The Challenger Space Center of Arizona was the site of the November 2004 PAReX Autonomous Event. The turnout was great, with teams from local high schools, and from as far away as Tucson and Las Vegas.

Teams continue to raise the bar on ingenuity and design, as robots got faster in Line Following and four maze runners competed at the Advanced and Expert levels.

Mini-Sumo continues to be a popular event, with thirteen entries this year. Third time veteran Shadow (a.k.a. FlatSpat) came in with a firmware overhaul and rolled over the competition to win the event. New comer Mr. Happy smiled his way into 2nd, while Mini-Spat crawled up through the loser bracket for 3rd.

The Novice and Advanced Maze competition used a new head-to-head format that allowed us to run the event faster. We saw four Novice entries, with Tractor Bot taking 1st place. Mazie was the only Advanced entry to compete. We saw three Expert robots do their thing, with MegaMazer turning in 3 almost perfect runs for 1st, while Four Eyes did some fast, smooth navigating for 2nd.

Line following continues to gain popularity as 8 robots hit the track. We had everything from Lego-bots, to model cars, and scratch built with monster tires. Blue Lightning streaked past the others for a 1st place finish, with Yellow Belly grabbing 2nd, and Mike III appropriately getting 3rd.

The club wishes to thank the Challenger Space Center of Arizona for again making available its excellent facilities for the competition. The Center is a wonderful resource for Phoenix and the state, providing educational activities for all ages.

Visit the Challenger Space Center web site to learn more about the Center.