Top 10 Robotics Prize-Winning Ideas to Explore in Competitions

Though all robotics competitions may not be difficult to crack, participants always struggle to find an idea.

DARPA robotics, funded by the US military is the most difficult robotics challenge. DARPA challenge is considered one of the toughest competitions, which judges the ability of a team based on tasks and not on the final product. Though all robotics competitions may not be this difficult to crack, participants always struggle to find an idea that brings out the Hiroshi Ishiguro living inside them. Having that one good idea is half the battle won. If you are someone curious and motivated to take an idea to its logical end – armed with robotic science strategies – here we provide you with ten such interesting ideas. The list though not exhaustive has interesting ideas to learn from and implement for your upcoming robotics project.

1. Soccer Robot:

Design a soccer robot just using your Android phone. The robot can move forward, backward and a couple of other directions with its speed controlled by the angle of rotation of a mobile phone. Make the robot kick the ball by shaking your phone.  The main components of the robot include an Arduino UNO board, servo motor, Bluetooth module JY MCU BT, motor driver L293D, and two DC motors.

2. Line following robot:

Usually employed by manufacturing industries, line-following robots come with pick-and-placement capabilities. They can move on a specified path to pick objects from different locations and place them at specified locations. While its Microcontroller AT89C51 controls the robot, other components include motor driver L293D, operational amplifier LM324, phototransistor, and other discrete components.

3. Robocar with wireless steering:

The wireless steering senses the motion of the remote control to transmit the corresponding motion to control motion through RF communication. The robot is conveniently equipped with an obstacle detection and avoidance system. It is equipped with Arduino uno board to process data and thereby transmit the corresponding signals through an RF transmitter.

4. Cell phone operated land rover:

Usually, preceptors or sensors are mounted on a robot to have control over it. In this project, the control is established by making the contact with the cell phone mounted on the rover through a mobile phone. When a call is placed, the tone pertaining to a button is caught on the processing end. The robot senses this tone with the help of a phone placed in the robot.

5. RF-based dual-mode robot:

Build a manually operated dual-mode robot using an RF-based remote control. The robot should change its path to avoid obstacles which should be possible through some inbuilt intelligence. Convert it into a vacuum cleaner automatically switching its mode via the remote control. The efficiency of a modular robot depends on its ability to establish good communication among its various parts. The prototype of the robot consists of two parts, the general board, and the communication board. The general board consists of ATMEGA 1280, a 32-bit microchip while the communication board contains an RF radio chip.

6. Remote operated spy robot circuit:

It is a robot that can capture audio and video from surrounding areas and send it back to the control centre. A CCD camera mounted in the robot senses its surroundings and sends data to the receiver through Radio Frequency wireless communication. The remote has four switches for control and its range is limited to 125 meters.

7. Human detection robot:

These robots basically identify human presence through the sensors mounted on them. It is operated manually using a PC. The robot is built using two parts, the transmitter, and the receiver. The transmitter section consists of a PC, MAX232 IC, AT89C51 microcontroller, RF transmitter and receiver, 4push buttons (Remote control), and a camera receiver module.

8. Maze solving robot:

Also known as a mouse robot, a maze-solving robot can trace its path through a maze. Its logic is quite different from regular line-following robots which are apparently not autonomous. These autonomous robots can be used for applications that require robots to decide for themselves. Apart from other common parts required for a motion robot the components required to make these robots include ultrasonic sensors.

9. Metal detector robot:

Like other detection robots, it contains two parts. The transmitter part and the receiver part. It comes with a metal detector interfaced with the controller on the receiver side. On encountering a metal, a buzzer sound is triggered, and the LCD will show the detected metal frequency. An android-based smartphone can control the robot up to 15 meters of radium and is effective for approximately 88 millimeters from the detector head.

10. Fruit picking robot:

A robot can help in picking the right fruit. Test it for yourself by designing one. A fruit picking robot works on image sensing technology, to identify the right fruit. Equipped with multiple and flexible arms having 360-degree movement, which is achieved using visibility graph search and inverse kinematics.