Yesterday, Thursday, the Science Camp on the topic of RoboBau started at the Schmalkalden University of Applied Sciences. In this scientific competition, different teams compete in the task of constructing a bridge. To make things interesting, the components of the bridge have to be made with a 3D printer and the bridge construct has to be assembled with the help of a robot gripper arm. As should be clear, this competition requires different engineering disciplines to work together.
The Science Camp is an initiative of the Alliance of Thuringian Engineering Sciences, i.e. a cooperation of engineering courses from various Thuringian universities. Thus, the field of participants is not only composed of students from different engineering disciplines, the participants also come from different universities. It is this integrative, cooperative approach to joint problem solving that is at the heart of the ThürIng alliance.
Thursday was all about arriving. After the welcome by the Vice President for Studies and International Relations, Uwe Hettler, the coordinator, Frederike Mohr, presented the daily schedule. This was followed by a campus tour and lunch together. In the afternoon, the first thematic pegs were driven in: Dr. László Dunai from the Department of Structural Engineering of the Budapest University of Technology and Economics introduced the topic of bridge construction from an architectural perspective and presented basic principles of possible construction methods, which the participants in the Science Camp can use as orientation. Afterwards, Prof. Abrahamczyk from Bauhaus University Weimar gave an overview of the exact task and introduced the teams. The day was rounded off by a joint barbecue for the nearly thirty participants.
Over the next few days, various crash courses will be held, including CAD, intelligent robotics and the Python programming language. After an excursion on Wednesday, the actual construction will start on Thursday at the latest.