Team Koalafied is a group of high school students from Pembroke School and mentors participating in the FIRST® Robotics Competition since 2018 in Adelaide, South Australia. Students design, build, test and program robots to compete from scratch based on each year's unique game challenge.

We currently have approximately 20 high school students and mentors (university students and parents) who meet regularly on weekends to build robots.

FIRST® Robotics Competition (FRC) is an international high school robotics competition. Starting in January, each year teams of students, coaches, and mentors work during a eight week period to build robots capable of competing in that year's game that weigh up to 60kg. Robots complete tasks such as scoring balls into goals, stacking milk crates, hanging on bars, and balancing robots on balance beams. The game, and required set of tasks, changes completely each year.

In 2024 Team Koalafied built our best robot yet, leveraging a 'swerve’ drive, which enables speedy movement of the robot in any direction; modern manufacturing techniques including computer-controlled (CNC) milling and 3D printing; and the use of computer-aided design (CAD) to design our robots. 

Our robot, named ‘10-32’, was fiercely competitive, defeating world-class teams and coming an extremely impressive third place. Later in the year we competed in the Melbourne Robotics Tournament, ultimately placing 2nd following a tense final.

We are working hard to prepare for our next competition. Our current goals include:

• Getting ready for the 2025 Southern Cross Regional in Sydney;

• Making further improvements to our current robot to enhance our skills;

• Continuing to recruit, develop and inspire our members in STEM;

• Further enhance our use of CAD to design our robots;

• Learning more about the use of advanced manufacturing techniques such as CNC milling and 3D printing; and