Oregon State University Robotics Club

03/29/2026

Grace Sopko has been an officer in DAM Robotics since joining in 2023. Her work has transformed our club’s accounting and revitalized our marketing. All of these contributions came alongside completing two MECOP internships, attaining a Six Sigma Green Belt Certification, and maintaining membership in the Alpha Pi Mu Honor Society.

Grace will be taking a gap year to work in industry before attending graduate school in Europe. We’d like to thank her for the extensive contributions to the club and wish her good luck in future endeavours.

Thank you Grace and congratulations on graduation!

02/21/2026

We're testing our new extendable tower and longer-distance communications for System Acceptance Review!!

University Rover Challenge
Canadian International Rover Challenge

12/16/2025

Underwater has accomplished switching from ROS 1 to ROS 2 and developing new parts for the robot. We have also taken apart the ROV to replace the pressure housing.

We hope to finish replacing the pressure housing next term, and we hope to be able to test our ROV in the water. We are all super pumped about getting ready for the competition in the spring!

A huge thank you to our team specific sponsors! Kenesto

12/14/2025

Many new students and some returning students were recruited to the Combat Robotics team this term. Some of the newest members of the team built their own bots for the fall term competition: Combat Robotics’ Fall Fracas Competition, hosted by the Robotics Club here on campus.

We are so excited for winter term, where the Robotics Club will host The Combat Robotics’ Winter Wars Competition, which is coming up fast. Of course, you do not have to be a member to compete, so CAD, print, and assemble a bot to watch plastic fly!

12/13/2025

This term, the rover team has onboarded and trained new members, started 4 capstone projects, began a redesign of our science mechanisms, and held our first two design reviews of the year. For training, we planned and held a mini-competition to help new members get a better grasp of our season end-goal. Our capstone projects include a three-finger gripper, a new autonomous navigation system, a real-life accurate rover simulation, and a three-axis gimbal for active image stabilization. Our science and science mechanism teams are developing a core sample collection system and a topsoil collection-to-onboard chemical analysis system.



We are excited to continue developing or rover to prepare for our 2026 competitions: the University Rover Challenge (27-30 May in Utah) and the Canadian International Rover Challenge (7-10 August in Alberta).

11/26/2025

Rover's Science Mechanism team has been prototyping and testing different forms of powered core-drills for deep (10cm) soil collection. Here the rough setup is an Odrive M8325s 100KV being controlled by an Odrive S1. This is powering a core drill with copper casing to retain the dirt. In competition, the cache will then be retrieved from the rover for analysis by judges.

11/25/2025

On the 1st of November, our Mars Rover team held their first design review of the term. Each project team presented and answered questions about their project goal, plan, current progress, and timeline. Due to its proximity to Halloween, we invited team members to dress up in impromptu costumes and present in-character. The Mars Rover leadership dedicated time to reformatting our design review process to have a more productive and enjoyable experience compared to the previous year. The implemented changes encouraged members to ask more questions, leading to a longer but more broadly engaging discussion.

Some of the more notable projects presented-on include:
- New gimbal design with active image stabilization
- Strain data collection for next year’s chassis redesign
- Redesigning the wrist-roll joint on our arm to include a larger slipring
- Physically accurate simulation (Capstone Project)
- Redesigning soil-core and topsoil collection mechanisms
- Designing a soil-sample chemical analysis system
- Creating a standardized connector set for the Rover
- Autonomous navigation system (Capstone Project)
- Physical camera layer (6 static cameras for surround view of rover)
- New three finger gripper design (Capstone Project)
- Design of switch and button board for arm dexterity testing (New Member Onboarding Project)

The team is excited to proceed from the planning and prototyping stage to a phase of further design, testing, and integration (for competition) next term!

10/21/2025

09/29/2025

Join us for Leadership this Wednesday, October 1st at 6pm in Kearney 212! This is the first in a three part installment our club will be hosting in partnership with Kim Harr and her company . This first topic will be on Effective Communication. We hope to see you all there!

09/29/2025

Welcome back for Fall 2025! Don’t forget to stop by kickoff at the Kelly Atrium on October 2nd to say hi and see some cool robots!

05/05/2025

Our Drone Racing Subteam, Dam Drones, took Second Place again this year at the Collegiate Drone Racing Championships in Raleigh-Durham, NC! 6 of our 8 competing pilots made it into the pro-top 16 bracket, and one more made it into the pro-next 16 bracket. More pilots than any other competing school!