The winner of the combined effort from SEW Eurodrive and Festo to showcase a student competition in mechatronic innovation has been announced. Seven universities from all over the country were invited to participate with the aim of showing innovation in design using SEW Eurodrive and Festo products.
The panel of judges convened during July 2008 to decide on the winning design. Judges included an esteemed panel of industry and product specialists including SAACE Young Engineer of the Year winner, Michelle Kruger, Erich Meintjes and Alistair Hodgkinson from DRA Mineral Projects, Dale Oosthuizen from Abtech, Tom Webster and Chris Oliver from Festo Didactic division as well as Thomas Diehl from SEW Eurodrive head office in Germany.
A~DOT – an automated dart throwing robot, designed by Stellenbosch University, won the first prize in the competition. Judges commented that the project was well researched, creative and logical. They commended the team on their accurate design and good presentation.
The Stellenbosch University team from left to right: P. van Deventer, P.J. Grobbelaar, B. de Lange and W.J.L. van Schalkwyk
Also receiving special mention were the projects from University of Pretoria (UAMP – Universal Autonomous Machining Platform) and the University of Cape Town (Fruit Picking Robot) who followed with the second and third highest points. Both of these projects were also commendable.
The winning team from Stellenbosch University has won an all expenses paid trip to Germany to visit the SEW Eurodrive and Festo head offices. Stellenbosch University will be receiving additional SEW Eurodrive and Festo equipment to the value of R100 000.
“It was a very exciting and topical competition which brought industry and academia closer together” commented Erich Meintjes, project manager from DRA Mineral Projects and one of the judges.
“We are very pleased with the response and the outcome of the competition,” commented Festo engineering manager, Adrian Buddingh, “overall the competition was very well received and we will be running it again next year.”
The winning design can be viewed at Electra Mining from 8–12 September on the SEW Eurodrive stand. The PneuDrive Team would like to thank the following universities for their participation:
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