ROBOTMAK3RS Blog

Today LEGOWORLD in Zwolle (the Netherlands) starts. We will be showing an automated highbay warehouse with over 25 NXT's. build and designed after the real version that LEGO has to store all their bricks. Hope to see you there, come visit us in the main LEGO hall. Martyn

At this moment; Thursday, Friday and Saturday are completely booked out! There are still tickets available for Sunday 25, Monday 26 and Tuesday 27 October. visit your Intertoys LEGO shop or www.legoworld.nl to buy a ticket for LEGOWORLD. Martyn

LEGOWROLD 2009 the biggest LEGO event in the world, starts on Thursday, 22 October 2009, if you still want to visit you will have to purchase tickets on-line, or in the Intertoys (a dutch LEGO shop), you can not purchase them at the entrance! look at http://legoworld.nl/english for more information. During this show we will be present with a large MINDSTORMS stand, for all your questions. Martyn

Last weekend, the SteinCHenwelt 2009 LEGO® event took place in the Swiss Technorama Science Center at Wintherthur, Switzerland. Here's the movie I made about it; though I could be present on Saturday only, it was worth the journey to Switzerland. Also the NXT 2.0 soccer robots performed quite well at their first mission.

Last weekend, the annual Fana'Briques took place for the 3rd time in Rosheim, Alsace (France). It's the largest LEGO® in Central Europe, and this time, the topic was "LEGO® - Basketball". I have been there by myself as an exhibitor, alongside with two remotely controlled Basketball playing NXT robots (created from the new NXT 2.0 Set): Fana'Briques 2009 was a great experience again and a tremendeous success.

In ten days, on 21st of March, the RobotChallenge 2009 will take place in Vienna (Austria). According to the organizers it is the "biggest competition in Austria for self-made, autonomous, and mobile robots": "The RobotChallenge offers suitable contests for beginners as well as for experienced robot designer. In addition to the possibility of exchanging ideas and innovations within an international group of participants there is also an excited audience as reward for the months of work in the area of informatics, electronics, mechanics and artificial intelligence." There will be several interesting contests, including robot sumo, slalom and sprint competitons for humanoid robots. Vienna is always worth a visit, and with this event, even more.

If you are living in Europe (or are going to visit it), mark end of June red in your calender: on 27th and 28th of June, Fana'Briques will take place again in Rosheim in the Alsace (France). It's one of the biggest LEGO® events in Central Europe; this year, it will be centered around the topic "LEGO® basketball". Everyone who has been there already (including me), will certainly come back. Who hasn't so far: it's absolutely worthwhile - nice athmosphere, tremendeous surroundings, interesting people, heaps of fascinating LEGO® stuff. By the way: for exhibitors, registration is open now.

Ever wanted to see a First Tech Challenge Final? Now, here is your change, today there will be a live broadcast, from Den Haag, the Netherlands. Today, you could have seen between 10:30 and 17:00 (CET), at this link: FTC-Nederland live You can also visit the final, the entrance is free. Winning team "Dinges" with their robot. More information ( FTC Dutch ) More information ( FTC English translated via google ) Martyn

Saturday 31 January in Utrecht was the Dutch FLL Final, in total more then 250 teams competed and over 2500 visitors were present. The polar bears from Hillegom won the first price, and are invited to go to Atlanta. The below team (windkracht zeven also form Hillegom) won the second place and with that a ticket to the Open European Championship in Kopenhagen (DK) in May. The team that won the third place (WereldWierdeWijs from Almelo) will have their project worked out in real. Team watt build this impressive robot that could do all but 3 missions! This robots was featuring a real interesting principle called MOT, (Main On Top). They say that removing and attaching parts during the game costs precious seconds, this robot has one part that can be swapped within a split second It might be the difference... (Two members of team Watt, and their robot) MOT motor and NXT, this unit can be pulled and placed in all their base robots. Here is a movie on how to do the full house mission. I e...