Rules
The maze is constructed of 3/4" shop plywood. The walls are approximately 6 inches high, and are painted in primary colors with glossy paint. The walls are set on a grid with 12-inch spacing. Due to the thickness of the plywood and limitations in accuracy, the hallways may be as narrow as 11.5-inches. The maze can be up to 20-feet square, but may be smaller depending on the space available for the event.

The maze will be set up on either industrial-type carpet or hard floor (depending on where we hold the event). The maze will be under cover, so your robot does not have to be rain proof; however, it may be exposed to various temperature, wind, and lighting conditions. The maze is a classical two-dimensional proper maze: there is a single path from the start to the finish and there are no islands in the maze. Both the entrance and exit are located on outside walls. Proper mazes can be solved by following either the left wall or the right wall. The maze is carefully designed so that there is no advantage if you follow the left wall or the right wall.

The main limit on the robot is that it be autonomous: once started by the owner or handler, no interaction is allowed until the robot emerges from the exit, or it becomes hopelessly stuck. Obviously the robot needs to be small enough to fit within the walls of the maze. It may touch the walls, but may not move the walls to its advantage -no bulldozers. The judges may disqualify a robot which appears to be moving the walls excessively. The robot must not damage either the walls of the maze, or the floor. Any form of power is allowed as long as local laws do not require hearing protection in its presence or place any other limitations on it.

Each robot is to be run through the maze three times. The robot with the lowest single time is the winner. The maximum time allowed per run is 5 minutes. If a robot cannot finish in that amount of time, the run is stopped and the robot receives a time of 5 minutes. If no robot succeeds in finding the exit of the maze, the one which made it the farthest will be declared the winner, as determined by the contest's judge.

Each robot will make one run, proceeding until all robots have attempted the maze. Each robot then does a second run through the maze, then the robots all do the third run. Some discretion will be allowed by the judge if a contestant must delay their run due to technical difficulties. A robot may remember what it found on a previous run to try to improve its time (mapping the maze on the first run), and can use this information in subsequent runs-as long as the robot does this itself. It is not allowed to manually "configure" the robot through hardware or software as to the layout of the maze.