Live streaming of the First Robotics Competition in St. Louis, Missouri—a contest that includes the Secret City Wildbots from Oak Ridge—can be viewed here.
Secret City Wildbots (Team 4265) are in the Hopper Division. Today’s qualification rounds were scheduled for #12 at 9:47 a.m., #23 at 11:04 a.m., #38 at 2:44 p.m., and #48 at 3:54 p.m.
There are 600 teams competing in this year’s international championship.
This is a video of Team 4265, the Secret City Wildbots, during the final qualification round at the Smoky Mountain Regionals in Knoxville on Saturday, April 4. It was the fifth annual FIRST Robotics Competition Smoky Mountain Regional.
Team 4265 won the coveted Engineering Inspiration Award sponsored by NASA and will compete at the World Championship in St. Louis, Missouri, from April 21-25.
The Secret City Wildbots (Team 4265) compete at the Smoky Mountain Regionals in Knoxville on Saturday. (Photos by Angi Agle)
KNOXVILLE—Team 4265, the Secret City Wildbots, finished the qualifying rounds ranked Number 10 and successfully negotiated the three-round quarterfinals on Saturday afternoon in Knoxville.
The team suffered a disappointing loss in the semifinals, but at the end of the awards ceremony, members were presented with the coveted Engineering Inspiration Award sponsored by NASA. The award qualifies them to compete at the World Championship in St. Louis, Missouri, from April 21-25, with the entry fee paid by NASA.
This is the Secret City Wildbots’ fourth year, and the team has earned the right to compete in the World Championship each of those four years. [Read more…]
Photos by Angi Agle
By Angi Agle and University of Tennessee
With the first day of competition complete, the Secret City Wildbots are ranked Number 9 in the Smoky Mountain Regionals competition held at the Knoxville Convention Center. Continuing competition Saturday morning will determine final standings for the elimination rounds Saturday afternoon.
Team selection for the elimination rounds are based partly on standing (the top eight teams are automatically entered and choose two other schools for their teammates), but partly on individual capabilities and other factors.
At the end of the elimination rounds, the winning team of three robots earns the right to enter the World Championship in St. Louis, Missouri, from April 22-25. [Read more…]
Photos by Angi Agle
By Angi Agle
The Smoky Mountain Regional robotics competition kicked off Thursday with practice rounds, and qualification matches began Friday morning.
The theme of this year’s game is “Recycle Rush.” Robots are to pick up recycle bins, put foam noodles in trash cans, and stack all of them in the center of the field. Additional points are gained for the number of containers stacked.
Human players feed foam noodles into the trash cans as the robots hold them up to a hole in the plexiglas, as well as feeding gray recycle bins into the field for the robots to stack.
Team 4265, the Secret City Wildbots, experienced some technical challenges, which were expected to be resolved Friday morning. [Read more…]
Two members of the Jefferson Middle School Master Builders team are preparing their robot to solve missions at a FIRST Lego League mission table. (Photo by Yvonne Dalschen)
At Linden Elementary School, Lisa Buckner’s third-graders are building robots and Lego floats representing continents in a months-long project aimed at engaging them in learning, problem solving, and creative and critical thinking.
The 38 members of Oak Ridge High School’s Secret City Robotics team are solving real-world problems as they build and program a 120-pound robot to enter FIRST Robotics Competitions as an extra-curricular activity.
Teachers view robots and Lego sets as tools giving Oak Ridge students opportunities to collaborate, design, build, and solve problems as they learn engineering, science, and technology skills, both inside and outside the classroom.
The Oak Ridge Public Schools Education Foundation supported these activities with $18,700 in grants last year to teachers at the Oak Ridge High School, Jefferson and Robertsville middle schools, and Linden Elementary School. The grants included a UT-Battelle donation of $10,000 directed to FIRST Robotics Competition, FIRST Tech Challenge, and FIRST Lego League teams, all extra-curricular programs at the high school and middle schools. [Read more…]
A film screening this month will feature an inspirational movie about a tiny technological solution that could be used to clean up the world’s water supply. The screening of the award-winning documentary will also raise money for the Oak Ridge High School’s FIRST Robotics Team 4265, the Secret City Wildbots.
The fundraiser and screening will start at 7 p.m. Friday, February 20, in the Oak Ridge High School Performing Arts Center, a press release said. The Secret City Wildbots will begin the evening with a short demonstration of the team’s robot from 7-7:20 p.m. The screening of the 97-minue film will begin promptly at 7:30 p.m. [Read more…]
From left to right, Eli Charles, Olivia Mahathy, Steven Charles. and Moire Gabor, part of the Secret City Wildbots from Oak Ridge High School, work on the initial stages of their robot. (Photos courtesy UT)
KNOXVILLE—For many, the end of football season usually means attention turns to basketball, but for more than 400 budding scientists and engineers who came to the University of Tennessee in Knoxville on Saturday it marks the start of something else: robot season.
FIRST Robotics kicked off its 2015 game, Recycle Rush, with a live reveal broadcast online to teams around the world, including 29 teams who gathered at Cox Auditorium on the UT campus.
“Saturday marks the first time that any of the teams get to see the challenge of this year’s game,” said L.J. Robinson, Tennessee’s regional director of FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology). “The kickoff event is a big deal in its own right, with gatherings held around the world to watch the announcement.
“Certainly, it’s an exciting moment for those new to the competition.” [Read more…]
Luke Buckner, Mark Buckner, and Tag Groff in the drivers’ station at the FIRST Robotics Competition Championship in St. Louis this past weekend. (Photo by Angi Agle)
The Secret City Wildbots team received an Excellence in Engineering award at the FIRST Robotics World Championships in St. Louis this past weekend, Oak Ridge school officials said Monday.
“The Wildbots competed in the Archimedes Division, and after 10 tough qualification matches, earned their way into the Elimination Tournament by defeating the top-ranked team in the division in the final qualification match,” according to information from Gordon F. Williams, engineering instructor, Oak Ridge High School Engineering and Robotics Academy, and FIRST Robotics Team 4265 coach and sponsor.
Williams said the Secret City Wildbots, Team 4265, formed an alliance team consisting of Team 20, The Rocketeers (from Clifton Park, N.Y.); Team 195, The Cyber Knights (from Southington, Conn.); and Team 4077, MASH (from Edmonds, Wash.) that was eliminated in the quarterfinals round. [Read more…]
The Secret City Wildbots survived the qualification rounds 6-4-0 and were selected to join alliance #6, advancing to the elimination rounds. Team 4265 representative Sydney Buckner, pictured, accepts the invitation from the alliance captain, Team 4077. (Photo by Angi Agle)
Note: This story was last updated at 7:41 p.m.
The Secret City Wildbots survived the qualification rounds 6-4-0 in the in the FIRST Robotics Competition Championship in St. Louis, Mo., this week and advanced to the elimination rounds.
Saturday evening update:Â The Secret City Wildbots made it as far as the quarterfinals, but did not advance to the semifinals.
See previous photos and video here.
The robot is double-loaded for autonomous mode (first 10 seconds of the match). In autonomous mode, each robot is given one ball. However, if one team on the alliance believes that another team’s robot is a more capable shooter, it can relinquish its ball to the more capable teammate. (Photos by Angi Agle)
The Secret City Wildbots were 5-4 in the FIRST Robotics Competition Championship in St. Louis on Friday night, with one qualifying round remaining this morning (Saturday morning). Here are pictures and video sent by Angi Agle from the Aerial Assist competition on Friday. [Read more…]
The Secret City Wildbots drive team (L to R: Tag Groff, Alana Joldersma, Luke Buckner, Andreas Franco) prepare for one of five qualification matches on Thursday. (Photo by Angi Agle)
By Angi Agle
The Secret City Wildbots drive team, pictured above, prepared for one of five qualification matches on Thursday. The Wildbots were 2-2 at the time, having lost the first two and won the next two decisively.
There was one more qualification match remaining Thursday, five on Friday, and one Saturday. Teams are ranked on six criteria, with rankings changing rapidly depending on the performance of all teams. We won’t know until noon Saturday which teams advance to the elimination rounds. [Read more…]
