1. Green flappy arms: When these arms are down, S.P.O.C. is ready to scoop up balls as far as a foot apart! But since they're fragile we designed our robot with the arms up, in case S.P.O.C. crashes into a wall or another unpleasant being. Another reason for having the arms up in the beginning is so S.P.O.C. can fit within the contest rule dimensions of 1'x1'x1' at starting time! With a servo mechanism, the arms are able to come all the way down or 90 degrees upwards.

2. Gate: If you inspect the pictures carefully, you might detect a human being hanging a little bit left of the center. This human being is actually attached to a tiny weight, which keeps our gate down when it's supposed to be down! We lower the gate to trap the second ball (watch the video!) and keep it from rolling out. But since the rods of the gate are naturally inclined to bend, we have the weights there to ensure safe-keeping of the ball. The two mini wheels to the left and right of the center help roll the ball in when we lower the gate. This gate is also powered by a servo mechanism, and we can control it to be lowered or raised.

3. Center divider: From the front you can see a center divider made up of two wheels. This divider ensures that any ball coming in will roll to the left or the right. There is just enough space on either side of the divider for one ball. And since the divider is made up of wheels, it also helps roll the balls one way or the other.

5. Elevated permanent arms: You see the blue/red arms which are permanently in a lowered position? Well, without the green flappy arms, we still have these arms to roll in the first ball in our course! If you see the video you'll know what we mean. They are raised a little more than half an inch off the ground because on the contest table there is a 1/2-inch lip which we want to push the balls over. Thus S.P.O.C. drives his arms over that lip and pushes the ball in with the back (wall) of its "mouth".