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Robot-sumo bouts can be a great way to pit your automation skills against others. Participating normally means a lot of hard work to get your bot functioning properly, and likely a fair amount of travel to meet your opponents. SurrogateTV, however, has a new alternative with their SumoBots Battle Royale arena that allows you to control actual sumo-bots over the Internet 24/7.
Their customized “pushers” from JSumo are made out of steel sheets, powered by an Arduino, a motor shield and a lithium-ion battery — all housed inside a 3D-printed enclosure — and tracked by a computer vision system. Four motors are used for movement and a servo on the top flips them right side up as needed.
The arena isn’t just a traditional circular ring either, but an area that is always dynamically changing. SurrogateTV decided on an interactive floor that drops as the game goes on, voted upon by the chat/viewers. A quick overview of the build process and how it works can be seen in the video below.
