You can view the entire Nova episode The Great Robot Race on the PBS website. It is all about the 2nd DARPA Grand Challenge Race, where autonomous vehicles race across the desert outside Las Vegas. Cool stuff!
[tags]Robots,DARPA Grand Challenge[/tags]
From the Make blog, an ingenious inventor has created a waffle making robot.
And now, to impress my wife and her coworkers who are astounded at my useless ability to quote Futurama on any subject…. Item #4.
Leela: “Fry?? He’s.. he’s dead!”
Bender: “Oh, who will make Bender waffles just the way he likes them now?”
This Make post links to a cool IBM developerworks article on quick prototyping of robots. Many cool nuggest, including the use of cardboard to prototype robot chassis.
I ran across a reference to the patent on the wheel system used by NASA in their Mars Rovers, and thought that Patent 4,840,394 - Articulated Suspension System might be worth noting for future examination.
A vehicle is provided which maintains a substantially constant weight, and therefore traction, on all wheels despite one wheel moving considerably higher or lower than the others, while avoiding a very soft spring suspenson.
Lem Fugitt has a nice robotics blog, and found my pictures of Robogames 2005. He nicely linked from his blog, so I thought I’d return the favor while tooting my own horn. His blog is cool too, wander around.
Keeping with today’s theme of robotics, here is a cool reconfigurable robot that I found courtesy of Engadget. It’s a cool bot, constructed from a large number of identical modules which can connect to one another and provide a wide varity of mobility options.
Well, just got back from a day of watching robot combat at the Robogames competition in at San Francisco State. It continues tomorrow. You can look at my gallery of photos, and maybe even watch a Quicktime of a poor Robosapien competing in an event.
For those of you interested in robotics, this weekend is a veritable feast. In addition to the previously mentioned Robogames, this weekend is the Silicon Valley Regional FIRST Competition at San Jose State. It’s free, and sounds like fun. You can look at the agenda here. If you aren’t in the San Jose area, you could try looking at this list of 2005 Regional Events.
RoboGames (formerly ROBOlympics) is going to be held this weekend in San Francisco! How did I let this sneak up on me? II’ll have to shell out my $20 and go at least one of the days. Stay tuned for a report!
If you’ve got your copy of Make, you know what this is all about.
Well, yesterday’s voyage to various Silicon Valley surplus locations didn’t yield many very many good buys, so my robot project is still proceeding rather slowly. I did pick up some alligator clips and scavenged the batteries out of my maglight, and gave them a test. Voila!, and and in reverse. Somewhere I heard that these motors were asymmetric, and ran at a different speed in one direction compared to the other, but as you can see, it’s pretty close. I don’t think I’m going to worry about it.
At 4.5 volts, the motors run somewhere around 40 rpms and pull about 1.5-1.7 amps. They also run pretty quiet, so I don’t think I’ll have many problems with noise.
The motors that I ordered from American Science and Surplus arrived this morning. I got a pair of Trico windshield wiper motors, originally destined for installation in a Saturn, but now pinched to serve a more noble purpose. Haven’t powered ‘em up yet, next stop: a deep cycle battery or gel cell.
Nothing like the smell of fresh grease to get those creative juices flowing.
Glancing around the surplus market yielded the following computer which seems like it would be entirely capable of driving my as yet unstarted robotics project.
Dell Optiplex GX1 PIII 450Mhz./ 128MB/ 6GB/ CD(Desktop)
I found out that tigersurplus has the same sort of systems for less money, but it’s about the same when you add in shipping. I think I’ll travel down south and have a gander at one of these this weekend.
Well, in an effort to push my as-yet unstarted robotics project forward, I decided to begin as I always do: by spending money! I ordered two windshield wiper motors from American Science and Surplus which I hope will do for powering my little robotic minion around. I’ll have to do an evaluation of their power before I set too many more design parameters, but they should be good enough to push a fairly good sized little bot around.
Now, I need to line up some 12v batteries and a charger, dust off my ammeter, and think about a test rig.
Addendum: I found this page which details a lot of the tests you can do on motors to help establish your robots overall performance characteristics. Good stuff.
Today’s book recommendation is Brad Graham and Kathy McGowan’s Build Your Own All-Terrain Robot. Brad and Kathy are the authors of a book which was highly recommended to me, Atomic Zombie’s Bicycle Builder’s Bonanza. I’m not all that interested in building strange bicycles, but robots, hey, that seems like more up my alley.
I’ve got quite a few books that concentrate on making robots which are little more than toys, but I was beginning to think of a bit grander project: a robot that could navigate outside over realistic if not rugged terrain. And this book delivers! It gives detailed descriptions of two different robotics projects, and tells you what you really need to know to get going. You won’t find chapters entitled “how to solder” or “PIC assembly code”, but you will find lots of information on finding the right motors, batteries, how to design and fabricate a welded steel frame, how to get it all working with remote control, and how to mount cameras and even a FRS radio to allow you to see what your ROV is doing.
Great book, highly recommended.