The Helderberg Robotics Club registered nine teams of two to three roboteers in four different categories at the World Robot Olympiad (WRO) Western Cape South event which took place at Christel House in Ottery.
The provincial competition spanned over four days from Friday 26 July to Saturday 3 August due to the rise in learners that are doing both coding and robotics. WRO started with 40 teams in South Africa in 2010, which increased to 755 teams consisting of 1 945 learners from 162 schools taking part in the provincial competition this year.
The Explorer category caters for primary school (Lite) and high school (Prime) beginner roboteers. Helderberg Robotics top-scored in both these categories. These two teams (pictured in the front row) were invited to compete for title honours among the best in South Africa in Johannesburg on Friday 13 September.
The three Robosport teams that competed at Christel House placed first, second and fifth respectively.
These teams designed robots that compete in tennis doubles against that of their competitors. The robots are coded to play the game autonomously.
All three teams were invited to compete at the national competition in Johannesburg on Saturday 14 September. The winner of this event will be competing in the international round scheduled to take place at Izmer in Turkey on Thursday 28 to Saturday 30 November.
The Helderberg Robotics Club also flew the flag at the Advance Robotics Challenge, which took place at Parklands College on Saturday 3 August. The local team clinched gold in the national competition. These two roboteers, Michael Shepstone and Raaid Fajandar, have been provisionally invited to compete in Izmir at the World Robot Olympiad. They have built their robot from scratch. The chassis is 3D-printed and Arduino and Raspberry pi’s are used as microcontrollers. They have designed a self-driving car that avoids obstacles around a course and do parallel parking.
The club is appealing to the community to assist these roboteers by donating at https://www.backabuddy.co.za/campaign/robotics-club. Marketing opportunities are also an option to sponsor a team and brand it.
. For more information on the Helderberg Robotics Club, visit https://helderbergrobotics.co.za/.
