GearTicks robot goes far at world championships

By Kevin Ji

The Lincoln GearTicks were finalists for the top award at the FIRST World Championship in Detroit, impressing the judges with their community outreach and robot design.

Teams came from all over the world at the end of April to take part in three-day event, the culmination of the FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) for middle and high school students. Teams design, build, and program robots to compete in a specific challenge each year while also promoting STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) in their communities. The GearTicks advanced from the state championships in Pennsylvania earlier this year.

For the Rover Ruckus challenge in 2018-19, teams had to design a robot that could deliver “minerals” (gold cubes and whiffle balls) into the lander (an elevated box with separate containers). Robots got extra points for attaching to the lander and lifting off the ground. Each team could also program a set of instructions for a 30-second autonomous period at the start of the match, where robots got points for finding a mineral and dropping off a “team marker,” along with other tasks.

After the state competition in March, the GearTicks worked to improve their robot’s intake mechanism to significantly boost the rate of capturing minerals. Team members made some other refinements, such as a new four-directional drive system, as well as welding a new hook.

Matches went on for a couple of days, with the GearTicks winning some and losing others. Additionally, they discovered that their hook mechanism wasn’t actually tall enough to hook onto the lander — a major blow to the number of points they could achieve. But with the help of a local workshop, the students were able to weld a new hook and continued to rank competitively at the world championship.

The GearTicks also enjoyed meeting other teams from other states and countries. There was a Taiwanese team showing off local traditions and toys, a Romanian team with a very interesting robot design, a Minnesotan team who got to work with the United Nations, and a New Hampshire team that ended up winning the robot tournament at the worlds.

The GearTicks were a finalist for the Inspire Award finalist — the highest FTC award, judged on a combination of robot design along with community outreach events and core values. The team was very proud of the work they’ve done throughout the season, and can’t wait to learn even more next year. They also thanked graduating seniors Howie Tsang, Irene Terpstra, Jack Hutchinson, and Evan Lee for putting in so much time and effort for the team.

Click here to watch the robot in action on YouTube (the GearTicks segment begins at 1:23:00 and the GearTicks robot is labeled 6055), or click here to download a 30-second video.