Robotics Research and Animation

Southside robotics activities and the happy home of robots SAM Sr., FireSAM, and SAM Jr. are located in the Computer Science Lab (room 227) at Southside High in Greenville SC. We pursue a number of robotic activities at the school as follows:

Current Robotics Activities

1) InvenTeam: Southside was one of 13 high schools nationwide which won a 2004 Lemelson-MIT InvenTeams grant. We proposed inventing a stair climbing robot which could carry firefighting gear up stairs and injured people down. and are still perfecting the prototype calles FireSAM.

2) SAM Sr: We are the happy home for SAM the robot, a retired FIRST competition contender from Team 281. SAM was rebuilt and reprogrammed by Southside students. He now works as an science and engineering ambassador. SAM is available for presentations at schools. Contact him here.

4) SAM Jr: was created as part of the Lemelson-MIT project to help develop control systems fro FireSAM.

5) Robotics in the Classroom: We use a number of different small robots or robotic devices for science experiments in physics class. Our after school robotics program will help add to the classroom robotics experiments available.

All robotics activities are open to any student in the Greenville area

Contact Person: Tom Rogers
e-mail: tkrogers@greenville.k12.sc.us

SAM Team News

We Won!
Southside Automated Machines won the 2005 Innovision award for Innovation in Education for providing students with a unique opportunity to participate in the innovation process. The The team designed and built a stair climbing robot for firefighters last year as part of a Lemelson-MIT InvenTeam grant and shower off their creation at MIT last June.

The competition among finalists was stiff and included Furman University as well as Spartanburg School District Number 3.

SAM Goes to Roper Mountain
SAM showed up at Roper Mountain Science Center (RMSC) for their Engineering day celebration in both 2004 and 2005. SAM not only performed a dance for the audience but also helped a make an engineering oriented presentation.

SAM has also wowed crowds at a number of Southside events including the International Festival. He is available for science and engineering presentations at schools and other educational events. Contact him here.


	SAM helps demonstrate a dipole antenna


	An appreciative crowd watches SAM dance

SAM and friends at the Southside International Festival

Tarak instructs SAM

Robotics Programming Area

The robotics programming and control system development area is located in the computer science lab, room 227. We have a complete set of FIRST robotics C language based controllers mounted on the wall and linked to 6 computers loaded with control system development software. We can develop programs in C or basic computer languages.

The Computer Science Lab also has 10 computers which are fully equipped with solid works CAD. This is a very powerful 3D CAD system used by many engineering departments in local companies.

Our new C language FIRST robotics control system.

Robotics Fabrication Area

We have over 2000 square feet of space in our robotics fabrication facility and are fully equipped with common shop tools.

We have five sets of Lego robotics kits to use for prototyping