For some reason, every engineering program from any reputable university anywhere holds some sort of annual robot competition for its students which, invariably, involves moving some sort of 25mm-diameter plastic balls (generally ping-ping balls) about in various ridiculously elaborate fashions. My alma mater was no exception.

The task was simple enough: move plastic golf balls from a reservoir (shown at bottom) to various scoring bins about the arena, using a robot that had to fit within a 10"x10"x10" cube at the beginning of the contest. Now, when presented with this challenge, the first solution that leapt to mind was...well...a little crazy.

Archimedes was a pretty cool guy.

The balls are pumped up from the reservoir by the two screws, then neatly projected into the bins via small ramps at the top. Our design got us all the way to third place in the competition, decidedly tromping 43 other teams.

The robot was named "Hawaii 50," in honor of one of our teammates who took a spontaneous two-week vacation in Hawaii in the middle of the project, with zero warning.