It Begins in Brockport (IBiB), a makerspace in the village of Brockport, hosted a sumobot exhibition at the Seymour Library on Wednesday, June 27. Sumobots are small, autonomous robots programmed to push one another out of a competition ring. Competitors build their sumobots according to league regulations and can customize their fight strategies.
Eight sumobots battled for first place, with The Purple Pusher (builder: Bohdan Smich) winning all three of its matches to take the top seat in the winner’s circle.
“Robotics has always been intriguing to me and something I wanted to try. I really enjoy the designing and building elements, but have never had much experience with the coding/programming,” said Smich. This passion for design, coupled with a supportive environment, was crucial to his success. “The code aspect has always been daunting to me and IBiB gave me the opportunity to give it a try with people who could help me with the aspects I was unfamiliar with.”
For many participants, the coding challenges presented significant hurdles. Smich recounted a particularly trying moment: “My main challenges, as I expected, were with the code/programming of the sumobot. As a beginner, it is very easy to create a bug/issue and very difficult to find and fix if you don’t know what you’re looking for. For example, my bot was working fine until I copied over a file that was the wrong version and everything completely stopped working and I was stumped.”
The collaborative atmosphere at IBiB proved invaluable. “BoB [Director of IBiB] took the time to help me figure it out and gave me some awesome troubleshooting tips for the future. Having others to ask and work together with has helped me overcome any challenges I faced and ultimately led to my sumobot coming out on top!” he said, highlighting the importance of community and mentorship in the makerspace.
While all of the builders were members of the makerspace for this initial exhibition, young spectators were encouraged to place the sumobots in the competition ring and initiate their start sequence. Following the competition, they were allowed to play with the sumobots in a battle royale, enjoying how the autonomous bots would continue to chase after one another or spin around looking for opponents.
The Seymour Library sponsored a raffle where one young spectator won a sumobot kit of his own. The library also has a pair of one-month makerspace memberships which will be given to lucky participants of their summer reading program.
The next sumobot competition will be held on August 28 at the Seymour Library. Contestants of all ages are encouraged to build their own sumobots and join in on the fun. Competition rules, build guidelines and kits are available at IBiB, and interested parties should contact the makerspace at info@ibib.us for details.
