News

Attention all DARC team members: A new attendance policy has been issued. To view it, click here.

All DARC Team members need to go here to fill out consent forms. Also, there is a parents meeting tomorrow at 7.

We're eagerly getting ready to travel to Auburn this weekend for the South's BEST regional competition. A few important items for team members traveling with us:

• For those going tomorrow (Thursday) night, the bus will be in front of the Austin library (NOT the Incubator) by 8 pm. We will be leaving as soon as those in the band concert are released.
• For those leaving Friday morning, the bus will be leaving from in front of the Austin library (again, NOT the Incubator) promptly at 8 am.
• Please be prepared to pay for two meals (lunch on the way down and dinner on the way home) along with any snacks you may want from the coliseum. Bear in mind the higher prices if purchasing from the concession stand.
• Please bring both of your DARC t-shirts (this year's competition shirt and the 'work' shirt with DARC only on it) to wear at competition. If you do not have one or both t-shirts, bring an Austin or Decatur shirt to wear.
• If you would like to give anyone not going the ability to watch the competition, Auburn will be hosting a webcast here of the day's competition.
• If you haven't already, please follow DARC on Twitter by texting 'follow darcrobotics' (without the quotes) to 40404. This will be our primary method of sending information at competition.

If you have any questions, please contact Mrs. Haddock, Derek, John, Phillip, or Jason. We'll see everyone in Auburn!

The time has almost come to head down to Auburn! Next weekend we’ll meet teams from across the state to compete for the right to go to the national phase of the BEST Competition. We’ve been hard at work since October making improvements to our robot and display table and can’t wait to get to South’s BEST. See you there!

This Saturday we loaded up the robot and headed off to Calhoun Community College for Tennessee Valley BEST competition. After a long day full of matches, we were happy to see that careful strategy and exceptional driving paid off as we won first place in the robotics competition and will be advancing to South’s BEST at Auburn University this December. DARC also placed in these other parts of the BEST competition:

• Igus Top Gun Award
• Best T-shirt Design: 3^rd Place
• Most Robust Robot: 3^rd Place
• Most Elegant Robot: 3^rd Place
• Best Table Display and Interview: 3^rd Place
• Best Project Engineering Notebook: 3^rd Place
• Best Webpage Design: 2^nd Place
• Best Oral Presentation: 1^st Place
• Best Spirit and Sportsmanship: 1^st Place
• BEST Award: 1^st Place

Tennessee Valley BEST Competition Day is tomorrow at Calhoun Community College in Kelley Gym. The competition will run from 9am-5pm with a compliance check starting at 7:30. We hope to see you there!

Mall Day was held at Madison Square Mall in Huntsville this afternoon. DARC was there taking the robot out for a test run on the playing field. Our tests went well, so now there's just a few things left to finish before competition day on the 24th.

Mall Day always takes place on the Saturday of the fifth week of the competition. There will be a working playing field set up for all teams to come and test their robot on. It's a great time to make last minute decisions that can improve your robot's functionality and see what the other teams are thinking.

Mall Day will be held on October the 11th at Madison Square Mall in Huntsville. Be sure to come out and take your robot for a practice run!

Today we went out to Calhoun Community College for the kick-off of Tennessee Valley BEST. Tennessee Valley BEST is a hub of BEST Robotics Inc., a middle and high school robotics competition whose mission is Boosting Engineering, Science, and Technology.

The BEST competition consists of two parts: a robotics game and The BEST Award. The robotics game is based on an annual theme with four teams competing at once in a series of three-minute, round-robin matches. The BEST Award is presented to the team that best embodies the concept of Boosting Engineering, Science, and Technology. Elements include a project summary notebook, oral presentation, table display, and spirit and sportsmanship.

The theme of this year's robotics game is inspired by recent fluctuations in oil prices. Although many have lobbied for investing in alternative fuel sources, research and development of high-density fuels has brought forth only limited success. None of the energy sources developed has been able to replace fossil as our main source of energy, but scientists in the BEST Robotics think-tank may have made a breakthrough in solving the crisis in the form of their new superchorophyll catalyst that should facilitate the production of long hydro-carbon chain molecules from CO2 and H2O.

The only thing standing in the way of the public announcement of their breakthrough is a few more tests to prove the concept and demonstrate that the reactions can be efficiently performed in an automated environment. Due to cost constraints, these tests will be run by teams of pre-collegiate students, which is where we come in. Our engineers must now build and demonstrate an automated method of creating those hydro-carbon chains using only the resources and time allotted to us by BEST Inc. Our robots will then compete against the robots of other teams to build the largest inventory of isooctane.

The new DARC Robotics website is currently under construction. Please excuse any strange happenings you experience here for the next few days.