Olympus Rover Trials
The Olympus Rover Trials is a UKSEDS run competition which challenges students to design, build and operate a rover for a mission to Mars.
Supported by Airbus and RAL Space, 2 of the largest space companies in the UK, the Olympus Rover Trials (ORT) is the foremost challenge available to UK university students in the field of robotics and roving vehicles.
Competition background
The Olympus Rover Trials are intended to mimic the real requirements of a rover which would travel to the surface of Mars and remotely conduct a mission such as drilling or sample collection.
The competition is split into 2 streams: Beginner and Advanced. The purpose of the two streams is to make ORT accessible and fun for teams who are new to robotics while also allowing experienced teams to innovate and challenge themselves.
2023/24
2023/24 was the first time as team from Queen’s University Belfast represented Northern Ireland at ORT. As a result, the team entered the Beginner stream and in October they began a journey of development to design and built a rover for the competition day in July.
With a crucial input from the QUB Robotics Society, the team met every deadline and ultimately travelled to RAL Space in Harwell Space Cluster for the competition day. After an intense schedule of presentations, vibration testing and field trialing of the rover, QPL’s team was crowned champions!
