The bots were unleashed today. There are three areas for testing. 12 teams run each area each day.

Area A is a loop road with 10-12 counter rotating traffic vehicles driven by stunt drivers (it's hard to count). Our job is to successfully cross oncoming traffic and merge into traffic. We do this test MON. I can't wait

Area C is another loop where DARPA plans to test stop sign and blocked roads. We run that tomorrow.

Area B is a long run where we have to navigate curvy streets with parked cars, parking spaces, and wide open zones with obstacles. That is what we had to run today. We saw 6 teams run the course before us but we could only see first 400m of the course. The first team was team gray, a favorite, got about 200m and failed ... That's when we thought this was going to be trouble. CMU (Carnegie Mellon University) ran next and whipped though the entire course (which turned out to be about 6.5 km) in 17 min. That's when we learned just how good Carnegie Mellon is. No one else finished the course ... One team (our across the pit neighbors, Urbanators, got only 6m). CalTech took 18min to go 100m.

We successfully completed our safety inspection and emergency stop (e-stop) tests ... Only a handful of teams did not. They all completed with another try. The test was basically to drive 15 mph and stop ... Restart and stop on a dime .. Should be no problem for anyone that has gotten this far. You would think there would be more time for getting around and talking to other teams, but we spend all of our time (and more) preparing for the next test we are about to run.

We had the kickoff meeting this evening and like any well run competition the schedule was radically changed. Our official safety inspection will be tomorrow along with our e-stop (emergency stop) testing. All the other tests are moved about ½ day. At this point the site is locked down pretty tight in that you can go to your pit … go to the practice area… or o off base. That’s about it … no peeking.

We have run our car in the practice area, which is really nothing but a large dirt field … with a telephone pole in the middle (to be avoided). Here are a few of the other cars at the event. Lots more to tell, but gotta run.

We checked in to the event and settled into our pit area today. The event takes places at the Southern Logistics Command Airbase, where DARPA has taken over the majority of the base (not the airstrip, however, and cargo planes still rumble overhead every couple of hours). DARPA must have 200 employees/volunteers here to direct the 35 teams that have made it this far. Of course none of them know anything except the one piece of information they were directed to tell you at that given moment.

The pit area is really just a 1600 square foot pad of concrete, bounded by white lines, where we need to set up camp. The camp is nice in the morning or evening when the weather is just gorgeous (50 degrees with a light breeze). It gets a bit warm at mid-day and its dry … I mean really dry.

We made it! The entire team is in California together after dodging the fires that are now raging southern California (what a mess but pictures from a small digital camera do not do the scene justice). We managed to check into our luxury accommodations without incident. The car survived the journey with minimal jostling but quite a bit more dust than we expected. As it turns out one of the top air vents was completely open to the fine desert air which of course permeated everything. After an hour of cleaning, everything was back to normal and we conducted preliminary testing in a relatively new subdivision. Here is Remo in the car readying everything for our first test runs. Well tomorrow is the day we really get started.

Well we blew another pair of tires today. Perhaps we should have done a more serious weights and balances analysis on the trailer. The good news is that Gary and Andy have gotten pretty good at changing tires on the trailer. The bad news is that we are out of spares, and we have ruined all the rims. Fortunately in the middle of the desert there are plenty of tire stores … I guess this is a common occurrence … but of course things take a little longer out here. So after 12 hours, the trailer is on the road again.

Today was pretty eventful … true to SAE’s predictions. Shortly after noon, somewhere in the middle of Texas, one of the tires on the trailer blew. This was followed immediately by a failure of the second tire on the same side. Andy managed to bring the trailer to a safe stop, but not before hot shredded rubber was flung into the surrounding brush. There was no damage to the trailer or the contents, but the rubber appeared to have caused a small brush fire. The fire department was quickly able to get it under control … but of course wanted to see the “robot car” that had caused the ruckus. After that excitement, the drivers managed to jack up the trailer to replace the tires (with spares we had) but in the process Andy apparently smacked his hand into the pavement pretty hard … hard enough to think it was broken. Paramedics were called to the scene, but by this point Gary, Andy and the robot car were famous. After seeing to Andy, the paramedics wanted their pictures taken with the robot car. Fortunately the rest of the day was less eventful and the team made it to Arizona.

Gary and Andy started driving at about 10AM today and are hoping to make at least 900 miles per day. At 8 MPG and $3 for diesel … we are looking at over $300 a day in fuel, and probably some unbelievable amount for carbon credits.

We loaded up the car today on a relatively old, but freshly painted trailer that the Society of Automotive Engineers at UCF let us borrow (thanks SAE).  The car fit nicely without having to remove any sensors which should save us some serious time unloading and preparing for the competition.  We managed to fill the rest of the trailer with other supplies and every spare we could think of.  You just know its not going to be the spare we need.  I am not sure why the SAE

Today, we scheduled an event to showcase Knight Rider to the local media. Several interesting stories and videos have emerged in the following days.Here are some of the links to the coverage:

1. Channel 6 (WKMG):

http://www.local6.com/news/14318122/detail.html

2. Channel 9 (WFTV):

http://www.wftv.com/video/14332188/detail.html (Video)