On December 3rd, teams from all around the area went to Itasca Community College for a day of robotics training seminars. Students learned programming, electrical wiring, and other aspects of robotics that will help them as they prepare to tackle this year’s FIRST Robotics challenge! Our team presented two classes: Drive Trains and Transmissions, and Robot Specific Electronics.
We learned a lot and are excited for our game Kickoff on January 7th so we can apply what we learned as we design, build, and program this year’s bot!

Hello, everyone! We want to thank the students from Denfeld Nation Automation who volunteered at the Marshall Lego Robotics Competition on December 3rd. We helped in several areas like concessions, pit supervision, and floating volunteers at this event, etc. A heartfelt thanks from the entire DNA team and its mentors.

On November, 5th, 2016, Denfeld Nation Automation, Marshall Topper Bots, and Lakeview Christian Academy Lions Pride all demonstrated their teams robot during the Mini Maker Fair.

Hello everyone! Robotic’s meetings, up until build season, will be Tuesdays 3:30-5:30 for veterans only and Thursdays 3:30-5:30 for everyone.

Each month during their regular meeting, Duluth School Board members take time to recognize students, school or staff accomplishments. In August, the School Board recognized the Denfeld Nation Automation (DNA) Robotics Team and the success they had this season.

July 2016: 1st & 2nd Place, Gitchi Gummi Mini-Regional Received Helping Hands Award for Gracious Professionalism.

May 2016: 2nd Place, MSHSL State Robotics Championship Received Dunwoody Award for Outstanding Engineering & Design.

April 2016: FIRST Robotics World Championship, Semi-Finalists in the Galileo Division.

March 2016: 1st Place Lake Superior Regional, 14 matches undefeated Received Engineering Inspiration Award.

DNA Robotics Team accepting a Certificate of
Recognition from the ISD 709 School Board.

For the past three years, Denfeld Nation Automation (DNA) held a two week LEGO Robotics Camp for the children in the Duluth area. Team 4009’s LEGO Camp is a great opportunity to help educate young students in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics).

DNA held the LEGO Camp again this year. Our FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) students mentor young students by helping them build a robot that has to complete multiple tasks. At the end of the two weeks, the LEGO Camp students modify their robots to compete with each other in a “sumo bot” match where they try to push the other robots out of a circular arena. On the last day of camp, DNA demonstrates their robots from previous years to show how the young students may apply recently learned skills later in their lives.

DNA students demonstrating to LEGO Camp how to drive the high school robots

LEGO Robots playing tug-of-war

Students learning how to drive the robots

The Denfeld Nation Automation “DNA” Robotics Team 4009 capped off an impressive season at the third annual Gitchi Gummi Get Together on Saturday, July 30th. The event, hosted by the Duluth East Daredevils Team 2512, gave teams another chance to compete with this year’s robot.

To fill all 18 competition spots, Team 3184, Blaze Robotics, and DNA both entered two robots. DNA gave their second robot the name of DNA Too and the number of 8009. Team 4009 drove the competition robot and Team 8009 drove the practice robot. The robots are nearly identical, only differing slightly in size and camera placement.

After qualification matches, Team 4009 was in first place and chose Team 3883, Data Bits and Team 4480, UC-Botics. Team 8009 was picked by the second seed alliance led by Team 1816, Green Machine. The third member of their alliance was Team 3102, Tech-No-Tigers.

Both teams won their semi-final matches and then both teams proceeded to the final rounds. In an amazing final match, Team 8009’s alliance won first place and Team 4009’s alliance took second place. During the award ceremony, DNA also won the Helping Hands award for their gracious professionalism throughout the competition.

DNA Team 4009 and DNA Too Team 8009 going head to head in a qualification match.

DNA and DNA Too with First Place, Second Place, and Helping Hand Award

On Saturday, May 21, 2016, Denfeld Nation Automation (DNA) Team 4009 competed at the Minnesota State High School League Championship in Minneapolis at the Mariucci Arena. DNA was ranked 4th out of 30 teams at the end of qualification matches. They became the third seeded alliance captain and chose Team 2883, F.R.E.D and Team 3042, Cobalt Catalyst to be their partners. Denfeld played in the finals and eventually lost to the top alliance.

Team DNA received the Outstanding Engineering and Design Award award at the State Championship last year. This year we were honored with it again! The Outstanding Engineering and Design Award is given to teams that exhibit uniquely engineered or designed robots and grants the team a $500 check to keep promoting excellence in engineering and design.