Minutes from the September 2005

Connecticut Robotics Society Meeting:

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Total attendance: 14

The meeting commenced with a viewing of several robotics related videos.

Jake was up next with an introduction to our new meeting place, the Greater Hartford Academy of Math and Science (GHAMAS). First, he gave everyone a demonstration of the Smart Board... an interactive white board which almost every room contains. For more information on the software required to use these, visit www.smarttech.com (the software is free).

Next Jake gave everyone a tour of the building including the optics, computer, and electronics labs (where Jake himself teaches). This is a very impressive building with tons of top quality equipment to experiment with. Thanks Jake for showing everyone around and also suggesting this as a meeting place!

After the tour, Jim talked about the contests we plan on holding every month: sumo, line following, and maze solving. Jim, Mark, and Walter all had robots for this competition, however when Jim and Mark tried out the line following they had trouble detecting the black line. This led to a thorough investigation into the matter using our new optics lab where we determined that the black marker used was in fact transparent to IR light. Most interesting!

When we got back to our room, a Lego walker was shown to the group. After showing a short video clip of the 'bot in action, a live demonstration commenced. The two people who constructed the 'bot explained how it worked and how they built it. Great work!

The meeting adjourned around 4:00pm