The SparkFun Autonomous Vehicle Competition Is Drawing Near

Mark Lelinwalla, Tech Times 09 June 2015, 05:06 pm

Why wait for Google's self-driving car to hit the market when you can do it yourself?

DIY-electronics aficionados will converge upon Niwot, Colo. for the seventh annual SparkFun Autonomous Vehicle Competition on Saturday, June 20 with one goal in mind — to successfully navigate their self-made vehicles around obstacles and past a finish line in under five minutes.

"The course is more difficult and we are giving teams bonus points for not relying on GPS, so we expect to see some very creative outside-the-box vehicles and strategies," Chris McGrady, content marketing lead at SparkFun Electronics, wrote in an email to Tech Times. "We also added a new competition for combat bot — the crazy, fighting robots you see on BattleBots. It should make for a very exciting and fun day."

For the 2015 AVC, event organizers nixed the aerial competition due to safety concerns. However, the ground course's stanchions, barrels, hoops and ramps should pose a big enough challenge for autonomous vehicle engineers.

"The SparkFun AVC is the perfect opportunity for folks of all ages and skill levels to try their hand at building an autonomous vehicle," McGrady added, "and it shows how anyone can play around with and experiment with electronics."

Through the years, AVC has seen everything from gas-powered RC cars to electric wheelchairs and even a 10-foot tall paper-maché dinosaur. However, last year, even McGrady was taken aback by what he witnessed in action.

"We had a full-sized 1986 Jeep Wagoneer," he said. "We worked with the team on a special basis because we usually don't accept full-size vehicles [because of safety concerns], but were able to get enough failsafes in place they could compete. They were not the fastest, but it was pretty cool to see a nearly 30-year old truck cruising around the course on its own."

Watch that below here.