Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy’s D’Penguineers

The challenge: Rebound Rumble—a basketball-themed game in which two alliances of three robots each compete to score foam basketballs into four hoops. Alliances have the opportunity to score additional points at the end of each match by balancing their robots on platforms, or “bridges,” in the middle of the field. In addition, movement is hindered by a four-inch tall “bump” over which robots have to maneuver over to cross the field. The D’Penguineers of Team 1717 hope to build a state-of-the art robot that not only performs well in the competitions, but also reflects the many hours of dedication the team put into their creation. The Press Relations team took some time to interview their classmates and see where they are in the build season.

Despite being in the program for three years, Shandeep Ahdi “never expected [the build season] to be like this with so many sleepless nights.” She used skills essential to solving real-world problems when her team “tested out prototypes and was given scenarios where anything could happen, and we had to adapt our design to the situation.” She remarks that “nothing is perfect the first time, so we had to make multiple prototypes of every mechanism.”

Some engineering students are beginning to feel the pressures of the looming February 21st deadline, when the team will have to stop work on the robot. According to Nick Zurlinden, a moment of brief celebration broke out “when the Internet turned back on and we were able to look at our parts list. We were unable to retrieve any of our files because we could not connect to our server.” Despite the setback, Nick feels that they are still on track to complete the robot, remarking that “we are close to the end of the design phase and about to start building our shooter.”