Saturday, October 25, 2008

Lunar Robotics Challenge - Day 5 – First Day of Actual Challenge

Our team spent the day fixing hardware. In the morning, we decided that there is not much use of additional testing. We will not have the time to change and improve things anyway, but it would introduce a certain risk to severely damage the robots and not being able to compete at all. Instead, we used the time to improve our hardware - especially making it more robust. The pajamas have been working fine so far, but as the robot has to travel long ways on really rough terrain, we thought it might be better to enforce them. Also we exchanged almost all cables of the pully-system, hoping to prevent bad surprises like on Thursday.
At 9 pm the challenge started with the team from Finland, who where followed by the Jacobs University Bremen and Madrid. The team from the UK was unfortunately unable to start due to three
The base camp at night. It’s a really magical place at night. It’s buzzing with students that work in the dark outside their trucks, giving the last finish to their equipment before getting to start.


This is how the way to the actual crater looks like.


The team of the Jacobs University Bremen are about to start. While the Lander is illuminated with this very weak side light, the inside of the crater is completely dark.

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