T. Röfer et al. (Eds.): RoboCup 2011, LNCS 7416, pp. 13–24, 2012.
© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2012
Robot Hardware, Software, and Technologies
behind the SKUBA Robot Team
Kanjanapan Sukvichai, Teeratath Ariyachartphadungkit, and Krit Chaiso
Faculty of Engineering, Kasetsart University, 50 Phaholyothin Road, Thailand
fengkpsc@ku.ac.th,
{teeratath,nuopolok}@hotmail.com
Abstract. SKUBA is a winner from RoboCup 2011, Turkey. The aim of this
paper is to explain the basic concepts of the design of the robot hardware and
the AI system. The robot mechanics are explained in detail along with the elec-
tronic boards. Protection circuits are added to make the robot more robust. A
torque controller is implemented as low-level controller to reduce the effect of
surfaces. The high level AI system is separated into three major modules: pre-
dictor/tracker, strategy, and control module. The tracking algorithm and the
Kalman Observer are implemented in the predictor/tracker module. The strate-
gy module takes care of playing and evaluates the probability of each play
against the opponent. Finally, the control module is explained. Path planning
algorithms and a modified kinematics equation are implemented in this module
in order to make the robot move along the desired trajectory with less velocity
error.
Keywords: Small Size League, mobile robot, torque controller, modified
kinematics.
1 Introduction
The Small Size League is a part of the RoboCup robot competitions, which take place
every year. The aim of RoboCup is to promote robotics and AI research by offering a
publicly appealing, but formidable challenge. The Small Size League is a robot soccer
competition that is designed based on the FIFA rules. The main interesting and strong
characteristic of this league are the complex AI algorithms, fast speed game play, and
multi-agents cooperation. Each team has five robots on the field and plays against the
opponent. The overhead wide-angle cameras are mounted over each side of the field
and send their images to the SSL-Vision system [1]. The SSL-Vision will broadcast
the positions of the ball and all robots to each team via a network cable.
Skuba is a Small Size League soccer robot team from Kasetsart University, which
has participated in the RoboCup competition since 2006. We won the championships
in the last three years, i.e. the RoboCup 2009 in Graz, Austria and 2010 in Singapore
and RoboCup 2011 in Istanbul, Turkey. We also won the RoboCup Iran Open in Te-
hran in April 2011. In this paper, the SKUBA robot structure and SKUBA software
are revealed and explained.