I have put my registration in for PiWars 2024 – Disaster Zone. PiWars is “The Raspberry Pi Robotics Competition”. PiWars is a Non-Destructive robotics competition run by members of the Cambridge Raspberry Jam. It will be held on Saturday 20th and Sunday 21st April 2024, in Cambridge UK. Full details can be found on their website, (there seems to be a USA one, you can view their site).
Here is a little bit of an introduction to the UK PiWars challenge from the site:
Pi Wars is an international, challenge-based robotics competition in which teams build Raspberry Pi-controlled robots and then compete in various non-destructive challenges to earn points. The competition takes place over a single weekend and at the end of each day, prizes, medals and trophies are awarded to those competing.
While the chance is that we won’t have the best PiWars robot, it will be a fun little Raspberry Pi project to do with the children, as a family, our team will be made up of Tamarisk, our son who is eight, and our daughter who is three, and myself (other people may get asked to help out). The first iteration of the robot will probably be made out of Lego, with DuPont connector wires all over the place! but as time goes by improvements will be made.
Chances are that the remote control and video feed parts of the robot will be heavily based on the work I am doing on my DIY underwater ROV.
The PiWars 2024 – Disaster Zone
There are seven main robot-based challenges in this competition, as well as an opportunity for more points for either blogging about the process of getting to the competition (worth up to 1400 points), as well making a video documentary about your robot (worth up to 2800 points).
The basic requirements for the robot are that it has to be:
- built around an official Raspberry Pi product (Raspberry Pi, Raspberry Pi Compute Module, Pi Zero, or a Pi Pico),
- un-tethered (no cable umbilical for either power or control),
- battery powered,
- ground-based (wheels, tracks, legs, or at a push hovercraft)
- Fit within a physical envelope of 300, 225, and 370 mm for the main robot, with any challenge-specific attachments not increasing that envelope beyond 400, 225 and 450 mm when at rest, with a maximum kinematic envelope (extension area) of 500, 325 and 450 mm.
PiWars Challenges
The challenges are split into three types, Autonomous only, Autonomous or Remote Control, and Remote Control only.
Lava Palava – Escape the volcanic eruption!
The story of Lava Palava, is where you have to outrun the lava flows from a volcanic eruption. Lava Palava is the only purely autonomous challenge and is fundamentally a line-following challenge on a seven-meter-long track, with at least one ‘speed hump’ which will need to be navigated by the robot.
Points will be awarded for speed, and points will be removed for touching the walls or needing to rescue the robot.
Eco-Disaster – Sort the barrels of toxic waste!
This is one of the four challenges that can either be autonomous or driven by remote control (autonomous operation is worth more points).
The background to Eco-Disaster is that a lorry carrying 12 drums, six green clean drums, and six red contaminated drums has overturned, the clean drums need to be sorted and moved into the clean blue zone, and the contaminated drums need to be sorted into the yellow contamination zone.
The drums are 3D printed out of PLA, so I shall print some for testing out our robot and calibration. An STL file is available from the PiWars website.
Points are awarded for correctly sorting each barrel, with additional points for completing six, and 12 barrels, points are deducted for incorrectly sorting barrels.
Like all these four challenges; there are more points associated with performing this task autonomously.
Escape Route – Navigate the blind maze to find your way out!
This is one of the four challenges that can either be autonomous or driven by remote control (autonomous operation is worth more points).
The driver will be positioned in such a way that they can not see the course, there are three options for completion,
- Fully autonomous (wall following, or vision system) – worth most points
- Blind remote control (camera mounted on the robot)
- Call and Response (someone other than the driver tells the driver which way to go and turn) – worth the least points
The Escape Route course has three blocks that can be moved around the arena:
Minesweeper – Find and defuse the bombs!
This is one of the four challenges that can either be autonomous or driven by remote control (autonomous operation is worth more points).
The arena is made up of 16 white perspex tiles, each tile is approximately 400 x 400 mm in a 4 x 4 arrangement. At any one time, a single tile will be lit from below and turn red. The robot should then be driven onto the tile where it will remain stationary for one second to ‘defuse’ the bomb, before moving to the next randomly lit tile.
The Zombie Apocalypse – Shoot the Undead!
This is one of the four challenges that can either be autonomous or driven by remote control (autonomous operation is worth more points).
Targets are 88 x 62 mm, and are placed between one and 1.5 meters from the robot, the targets will be between ground level and 600 mm from the ground. The targets need to be knocked over by a projectile.
Pi Noon – The Hindenburg Disaster – Defend your balloon from an explosive end!
There is no advantage to trying to complete this challenge autonomously.
This challenge is a non-destructive robot wars, where you strap balloons to your robot, and aim to pop the balloons of the robot you are competing against, without your balloons being popped.
The Temple of Doom – Go on an adventure and tackle the obstacles in your way!
There is no advantage to trying to complete this challenge autonomously.
This is an obstacle course made up of seven obstacles, no one will know what this course looks like until the day.
