Chapter 26 – Racing Against Time

Publisher Summary This chapter explores the world of MINDSTORMS robotics contests and challenges. A contest offers many opportunities to learn new concepts and build some experience. One can identify at least four main phases of participating in a contest, each one requiring extensive usage of know-how while contributing to knowledge base. The phases are: defining the rules, studying the rules and deciding on a strategy, building the robot, and attending the contest. Further, optimizing speed is discussed; the speed of a vehicle is affected by a number of factors: motor power, gear ratio, mass, and friction. Using electric motors, the maximum power one can apply to a race car depends on the kind and number of motors, and the current to supply them. There is only one kind of motor in MIND STORMS, which forces upon a simple rule: use as many motors as allowed. There are several other type of contests that require a robot to perform an action as quickly as possible, such as car racing, wall climbing, fast painting, and monkey bars.