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Members of the Fleetwood Park engineering club -- Gurshane Sidhu, Arvind Rao, Kavi Ratnaweera and Shakeel Khan along with coaches Vincent Gabel and student teacher Ms. Stalker -- used cool logic and design smarts to design and build the best remotely operated vehicle (ROV) at a province-wide high school competition at the B.C. Institute of Technology.
The team’s ability to troubleshoot problems and work together garnered bonus points, resulting in a score of 303 out of 300 points.
Teams had to design and build an ROV that could travel to the bottom of a swimming pool to identify damage points on a disabled submarine, then deliver rescue supply containers to the submarine. The activity mimics what actual ROVs are doing off the Pacific Coast.
The challenge took place over two Saturdays, February 14 and 28 at BCIT. On the first Saturday, the team learned the design requirements for the ROV and was provided construction supplies by BCIT.
Over the next two weeks, the team assembled the robot at school from piping, plastic grating, styrofoam, bilge pump motors, a waterproof video camera and many plastic tie straps.
The Fleetwood Park students immersed the robot in a Rubbermaid container full of water for testing before heading back to BCIT to test the ROV in the pool and heading into the competition.
During testing at BCIT, the team discovered that although the robot was very manoeuvrable and the camera provided good vision, its slow return to the surface and difficulty picking up rescue containers caused problems. The team decided to make a design change right on the pool deck.
A second modification was made minutes before competition began when the team decided on a last minute gamble to improve the hook used to retrieve and deliver supplies – a gamble which paid off with a first place finish.
Last Updated: March 9, 2009
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