Thanksgiving RoboParade

Posted 27 Nov 2008 at 14:50 UTC (updated 27 Nov 2008 at 14:50 UTC) by steve

It's Thanksgiving, that day when robots everywhere put aside their toils and take time out from endless mental repetition of the thought, "kill all humans", to take part in traditional holiday festivities. Every year around this time, Lawrence Tech puts on the Thanksgiving RoboParade. Teams of high school students build up to 50 robot floats. After individual test runs, the fully autonomous robots follow each other down an elevated 10" wide line following course. In addition to following the line, each robot must detect the robot in front of it so it can stop or adjust its speed to avoid bumping into it. Video of the 2008 parade isn't available yet but enjoy this video of the 2007 RoboParade and check out photos of the 2007 or 2006 parades.