Mechanical engineer at RoboTeam Twente: Ludwig on joining a student team during your studies

The RoboTeam of today is not the same as the previous iterations. This year, RoboTeam has decided to stop designing mini-football robots competing in the RoboCup, and focus on an entirely new competition: the European Rover Challenge. We’ve decided to pivot into a more innovative competition. We’re currently building a Mars Rover, like what you see in Perseverance or Curiosity. 

I’m mainly responsible for the drivetrain. That includes the suspension and the wheels. Basically, everything that keeps the rover moving and stable. Right now, I’m in the design process – so a lot of research into previous rovers, seeing what works, what doesn’t work, seeing where older rovers failed and to improve upon those failures and implement it on our own rover.

Honestly, it’s been a good experience. So far, in Mechanical Engineering, we’ve only had a sort of… introduction, you know? In module 6, we were working with Industrial Design Engineering students and Industrial Engineering & Management students, but that didn’t really give us a full idea of how a true multidisciplinary workspace would actually operate. At its core, student teams are companies, and within companies, I think communication between different subteams is necessary. For example, when I was first starting, I never really thought about how the electrical engineers would route their wires, or mount their PCBs, and all that. It’s taught me a lot of what to keep in mind while designing.

Well, my SolidWorks skills have definitely improved. But that’s a skill anyone with enough time in the software can learn. But aside from that, at the start, I realised how horrible my design work was. I took no regard towards how anyone would actually put this together, you know? And that’s improved tremendously.

Combining with your studies? Sure, that’s definitely possible. For us third years in Mechanical Engineering, you’re able to do your minor project with the team itself, and that’s what I’m doing. It leaves you a lot of space to work full-time with the team. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be your own project that you work on all the time; I know a couple of people, a mechanical engineer, for example, who does electrical work in the team to broaden their skillset. But working full-time and studying full-time? No. You’re here in the office from nine to five, so when are you going to go to class or study? But if you’re doing part-time RoboTeam, then that’s definitely doable. There are a lot of second-year mechanicals that we have in our team that work more or less 12 hours a week.

RoboTeam is for everyone. You definitely don’t have to be a robotics expert or a robotics nerd to join at all. We have students from the business field, for example, and they’re responsible for the more corporate side of the team. Like I said, at its core, RoboTeam is a company, so it’s got to have its financial managers, it’s got to have its externals, it needs its PR team. There are plenty of opportunities, and it’s not just for technically inclined people. I mean, I wasn’t into robotics when I originally joined the team, but it was something I wanted to learn more about. So it does certainly help to have an interest in the things you’re doing.

RoboTeam has brought me into contact with a bunch of different companies and sponsors who are good contacts to have when you graduate. If you want to do your thesis and you talk to one of these companies that have collaborated with RoboTeam in the past, then these companies are a lot more willing to give you a chance. It doesn’t have to be RoboTeam per se, it can be any student team for that matter.

I would say that it’s a very good opportunity. It teaches you how to apply the things you’ve learned so far in a technical study, at least in my case. And it, of course, brings you into contact with big companies, so there’s that. It’s a great opportunity to get work experience as a student.