ITS team wins 6th robot contest

Evi Mariani, Jakarta

The 10th November Institute of Technology Polytechnic (PENS-ITS), Surabaya, won on Sunday its sixth Indonesian Robot Competition at the University of Indonesia in Depok, South Jakarta.

The team's three robots, called SIFAA, outshone runner-up Wimatek-R from the Widya Mandala Catholic University of Surabaya in a three-minute final with a score of 16-9.

The victory entitles the PENS-ITS team to a slot in the 2004 Asia Pacific Robot Competition, to be held on Sept. 11 in Seoul.

Members of the PENS-ITS team jumped up and down, shrieking joyfully at their success, while Widya Mandala team members hugged each other over their defeat.

The teams had advanced to the final after beating out 30 other teams from 24 engineering schools from: Jakarta; Bandung; Yogyakarta; Riau; Makassar, South Sulawesi; Lhokseumawe, Aceh; and Banjarmasin, South Kalimantan.

The teams were assigned to design robots for a game called the "Reunion of Rama and Sinta", a variation of the Asia Pacific Robot Competition's theme: "Reunion of Separated Lovers Gyeonwoo and Jiknyeo".

During the three-minute game, opposing teams were to use their robots to reunite a yellow block -- "Rama" -- with "Sinta", a yellow pole located about five meters away. The robot that reunited the separated "lovers" won.

If no robot could reunite "Rama" with "Sinta", the winner was decided by the highest points obtained through collecting "gifts" of small, blue or red blocks.

During the two-day contest, only SIFAA succeeded in reuniting the "lovers", at its first match on Saturday. All other matches, including the final, was won by points.

"This is our sixth victory. We made the robot over two months with a Rp 6 million (US$665) budget," said PENS-ITS lecturer Eko Henfri. "But we have to fix the robot because one of its cables broke."

"We have a chance to win in Korea, but we have tough rivals from Thailand, Japan and Malaysia," he said.

A PENS-ITS team won the 2001 Asia Pacific Robot Competition.

The Ministry of National Education, which organized the event, also held the Indonesian Artificial Intelligence Competition -- the first competition of its kind.

The Bandung State Polytechnic team's Evo 113, a robot on wheels, beat out 11 competitors.

The University of Surabaya's Arachnid, a robot with spider- like legs, overwhelmed its sole rival IR-HEX from the ITS.

Fourteen teams from 13 engineering schools across Java participated in the competition, for which they were required to design a fire fighting robot and extinguish the flame of a candle placed in one of four rooms in a simple labyrinth. Each robot had three tries, with additional points if it returned to its starting position.

The winning Evo 113 succeeded in extinguishing the flame and returned to its starting point -- it was also the audience's favorite, because of its sleek design and speed.

The theme of the competition was adapted from the Fire Fighting Robot Contest to be held next April at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut.

It is not clear whether the government will sponsor the winning team in the contest.