Indonesia Robot Contest (KRI) for Region III (Yogyakarta and Central Java) will be conducted on Thursday and Friday (11-13/5) at University of Gadjah Mada (UGM). Teams of Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta (UMY) will participate in three of four contest categories.

A team supervisor Rama Okta Wiyagi, M.Eng. mentioned the three categories, namely Indonesia Fire Fighting Robot Contest (KRPAI), Indonesia Soccer Robot Contest (KRSBI), and Indonesia ABU Robot Contest (KRAI). “UMY’s teams have prepared for the contest, particularly for the KRAI category, since KRI committee officially announced the contest. Indeed, the KRAI is in line with the International ABU Robot Contest 2017 announced last year. This year the KRAI devotes a contest of a robot throwing a disc,” explained Rama in a robot demo by UMY’s teams on Wednesday (10/5) at volleyball court of UMY.

Rama also told that the teams comprises of students of Department of Electrical Engineering and Mechanical Engineering. “A robot contains electrical and mechanical elements so that we chose students from those two departments. The hardest part of our preparation was to design the wheel. Once it failed, we had to try to make it again so that designing the robot took time and it was exhausting,” he expressed.

Robots of UMY’s teams possesses different name. The robot throwing a disc is called Mr_Recht that consisting three main team members and three mechanical crews, namely Gunawan Eka, Dwi Verdi, Arif Burhanudin, Hazan Zidni, Raha Dian, and Noor Pratama. In Fire Fighting Robot Contest, UMY’s robot is named Mr_Cool MK6 that the team members are Try Ahmad, Wicaksono Aji, and Bintang Surya. For Soccer Robot Contest, UMY’s robot is Mr_Dev 1 and the team members are  Danardono, Vendy Dwi, Iwan Tru, Merina Putri, and Lutfi A.

Rama added that UMY has joined the Indonesia Robot Contest since 2010. He expected that students’ enthusiasm to a robotic area can increase. “Only a few students are interested in a robotic field because they assume that designing a robot is complicated. The mindset makes students give up even before learning. In fact, it absolutely can be learned,” he asserted.