‘Wonderbots’ win statewide competition Warren team’s robot takes LEGO honors

ORONO – In the techno-toy world of LEGO robotics, precision and timing can be everything.

So 10 members of a team from the Warren Community School had their work cut out for them Saturday.

Pitting themselves against a dozen other teams in the LEGO League Championship, the third- through fifth-graders managed to steer clear of some unexpected delays and potentially competition-ending problems to outmaneuver their opponents on the tabletop to come out on top.

The first competition of its kind in the state drew teams from around Maine as well as Vermont and Ontario – where there are no such competitions – and a team from Massachusetts, where an abundance of teams had to find vacancies in other state competitions.

All teams start with the same special LEGO kit. Such kits sell for about $500, and contestants were limited only by the contents of the box. If it wasn’t in the kit, it couldn’t be used.

How the plastic robots looked, maneuvered and solved problems was left up to the teams that had to develop precise data and commands for an onboard computer that would operate the robot. No remote control here.

Once the robot was on the 4-foot by 8-foot tabletop playing field and team members set it in motion, the machine was on its own.

Each team was given the same mission, which, in keeping with the program’s theme of promoting science and technology, had to do with an active volcano: The robot had to rescue a scientist stranded too close to a waking volcano, while also retrieving scientific samples, deploying a sensor in the volcano’s crater and setting up a barrier to protect a nearby village from the inevitable lava flow.

The last action of the robot is to set the lava flowing, represented by marbles that roll down the volcano.

Points were added or subtracted based on how well each mission was accomplished, and teams were also judged on creativity, team spirit and professionalism.

The Warren team – calling itself the Wonderbots for the competition – had a less-than-auspicious start.

The members didn’t find out about the program until a week before the Oct. 6 registration deadline and received their kit eight weeks before the competition, said coach and teacher Jay Cargill.

Then the first of several glitches occurred.

It was only after a local woodworker built a practice table for them that the team members discovered they had misconstrued the specifications and that their table was three-eighths of an inch too short. Although that may not sound like a lot, it can be when precision is required to grab onto a LEGO scientist perched precariously on an unstable platform.

“A little bit off means a lot off,” acknowledged 10-year-old team member Sam Nevens.

The team lost two days of preparation in fixing the problem.

During the waning weeks, with the pressure mounting, the team began to gel, Cargill said, and members were awaiting the competition day with a mixture of anxiousness and excitement.

On Friday, the day before the big event, things began to fall apart, literally.

Their four-wheeled robot hit a wall during practice and its wheels fell off, said 10-year-old Alison Cornforth. Then the claw, used to pick up the scientist and scientific samples, broke.

Making do with what they had in hand, the team used a rubber band supplied in the kit to keep the claw in place, and Saturday morning one student made a stabilizer to keep the wheels in line. During the day, team members kept a close eye on the competition, not just to see how they fared this year but also to see what they could do differently next near.

One team used a three-pronged catcher to pick up the handles of the LEGO scientific samples, which Warren team members said appeared to be more efficient since it could pick up three samples at once.

And the team had learned some things along the way, from computer programming to engineering.

For Miranda Conary, 10, it was the importance of working together that stuck out in her mind. Having others to talk to about ideas helped the team avoid problems.

“The team comes first and not yourself,” she said during a break in the competition, recalling that early on she had thought it best to have the robot push the sensor up the side of the volcano. Discussions with others convinced her that the robot could get its wheels stuck on the crater or stuck on the slope by the sensor.

Sometimes the students said they didn’t even realize they were using mathematics or science and, even when it was obvious, it was entertaining.

“It’s science and math put together with fun,” Nevens said.