Last year marked the first time that the State University of New York at Stony Brook competed in the International Walking Machine Decathlon. The team was founded in November of 1996 shortly after receiving funding from the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences. During the next five months the team designed and hand built the walking robot, which was later named DAVID. The robot was taken to competition at Universidad Panimericana in Mexico City where it competed against twelve other schools.

DAVID suffered a major computer failure just hours prior to competition, as a result the first three events were missed while the team scrambled to recover control of the machine. It was found that control of the computer could not be reestablished before the end of the competition and so an attempt was made to control the legs directly. DAVID began competing in the fourth event, he completed two events successfully, attempting six of the seven that remained. It was found that the inaccuracy associated with human control of the legs resulted in frequent failure of parts that were designed to break under excursion loads. In retrospect the team feels that DAVID could have completed at least five of the ten events had he been under the control of his onboard computer.

Despite the numerous problems encountered during the competition DAVID finished tenth overall. The team’s scores and final placement can be viewed on the SAE website.