> The Chittenango High School Robotics teams wrapped up the 2017 Vex Starstruck Competition at the Northern New York State Championships on Saturday, Feb. 18 at the SRC Arena.
Three teams from CHS qualified for the tournament by competing well at other tournaments throughout the season, which began in October.
Vex Robotics teams design, build, and program a robot that competes on a 12-by-12 foot field against other robots in a game that changes every year. This year’s challenge required robots to toss oversize foam objects shaped like jacks and large pillow bags over a fence in a reverse style keep away format. Matches begin with a 15 second autonomous period followed by a driver control portion.
Team 7157C, The Bueno Hombres, with members Dakota Prado, Pablo Obando and Abe Czarnecki made a deep run in the tournament with their scissor lift design before being eliminated in the finals of the Technology Division.
Juniors Trevor Crystal, Ben Cyr, Lucas Spiridilozzi and Sean Austin competed well with a “strong arm” bot and executed several successful high hang maneuvers worth extra points in the game. The 7157B robot with a cool but complex holonomic drive struggled with motor issues all day and, despite a valiant lunchtime rewiring effort, were eliminated after the qualifying rounds in the Engineering Division.
While the teamfell short of its goal of qualifying for the World Championships in Texas, members say they are all looking forward to the chance to inspire the next generation of Robo Bears at the Bolivar Elementary STEM night and anxiously await unveiling of next year’s game challenge in April.