Saturday, Nov. 12, 2011

Today, Team #11570, The Mekanikal Maniaks 2 went to the district qualifying tournament at Kalani High School.  It was a big tournament, with a total of 20 teams.  Our pit tables were in the cafeteria, with the robot matches held in the gym.  It was an exciting, fun tournament, and to make it even more special, we had our very own cheering section, led by our siblings and families.  We felt really good about our presentations, and really tried our best.  During the robot games, we cheered for our team, as well as others.  We even got to do our own team cheer in front of the audience with a microphone.

During the awards, we were pleasantly surprised to win the award for "Team Work."  Right after that, we were still in shock, as they announced that Team #11570  would also be advancing to the State Championship tournament!  Great job, Mekanikal Maniaks!  We hope you can come cheer us on on Sat. Dec. 3rd.

P.S  We have decided to change our team name for the State Championship Tournament.  We voted to call oursevles the "Lightning Maniaks!"

 Meet Team #11570 - The Mekanikal Maniaks . . . aka The Lightning Maniaks

View of the robot matches, from the audience's point of view.

Celebrating a great robot match! 

 Winning the award for Excellent Team Work, and celebrating our advancing to the State Championship Tournament in December.

 Getting ready for the start of the robot match, in the gym at Kalani High School.

 Click to play a video of the robot game.

 Wanna hear the most energetic team share their cheer?  

 Click to play a close up of the robot match.  See the Lightning Maniak run through as many missions as they can.

 Hooray for Team # 11570.  Go Maniaks!

Here we are, with big smiles to celebrate our award for excellent Team work and for advancing to the State Championship Tournament in a few weeks.  Wish us luck!

Saturday, November 5, 2011

Meet Team #4003.  We competed today at the Punahou Tournament.  We were so excited and ready to go.  Nerves have not gotten the best of us.  There are only 5 on our team, but we worked hard.  We were all ready for the Food Factor Challenge, and to have some FUN!  Our team did very well.  We qualified, and were invited to compete in the Hawaii First Lego League State Championship tournament on Saturday, Dec. 3rd at the Blaisdell.  Come and support and cheer for us.  Good luck Team #4003!  Go Maniaks!!!

Flashing the shaka is a good sign!

 Ready to begin the fun!

 Getting in some last minute practice.

 Make sure to aim carefully.

 Go Maniaks, Go!

 Congratulations, Team #4003, for a job well done!

 District Tournament qualifiers.  We will proudly represent Liholiho at the Blasidell.

 Some time in the morning to practice our research presentation.

 The Mekanikal Maniapp . . . an app to test . . .

 Go Maniaks!!!

 We did it!!!  Yay!

Coaches for Team #4003 - tired, but happy and proud

Sat. October 22, 2011

Practice makes perfect! Team #4003 is working toward their goal. Team #4003 was mostly working on their research and their props. Team #11570 is working on both research and their robots. They made only a little bit of success on their robots. The research has improved much more since the beginning.

Team #11570 is still going toward success!

Team #4003 is working on their Maniapp!

On sale from November 5th, at Punahou. It could just save your life.  

Robot on the loose! DANGER!!!!

Problem solved!

Here is the Mekanikal Cooler.  The cooler is really close to being done

Here We Go Again!!! Sat. October 15, 2011

This year, the Mekanikal Maniaks have two teams - #4003, participating in the Punahou tournament on Nov. 5th, and #11570, participating in the Kalani High School tournament on Nov. 12th.  The theme for this year's competition is "Food Factor."  We're hard at work, and want to share with you our weekly progress.  We hope you follow along and enjoy our blog.

We made a jig to start the robot in same position every time.

This is one of our research teams working on the Mekanikal Cooler.  They're making the props.

Team #11570's robot is going fishing.

Team #4003 is on a rat hunt!  Gotta catch those rodents to keep our food clean and safe.

We're "fishing" for our first mission of the game.

Aim carefully . . . and have your partner check to make sure the robot it ready

Here is one of our innovation solutions - The Mekanikal Cooler!  It keeps food fresh, better than your regular cooler!

We're doing lots of research online and interviewing experts to help with our research on Food Safety.

This is our other innovative solution, The Mekanikal Maniapp.  And you thought the iPhone was good?  Wait till you see this!

Here is our "Blog Master" working on the blog to share our progress each week with our viewers.

Field Trip to Waialua High School Robotics

On Friday, February 18, 2011, The Mekanikal Maniaks, Team 4951, visited Waialua High School.  We were greeted on campus by the students from the VEX and FRC teams, and taken on a tour of their robotics facilities.

We first visited their industrial education shop, where the parts of the robot were built and put together.

Then, we were taken to the animation room where we watched Waialua's Lifetime of Safety video and the animation video created by the animation/CAD designers.


Next, we visited Waialua's FLL Team 1739's room where we got to see their robot run through the missions.

After that, we went to the VEX room.  Their team members demonstrated their robots, and to our surprise, we got to drive the VEX robots.  It was fun, and took awhile for us to get the hang of it.  For many of us, this was our favorite part of the day.

Last, we visited the testing room where we all got to watch the 2011 FRC robot, Ho'okahi, in action.  This was a real treat for us, as their robot was in the final stages, and would be shipped out to New York, for their competition in early March.    The theme for their game this year is, "LogoMotion".

To end our day, we were treated to a pizza lunch from Waialua High School's Team 359, The Hawaiian Kids.  All of the members of Waialua High School's Robotics team truely displayed Gracious Professionalism, as they treated us with so much respect and kindness.  It was also evident in the way that they worked together with each other.

We were all amazed and impressed with what these teams have accomplished.  It was just awesome to see what the students are doing at the high school level, and this is something we have to look forward to.  It's no wonder that Waialua Robotics brings home so many awards!

Thank you to Waialua Robotics Teams for hosting our visit during a very busy time, just before your upcoming national competitions.  We wish you much luck in all of them!

FLL State Championship Tournament Dec, 11, 1020

The Mekanikal Maniaks met at the Blaisdell Center on Saturday December 11, 2010 for the First Lego League State Championship Tournament.

First, we went to the Robot Design interview, and introduced ourselves with our team cheer.  We showed the judges our best program which was the Mechanical Arm.  We also presented the program for the syringe and the Patient Area.  We all felt overjoyed from doing our best, but at the same time, we were relieved the pressure vanished.

After, we went into the Project Presentation interview.  Again, we introduced ourselves with the team cheer, and started our skit.  We were so nervous, but in the end, we were relieved once again.

We couldn't relax just yet.  The robot games had just begun.  It was very loud in the arena because all the parents were screaming for the teams.  In round 1, our robot, The Mekanikal Warrior, didn't run so well.  He scored 95 points.  It was very frustrating, but we kept persevering.  In round 2, we improved with a score of 135 points!  Round 3 was our last chance to score high, and we felt so nervous, some of us were starting to feel sick!  Still, the last round was our best score yet!  We had gotten 220 points, better than 95 and 135.

We practiced hard between rounds.  We were ranked 12 among the 56 teams for the robot game.   In the end, our robot was nominated for the QUALITY DESIGN by the judges, and The Mekanikal Warrior ranked somewhere in the top 10 of 56 other robots!  Team 4951, The Mekanikal Maniaks, was judged EXCELLENT by the Teamwork Judges, and again ranked in the top 10 of 56 teams.  In addition, our team was judged GOOD by the Project Judges.  

Although we did not take home any awards in the end, what we discovered about ourselves and our team is more important than what we could ever win!  AWESOME JOB, to the Mekanikal Maniaks of 

Liholiho Elementary School.

working on the patient area program

                                            
                                                 downloading the revised program
                                                  

                                          
                                                  working on bionic eyes with our mentor

doing the patent area mission

doing the blog

                                                                      New Robot !

                                                          our mentor from Punahou is back!