AME Students Build BattleBot for Capstone Project

Former UA Engineering student Matt Bunting built this hexapod robot as an undergraduate. Students in a new College of Engineering club will build battle-ready robots of a similar size.

For their Interdisciplinary Capstone Project, four AME students are building a combat robot to combine engineering principles with action-packed competition. The team includes mechanical engineering students Al Hurworth, Nick Sivertson and Alexander Wait, as well as aerospace engineering student Mathias Ramirez. They're joined by two students majoring in electrical and computer engineering.

Team 23037 has two goals: to build a robot that complies with the “BattleBots” TV show rules and to lay the foundation for a new student club for combat robotics, which will be called Wildcat Robotics.

The students plan to  submit their fighting robot to the show for consideration. Acceptance into the tournament relies mainly on creativity, so this criterion will serve as a main design guideline. If successful, the team will demonstrate full robot functionality at Craig M. Berge Design Day in 2023.

The team will also detail the structure for the future club and establish a foundation for its members to access the resources needed to continue its growth, such as company sponsorships. Hurworth, Sivertson and Ramirez have served in leadership positions in another College of Engineering student organization, Baja SAE Club. Hurworth is confident the three have gained the experience to achieve success in this effort.

“There’s already kind of an excitement,” said Hurworth. “A lot of people know what it is, and everybody I’ve talked to is interested.”