SAM the Robot (and his handlers) Wins First Place

Semi-autonomous Marauder, or SAM, a robot built by the Robotics Team at Millersville University recently demonstrated its national championship, award-winning skills in Stayer Hall.

The team took first place at the Association of Technology, Management and Applied Engineering (ATMAE) conference, held in Panama City Beach, October 27-30.

Each team’s robotic vehicle moved across the beach in an effort to autonomously detect the location of multiple steel cylinders of varying sizes in the sand. Once the location was found, the robot was supposed to automatically extract and pick up a steel cylinder and return to its starting position under operator control. The Millersville University vehicle was the only one to successfully use autonomous control to detect and pick-up a cylinder and move about the sand with ease – they did this using vision, which adds to the complexity of the task.

Millersville’s robotics team won first place overall in the Robotics Cup, first place in performance and first place for best/electrical/control methodology. The team, advised by Drs. John Wright and Chris Erickson, industry & technology, received numerous prizes including $950 in cash, free software and robotic kits; Rixan Robotics Training for team members (valued at $1,000 per seat); a professionally printed vinyl banner for the department and a trophy, passed on to Millersville University from the previous year’s winning team.

“The combination of challenges made this competition that of a graduate level control problem, in my opinion,” said Wright. “The team worked very hard all year and did a wonderful job representing Millersville University.”

Individual students were eligible to win special awards such as the “Best Driver Award.” Greg Betz, a technology education student at Millersville, received this award, and a $25 cash prize. Other student robotics team members, majoring in industry technology, computer science, technology education and physics, who attended the competition included David Oliver (team captain); Bradley Sensenig, Pauline Gemberling, Michael Edkin, Adam Fox, Joshua Jordan, Sean Farrow, Jake Girton, Mylinda Johe, Brendon Fowler and Curtis Rosche.