Husky Robotics (University of Washington)

Husky Robotics is a large, well-organised club with more than a hundred members, thirteen sponsors and a named lead for every subsystem. Its best URC finish is ninth, in 2017. Its two most recent finals were 29^th and 30^th, and the 2026 rover was the most feature-complete in its record: a six-wheel rocker-bogie, a six-axis arm, a custom dual-detection spectrometer and an autonomous carbon-fibre drone. It scored 85 in Science and zero in Delivery, Equipment Servicing and Autonomy.

Identity and results

The three finals before 2019 are tabulated separately because no mission split survives for them:

The 2016 event ran in two brackets, so its place is within the bracket rather than in the field S-URC-HISTRESULTS. The team registered for the 2023 and 2024 competitions and published a review film in 2024, but neither year has a finals result S-URC23-TEAMS S-URC24-TEAMS S-URC24-SCORES.

The trajectory runs from the top half of the field to the bottom quarter. Fourteenth in 2015, ninth in 2017, then 29^th in 2019 and 29^th and 30^th in the two most recent seasons.

A claim on the team’s About page deserves care. It lists “2^nd and 3^rd place finishes worldwide and consistent podium placements” including the Canadian and American events, and a summary panel reads “Global Rank 3^rd (CIRC 2024)” S-HUSKY-ABOUT. The Canadian claim is not contradicted by anything in the record. The American half is not supported by it: the best URC finish between 2013 and 2026 is ninth S-URC-HISTRESULTS. The most likely reading is that the podium refers to the Canadian event.

Rover generations

The team has used names only recently: Prometheus in 2025 and Daedalus in 2026, with an autonomous drone named Icarus S-HUSKY-SITE S-HUSKY-SAR2026. Earlier rovers are unnamed in every source, which makes cross-year comparison depend on the review films alone.

2025: Prometheus. A season in which the review and the science payload worked and the task missions did not: a review score of 91.21 and Science 77, beside Delivery 3, Equipment 17.6 and Autonomy 14 S-URC25-SCORES. The rover could analyse a sample and could not deliver one.

2026: Daedalus and Icarus. The team’s own summary of the vehicle is a “robust 6-wheel rocker-bogie suspension”, a “high-torque 6-DOF robotic arm”, a “custom dual-detection spectrometer” and an autonomous carbon-fibre drone S-HUSKY-SAR2026. Science rose to 85, the best in the record, while the three task missions went to zero S-URC26-SCORES.

Subsystems

Mobility. A six-wheel rocker-bogie suspension, per the team’s own summary S-HUSKY-SAR2026. Drive electronics exist as a board-level project and a separate brushless motor board with a dated season in its name S-HUSKY-GH. There is one contradiction in the record worth stating plainly: the drive project is named for a swerve drive and describes “the drive and swerve board”, while the rover is described as a rocker-bogie. Those are compatible only if the rover has some steerable module, or if the name is historical. The sources do not settle it S-HUSKY-GH S-HUSKY-SAR2026.

Arm. A six-axis arm described as high-torque, with two named arm leads and a hand board of its own in the electronics organisation S-HUSKY-SAR2026 S-HUSKY-GH. Reach, payload and actuator family are unpublished, and the arm’s mission scored zero in 2026.

Science. A custom dual-detection spectrometer S-HUSKY-SAR2026, supported by a science sensor board and an instrumentation group in the electrical organisation S-HUSKY-GH. This is the subsystem the team has improved most: 50.6, 77 and 85 across the three seasons with published mission scores.

Power. A battery management firmware project dated for the 2026–27 season, which is a more serious treatment of the pack than most teams publish S-HUSKY-GH. Chemistry, capacity and voltage are unpublished.

Communications. A communications board project for the 2026–27 season, and a bridge between the rover stack and the operator software S-HUSKY-GH. Radio band and power are unpublished.

Software. Two parallel codebases in C++ on ROS, a browser-based operator interface, a sensor and motor interface for a single-board computer, and a driver that talks to an open-source autopilot localisation stack S-HUSKY-GH. Two independent simulators sit alongside: a Gazebo environment for the ROS stack and a Unity environment for the operator experience S-HUSKY-GH. That mirrors what the strongest programmes in the field do, and it only pays off if the simulation and the rover are kept in step.

The drone. Icarus, described as an autonomous carbon-fibre aircraft S-HUSKY-SAR2026. Whether it flew at competition is unpublished, and the Delivery score of zero suggests it did not contribute.

Staffing. The 2026 review credits twelve named leads: an operational director, two mobility leads, a manufacturing lead, a drone lead, two arm leads, three instrumentation leads, an electronics lead and a software lead S-HUSKY-SAR2026. That is the most elaborate staffing structure in the census and it is worth reading beside the result.

Mission performance

2019: the shape appears early. A review score of 87.41 and Delivery 40, with Equipment Servicing at zero and Autonomy at 8 S-URC-HISTRESULTS. The servicing mission was already the hole seven years before the 2026 result.

2025: one mission working. Science 77 and a review score of 91.21, with Delivery 3, Equipment 17.6 and Autonomy 14 S-URC25-SCORES.

2026: the most extreme split in the field. Science 85, the team’s best, beside three zeros S-URC26-SCORES. A rover carrying a working spectrometer, a six-axis arm and a drone scored nothing in the three missions that require the arm to touch something or the rover to drive itself. The hardware appears to have existed; the score sheet says it did not work on the day.

The pattern across the three seasons is consistent enough to name. The payload and the written review are in good order, and every mission that depends on field integration or operator procedure is at or near zero. That is an integration and field-readiness failure rather than a component failure, and it is the same failure that appears at other teams with wide scope and short field time.

Lessons for a first build

• Scope is the first engineering decision. A drone, a six-axis arm, a custom spectrometer and an autonomy stack in one season create three integration risks where a mid-field team carries one. The 2026 result is what three simultaneous risks look like on a score sheet S-URC26-SCORES.
• A custom bus specification is a long commitment. A controller-area-network library with its own written specification and a firmware project per board is a mature architecture and a standing maintenance load for a student team S-HUSKY-GH.
• Two simulators need one owner. A physics simulator and an operator-experience simulator are both good, and they diverge unless the same person keeps them aligned with the rover.
• Name the drone only if it flies. An aircraft with a name and a carbon-fibre airframe appears in the review; whether it flew is unpublished, and its mission scored zero. A first build should be able to say what its aircraft did at the event.
• Keep the public claim equal to the score sheet. A podium claim that sits beside 29^th and 30^th is read by sponsors as well as by teams, and the official record is one click away S-HUSKY-ABOUT S-URC26-SCORES.

What remains uncertain

The mobility architecture is genuinely unresolved: a six-wheel rocker-bogie in the review summary and a drive board named for swerve in the electrical organisation. Mass, stowed dimensions, wheel diameter, motors, battery chemistry, radio and computer board are all unpublished. So is whether Icarus flew, and what specifically failed in the 2026 delivery and servicing runs.

Two administrative questions remain open. Why the 2023 and 2024 seasons produced registrations and a review film but no finals result is unexplained. And the podium claims on the About page need a Canadian results source to pin them to specific years.

Team sources

• huskyrobotics.me, the team site.
• About, size, sponsors and the team’s own record claims.
• huskyroboticsteam on GitHub, 30 archives covering boards, firmware, software and simulation.
• 2026 System Acceptance Review, the primary film for Daedalus and Icarus.
• 2025 System Acceptance Review, the Prometheus season.
• 2024 System Acceptance Review, a season with a film and no finals result.