[Kevin Ainsworth]

We did some extensive testing with the Robopeak RPLIDAR A1 sensor.
One of our students had some great obstacle avoidance software running that showed the robot making the correct decision most of the time. The only issue is the lasers don't see polycarbonate. Diamond plate=fine, robots=fine, game object=fine, polycarbonate field elements and side panels=no good. I asked this particular student to record his progress but I never got the information from him. Too bad because the work he did looked really good.

I would like to make a setup that uses a lidar to detect everything but the field itself and then mount a spinning ultrasonic sensor or four corner sensors to grossly detect the boundaries of the field. The issue with a spinning ultrasonic is that you can't rotate the sensor very fast due to its response time. We've just never got to that project yet.