Cal Poly Robotics Club brings home 2nd place at global competition

Even though they went in with low expectations, the Cal Poly Gear Slingers club took its robots into competition at the VEX U collegiate world robotics competition and finished in second place.

Drifting to parallel park is something you might see in the “Fast and Furious” movies. The robots created by the Cal Poly Gear Slingers with the Cal Poly Robotics Club can do just that, but that’s not what they’re for.

“I think for the team, they just wanted to see how good they really were,” said John Seng, a computer science and computer engineering professor at Cal Poly.

And as it turns out, they aren’t just a good team, they’re an exceptional team.

The Gear Slingers took their two robots head-to-head against collegiate robotics clubs across the state this school year and amassed an undefeated record heading into the VEX World Championships collegiate division, VEX U, in Dallas at the end of April. In their first appearance at the championships against 112 teams, they battled their way to the finals against powerhouse Purdue.

“We knew we were good, especially in California, but we didn’t know how we were going to do against some of these legendary teams we’ve seen in previous worlds competitions,” said Timothy Hunter, the president of the Cal Poly Robotics Club. “It was just really neat to see where we stood in the realm of VEX.”

Those accolades don’t come without countless hours of hard, tedious work.

“We’re going into CAD, we’re 3D modeling all of this. We’re then 3D printing it and testing it with our hands, trying it with the game pieces. Then we’ll go through and keep prototyping and prototyping until we come up with our final design here,” said Garrett Schnack, the project lead for the Cal Poly Gear Slingers.

“I just really enjoy that process of building, designing, rebuilding, redesigning, and working with this team is just super cool, too. The collaboration on our ideas is a lot of fun,” Hunter said.

At the end of the day, the competition is fun and games, but the knowledge learned and earned by the robotics club goes much further than a standout showing against the best of the best college robotics teams from around the world.

“We have our programmers going through and testing all the software. We’re really learning all the different elements of engineering, so that we can apply it towards an internship or a career in the future,” Schnack said.

Great success at a global competition just put Cal Poly Robotics on the map.

“I think the future is really bright for VEX U at Cal Poly,” Seng said.

Click here for more information on the Cal Poly Robotics Club.