Sumo

In this project we designed and built a sumo robot from scratch for the XII Robotics Contest, held at the Federico Santa María Technical University in Valparaiso, Chile.

Team

Ricardo Pino, Mechanical Engineer Student from the University of Concepcion.
Roberto Riquelme, Electronic Engineer Student from the University of Concepcion.
Camilo Salazar, Electronic Engineer Student from the University of Concepcion.
Pablo Vela, Electronic Engineer Student from the University of Concepcion.

About the Competition

This year's competition had 3 different categories, open, speed runner and sumo. We decided to participated on sumo category because it was a new challenge for us, besides designing an optimal robot, we also needed to think ahead to prepare counter strategies for our opponents.

Robot sumo competition consists in two robots attempting to push each other out of a circle (in a similar fashion to the sport of sumo) in 2 minutes maximum.

Design

Our strategy for this competition was to use a heavyweight robot and high torque motors, to take advantage of a lower center of mass. We designed the robot using Autodesk Inventor and performed several iterations until we got our final design.

The hardware used was:

2 Arduinos Leonardo (Master - Slave Configuration).
4 Servo Motors.
1 HC-SR04 Sensor.
4 QRD1114 Sensors
1 Buck-Boost.

First Iteration.

Second Iteration.

Final Design.

Cover.

The electronics and PCB were fully designed on Proteus and then fabricated using acid, this way the board could endure better and look more professional.

Schematic.

PCB Layout.

3D View.

Construction

This year we decided to 3D print our whole robot because Roberto had just bought a 3D printer, the advantages are obvious: fast prototyping, low cost and complex geometry pieces can be created.

Cover being 3D printed at Roberto's home.

After some tweaks and waiting a couple hours the printing was finished. The final result is shown in the picture.

Testing the electronics of our robot.

Lead blocks were crafted to add weight.

Competition

Judges measuring and weighting our robot before each match to verified that maximum weight and size has not be exceeded.

At last moment we decided to paint our robot black to give it a more badass look.

First Combat.

Second Day.

Third Day.

Results

This year, after 3 days of competition and many challenging combats we were able to achieve the third place in the sumo category. Overall, we did it very well, learn a lot, made new friends and had fun.

Award Ceremony.

Returning Home.