Coimbatore :

They were at last happy to see their robot go back and forth without interruptions winning the first prize and getting a chance to go to the National Robotics Competition (NRC) to be held at IIT Karagpur in a few months. Muhammed Shafeeq, and his team members, all second year electrical engineering students were participating in the two-day workshop and competition held on Tuesday at the Park College of Engineering and Technology. Engineering students from various city colleges had participated in the event which was conducted to train and select a team for the national-level event.

“It was a challenge to put to task what we had read as theories but it was an interesting experience,” said Shafeeq. Twenty five teams of five students each took part in the two-day workshop and the competition, which were held at the end of the second day. They were trained to make the hardware of the robots as well as to programme the machines.

At the same time their trainers said that the students were given simpler training as they were not used to doing projects.

A Himanshu, who was one of the resource persons for the event from ARK Technosolutions said that the students who were from various engineering branches were not quite familiar with doing application-based projects. “Knowing the theories is one thing and applying them as well as tackling the difficulties, which arise as the task continues is another. Even the fourth year students found it hard to execute the tasks,” he said. At the same time the pace with which the students learnt could help them to stand in good stead with the competitors, he said.

The application of robotics is growing in several of the industrial units. This has created a growing interest among students to pursue more about the subject. Experts say that the field involves topics from several engineering streams including electronics, and electrical to computer programming.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / Home> City> Coimbatore / TNN / January 23rd, 2013