On March 26 and 27, after six weeks of designing, building, and testing, Beaver’s robotics team turned its robot, Leslie II, loose at the 2010 FIRST Robotics Competition.

The team, known as the Beaverbots, had to create a robot that would work autonomously and with a human driver, be able to maneuver a soccer ball into a goal, climb over large bumps, and be sturdy enough to survive multiple collisions with other robots. Clearly, that’s no small task.

Throughout the two-day competition, the Beaverbots joined other teams in a game that involved scoring as many goals as possible and robots using their own power to hoist themselves up a pole. (For a complete description of the game see our previous post.)

After technical difficulties on the first day that prevented the human drivers from communicating with Leslie II, the team spent the evening troubleshooting and had a successful second day. Overall, the Beaverbots finished with four wins, four losses, and one tie, good for 22nd place out of 55 teams. It was a great showing for only their second year in the competition.

For more photos of action from the competition, visit the gallery on Flickr. You can also watch a video of Leslie II in action (she is on the red team, robot number 2888).