Lessons Menu:

• Lesson 1 – Getting Started
• Lesson 2 - Choosing a Robotic Platform
• Lesson 3 - Making Sense of Actuators
• Lesson 4 - Understanding Microcontrollers
• Lesson 5 - Choosing a Motor Controller
• Lesson 6 - Understanding Communication Methods
• Lesson 7 - Using Sensors
• Lesson 8 - Getting the Right Tools
• Lesson 9 - Assembling a Robot
• Lesson 10 - Programming a Robot

Choosing a Robotic Platform

Following the first lesson, you now have a basic understanding of what a robot is and what current robots normally do.

Now, it is time to decide on the type if robot you are going to build. A custom robot design often starts with a “vision” of what the robot will look like and what it will do. The types of robots possible are unlimited, though the more popular are:

• Land wheeled, tracked, and legged robots
• Aerial planes, helicopters, and blimp
• Aquatic boats, submarines, and swimming robots
• Misc. and mixed robots
• Stationary robot arms, and  manipulators

This lesson is intended to help you decide what type of robot to build to best suite your mission. Since you have brainstormed on what tasks or functions you want it to accomplish (after lesson 1),  you can now choose the type of robot that will best suite your needs. Below, you will find a description of all the major robot types.

Land

Land-based robots, especially the wheeled ones,  are the most popular mobile robots among beginners as they usually require the least investment while providing significant exposure to robotics. On the other hand, the most complex type of robots is the humanoid (akin to a human), as it requires many degrees of freedom and synchronizing the motion of many motors, and uses many sensors.

Wheeled Robots

Wheels are by far the most popular method of providing mobility to a robot and are used to propel many different sized robots and robotic platforms. Wheels can be just about any size, from a few centimetres  up to 30 cm and more . Tabletop robots tend to have the smallest wheels, usually less than 5 cm in diameter. Robots can have just about any number of wheels, although 3 and 4 are the most common. Normally a three-wheeled robot uses two wheels and a caster at one end. More complex two wheeled robots may use gyroscopic stabilization. It is rare that a wheeled robot use anything but skid steering (like that of a tank). Rack and pinion steering such as that found on a car requires too many parts and its complexity and cost outweigh most of its advantages.

Four and six wheeled robots have the advantage of using multiple drive motors (one connected to each wheel) which reduces slip. Also, omni-directional wheels or mecanum wheels, used properly, can give the robot significant mobility advantages. A common misconception about building a wheeled robot is that large, low-cost DC motors can propel a medium sized robot. As we will see later in this series, there is a lot more involved than just a motor.

Advantages

• Usually low-cost compared to other methods
• Simple design and construction
• Abundance of choice
• Six wheels or more rival a track system
• Excellent choice for beginners

Disadvantages

• May lose traction (slip)
• Small contact area (only a small rectangle or line underneath each wheel is in contact with the ground)

Tracked Robots

Tracks (or treads) are what tanks use. Although tracks do not provide added “force” (torque), they do reduce slip and more evenly distribute the weight of the robot, making them useful for loose surfaces such as sand and gravel. Also, a track system with some flexibility can better conform to a bumpy surface. Finally, most people tend to agree that tank tracks add an “aggressive” look to the robot as well.

Advantages

• Constant contact with the ground prevents slipping that might occur with wheels
• Evenly distributed weight helps your robot tackle a variety of surfaces
• Can be used to significantly increase a robot’s ground clearance without incorporating a larger drive wheel

Disadvantages

• When turning, there is a sideways force that acts on the ground; this can cause damage to the surface the robot is being used on, and cause the tracks to wear
• Not many different tracks are available (robot is usually constructed around the tracks)
• Drive sprocket might significantly limit the number of motors that can be used.
• Increased mechanical complexity (idler placement and number, # of links) and connections

Legs

An increasing number of robots use legs for mobility. Legs are often preferred for robots that must navigate on very uneven terrain. Most amateur robots are designed with six legs, which allow the robot to be statically balanced (balanced at all times on 3 legs); robots with fewer legs are harder to balance. The latter require “dynamic stability”, meaning that if the robot stops moving mid-stride, it might fall over. Researchers have experimented with monopod (one legged “hopping”) designs, though bipeds (two legs), quadrupeds (four legs), and hexapods (six legs) are the  most popular.

Advantages

• Closer to organic or natural motion
• Can potentially overcome large obstacles and navigate very rough terrain

Disadvantages

• Increased mechanical, electronic and coding complexity (not the easiest way to get into robotics).
• Lower battery size despite increased power demands
• Higher cost to build

Air

A AUAV (Autonomous Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) is very appealing and is entirely within the capability of many robot enthusiasts. However, the advantages of building an autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles, especially if you are a beginner, have yet to outweigh the risks.  When considering an aerial vehicle, most hobbyists still use existing commercial remote controlled aircraft. On the professional side, aircraft such as the US military Predator were initially semi-autonomous though in recent years Predator aircraft have flown missions autonomously.

Advantages

• Remote controlled aircraft have been in existence for decades (so there is a large community, at least for the mechanics)
• Excellent for surveillance

Disadvantages

• The entire investment can be lost in one crash.
• Limited robotic community to provide help for autonomous control

Water

An increasing number of hobbyists, institutions and companies are developing unmanned underwater vehicles. There are many obstacles yet to overcome to make underwater robots attractive to the wider robotic community though in recent years, several companies have commercialized pool cleaning “robots”. Underwater vehicles can use ballast (compressed air and flooded compartments), thrusters, tail and fins or even wings to submerge. Other aquatic robots such as pool cleaners are useful commercial products.

Advantages

• Most of our planet is water, so there is a lot to explore and discover
• Design is almost guaranteed to be unique
• Can be used and/or tested in a pool

Disadvantages

• Robot can be lost many ways (sinking, leaking, entangled…)
• Most electronic parts do not like water (also consider water falling on electronics when accessing the robot after a dive)
• Surpassing depths of 10m or more can require significant research and investment
• Very limited robotic community to provide help
• Limited wireless communication options

Miscellaneous and hybrid combinations

Your idea for a robot may not fall nicely into any of the above categories or may be comprised of several different functional sections. Note again that this guide is intended for mobile robots as opposed to stationary or permanently fixed designs (other than robotic arms and grippers). It is wise to consider when building a hybrid design, to use a modular design (each functional part can be taken off and tested separately). Miscellaneous designs can include hovercraft, snake-like designs, turrets and more.

Advantages

• Designed and built to meet specific needs
• Multi-tasking and can be comprised of modules
• Can lead to increased functionality and versatility

Disadvantages

• Possible Increased complexity and cost
• Often times, parts must be custom designed and built

Arms & Grippers

Although these do not fall under the category of mobile robotics, the field of robotics essentially started with arms and end-effectors (devices that attach to the end of an arm such as grippers, electromagnets etc). Arms and grippers are the best way for a robot to interact with the environment it is exploring. Simple robot arms can have just one motion, while more complex arms can have a dozen or more unique degrees of freedom.

Advantages

• Very simple to very complex design possibilities
• Easy to make a 3 or 4 degree of freedom robot arm (two joints and turning base)

Disadvantages

• Stationary unless mounted on a mobile platform
• Cost to build is proportional to lifting capability

Practical Example

In our case, we have opted for building a robot that will provide the maximum exposure to robotics. A programmable tracked platform that can accommodate a variety of sensors and gripper sees ideal in this case, specially since we consider tank tracks  are far cooler than wheels.

In order to keep the costs down, we opted to build a small desktop robot that will be able to roam indoors and on tabletops. We also have taken into consideration the fact that there are not many tracks available, and to keep things simple, we’ll only consider a single drive sprocket and single idler sprocket system, this should not be a problem since the robot will be very light weight.

The preliminary CAD below summarized the features describes so far.

Next, we will be choosing the right actuators (e.g. motors) for your robot.

Lessons Menu:

• Lesson 1 – Getting Started
• Lesson 2 - Choosing a Robotic Platform
• Lesson 3 - Making Sense of Actuators
• Lesson 4 - Understanding Microcontrollers
• Lesson 5 - Choosing a Motor Controller
• Lesson 6 - Understanding Communication Methods
• Lesson 7 - Using Sensors
• Lesson 8 - Getting the Right Tools
• Lesson 9 - Assembling a Robot
• Lesson 10 - Programming a Robot

Getting Started

Welcome to the first installment of the Grand RobotShop Tutorial, a series of 10 lessons that will teach you how to make your own robot. This tutorial is aimed at anybody willing to get started in robotics and have a basic understanding of terms such as “voltage”, “current”, “motor”, and “sensors”. Although this might seem pretty basic, even people with previous robot building experience might find useful information regarding the general method of building a robot.

What is a robot?

There are many definitions of robot and no real consensus has been attained so far. We loosely define a robot as follows:

Robot: An electromechanical device which is capable of reacting in some way to its environment, and take autonomous decisions or actions in order to achieve a specific task.

This means that a toaster, a lamp, or a car  would not be considered as robots since they have no way of perceiving their environment. On the other hand, a vacuum cleaner that can navigate around a room, or a solar panel that seeks the sun, can be considered as a robotic system.

It is also important to note that the  “robots” featured in Robot Wars for instance or any solely remote controlled device would not fall under this definition and would be closer to a more complex remote controlled car.

Although this definition is quite general, it might need to evolve in the future in order to keep up with the latest advancement in the field. In order to get a sens of how robotics is rapidly growing, we suggest you take a look at the RobotShop History of Robotics.

Let’s get started

This series of tutorials is intended to guide you through the steps of building a complete mobile robot.

There are 10 lessons that will be released in the following 10 weeks.  Each lesson guides you through one step of making a general-purpose mobile robot.  This will enable you to build your very own mobile robot in order to perform a task of your choice. Each lesson will be illustrated with an example from RobotShop experience in producing the RobotShop Rover. The lessons are intended to be read one after the other and build upon the information gained.

STEP 1

The first step is to determine what your robot should do (i.e. what is its purpose in life). Robots can be used in almost any situation and are primarily intended to help humans in some way. If you are unsure of what you want your robot to do or simply want to concentrate your efforts on specific tasks, here are some ideas:

Knowledge & Learning

In order to build increasingly complex robots, most professionals and hobbyists use knowledge they have acquired when building previous robots. Instead of building one robot, you can learn how to use individual components with the objective of building your own “knowledge library” to use to undertake a larger, more complex design in the future.

Amusement & Companionship

Building a robot is in and of itself is fun and exciting. Robotics incorporates aspects of many disciplines including engineering (mechanical, electrical, computer), sciences (mathematics and physics) and arts (aesthetics) and users are free to use their imagination. Amusing others with your creations (especially if they are user-friendly and interactive) helps others to become interested in the field.

Competitions & Contests

Competitions give the project design guidelines and a due date. They also put your robot against others in the same class and test your design and construction skills. Although many competitions are specifically for students (elementary to university), there also exist open competitions where adults and professionals alike can compete.

Autonomous life form

Humans are natural creators and innovators. The next great innovation will be to develop a fully autonomous life form that rivals or surpasses ourselves in ability and perhaps creativity. This goal is still being accomplished in small steps by individuals, research organizations and professionals.

Domestic or Professional tasks

Domestic robots help liberate people from unpleasant or dangerous tasks and give them more liberty and security. Professional and Service Robots are used in a variety of applications at work, in public, in hazardous environments, in locations such as deep-sea, battlefields and space, just to name a few. In addition to the service areas such as cleaning, surveillance, inspection and maintenance, we utilize these robots where manual task execution is dangerous, impossible or unacceptable.  Professional and Service Robots are more capable, rugged and often more expensive than domestic robots and are ideally suited for professional and/or commercial use.

Security and Surveillance

Most mobile robots are used to venture into areas where humans either should not or cannot go. Robots of various sizes (either remote controlled, semi-autonomous or fully autonomous) are an ideal choice for these tasks.

Practical Example

We anticipate that most of you following this guide have the objective of building a robot for learning and knowledge, but also for sheer fun; though many will have a specific idea or project they want to materialize.

The last major consideration is budget. It is difficult to know exactly what people have in mind when they build their first robot; one might already want to build an autonomous snow removal robot, while another simply wants to make an intelligent clock. A simple programmable mobile robot might cost about $100 while a more complex can be several thousands of dollars.

In this exercise, we have chosen to make a mobile platform in order to get an understanding of motors, sensors, microcontrollers and programming, and to include a variety of sensors. We’ll keep the budget to about $200 to $300 since we want it to be fairly complete.

See you next week when we discuss how to chose the best type of robotic platform for your needs.

The DFRobotShop Rover is a versatile mobile robot tank based on the popular Arduino Duemilanove.  It incorporates all the Duemilanove features (since it uses a surface mount ATMega328),  including shield compatibility, and is supplemented with (1) an on-board DC step-up that allows it to be easily powered from small power sources such as AA batteries,  (2) a dual H-bridge DC-motor controller (L293B), and (3) an APC220 and Bluetooth serial interface connector for telemetry and radio control. As an addition it also features a temperature and light sensors that can be readily connected to analog inputs on the ATMega328 for immediate use. This Arduino-compatible platform rides on the popular Tamiya twin motor gearbox and the Tamiya track and wheel set.  This created a low-cost traction system that has been tested to carry over 2 kg without issues.

- Robotshop Blog

Let us know what would you like to do with this very cool Arduino tank.

Via RobotShop Blog.

He is using the Mindsesors Multiplexer for NXT Motors coupled with an Arduino Compatible Seeeduino in order to control a small robot made from Lego NXT parts, read NXT encoders, and more.  The code for the Arduino can be found in the NXT I2C Devices For Arduino Project Page.

The possibilities that this enables are almost endless.  Especially when considering that now Arduino Shields can be used in order to extend the capabilities of the Lego NXT parts.

Via RobotShop Blog.

Oleg put together this pretty neat robotic arm that he can control using a standard USB mouse. He used a Lynxmotion robotic arm with a wrist upgrade, an Arduino as the brain, a USB Host shield in order to interface a regular computer mouse, and a custom made servo motor controller.

This is a rather clever design and, as shown in the video below, all the degrees of freedom of the arm can be controlled by combining the motion of the mouse and the scroll wheel, and the clicking of the mouse buttons.

Via Hack a Day (via Circuits@Home)

I’m pleased to bring GoRobotics an exclusive interview with Angelica Lim of Kyoto University. When I first started writing here at GoRobotics, one of my goals that I stated was to bring more compelling academic research to the general public and enthusiasts because behind lots of jargon and hidden in some grad student’s lab somewhere is a robot waiting for it’s chance in the spotlight.

Let’s get right into things with Angelica.

How did you end up a roboticist? Was it a childhood dream?

I had no idea I wanted to be a roboticist when I was a kid. It started when I was on exchange in France, doing a year of Computer Science classes at the University of Nice. One of our projects was to pick amongst research topics proposed by faculty members, and “Build a Data Server for an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV)” was one of them. I ended up choosing that on a whim, and our team did a pretty good job coding it up in C++ under her specs. I got called back the next year to help integrate it with a real “live” AUV for a competition in England, and I was hooked. I liked it so much that I put together the robotics team back home in Canada. That was my second robotics competition – hopefully not my last!

How did you end up in Japan working on robots?
The main reason I wanted to come to Japan was simply because the hardware is much more advanced and easy to acquire. Full-size humanoid research platforms have been out in Japan for almost a decade. Only now are companies like Willow Garage starting to gain traction in North America.

On a more personal level, I also felt like my research options would be limited in North America. In the US, robotics research is heavily funded by the military, and therefore it seemed to me, at least that my research would have to conform to very serious and grave goals in order to gain funding. In Japan, robotics applications sound less like “Big Dog” and more like “RIBA Nurse Robot” and “Fan Dancing Robots” . I prefer the Japanese outlook on a future with robots. Does that make sense?

More after the jump …

It does. It sounds like you want the application of robots to be a wholesome augmentation of society rather than something that has the potential to destroy our planet any further than we have already.

To more specifically answer your question as to how I managed to get to Japan – I found a scholarship that sends Canadians to Japan to do research, and boom! Here I am.

What lab are you with and what kind of research does it work on?
I’m with Kyoto University’s Speech and Media Processing lab. Nowhere in the title does it say “robots”, but I can assure you that over half the group works with them in some way. One sub-team works on Human-Robot Interaction, doing research such as robot learning using neural networks. Another does Speech Processing and Robot Audition: giving robots speech comprehension and production abilities. The third group does music research, such as taking a CD recording, extracting parts and synthesizing new instruments. My group is a fusion of the music team and the robot team. We do research on music robots.

What project are you on specifically?
We’re developing a theremin-playing robot that has adaptive abilities. It can play with humans and understand gestures to play on command, and that is the project I am currently hands-on with. The robot can also listen to another player (for example, a drummer) and adapt its playing to their rhythm. It is a music robot that can watch and listen to the people it’s playing with. This, I have to say, is an ability that many human musicians still have yet to learn.

If you can get a robot doing that before the kids in band class, I’m going to be impressed.

What is your favorite thing about your current project?

I’m a flute player, and I have a pile of duet music that I’ve been dying to try out with someone. My favorite thing about my current project is that late at night I can head into the robot lab and jam with the robot.

What conferences have you presented your work on this project to, and how was the reception?
I presented my gesture recognition work last month in Tokyo at a Japan-wide conference on technology. The attendees seemed to really like the idea of using gesture recognition to guide the music robot. We don’t often realize the unconscious physical gestures that we use, not just in music, but in every day life. One attendee noted that it’s not just robotics or music research we touch on here, but a more fundamental, ethnographic question – how do humans communicate? To give robots this gesture recognition capability, we must first understand what exactly what we’re doing ourselves.

How do you think what you’re working on will become useful to the world? What do you hope it will be used for?
At conferences, our work typically falls under the category of “entertainment robots”. At first glance, it seems like our work is somehow less impressive for that reason, as intuitively this does not seem immediately useful to most people. Why would we want robots to entertain us? Wouldn’t you rather have a human play music instead of a robot? There’s no way they could play as well, etc. Well, I’d like to think on a longer scale and about the bigger picture as this field develops.

In Japan, the idea of having “robot companions” is very exciting, especially for the elderly population. There just aren’t enough young volunteers or workers to care for them on more than a just basic level. The brain needs exercise and stimulating interaction, particularly for those recovering from neurological impairment or deterioration, such as in the case of a stroke. A robot that can play chess, perform Bach, or do magic tricks wouldn’t just be an “entertainment robot”, it could actually be a tireless therapeutic device.

If you had to pick other research than your own lab, what research or robot out there do you think is really cool? What do you think Go Robotics should be keeping an eye on?
I’m really interested in the programming by demonstration research paradigm.

For example, Aude Billard’s group out at Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne in Switzerland has made a robot that learns how to cook by imitation as well as a robot that can play ping pong.

The start-up Aldebaran Robotics in France is also taking leaps forward with their miniature robot system named Nao. Eventually, once they work out the bugs on the small-scale version, they’re planning on developing a human-sized version with the same functionality!

What do you think is the most common misconception people have about robots?
“Robots will take over the world. Stop giving the robots intelligence; they’ll use it against us!”

I think that people are fooled into thinking how intelligent robots are based on on the great YouTube videos that come out every other week. The reality is, it looks real, and we are trying very hard to have robots pass the Turing Test (ie. when we can’t tell the difference between a robot and a human.) But, looking and seeming intelligent and actually being intelligent are very different. Even more compelling is looking and seeming conscious compared to the idea of being conscious. My tip is: don’t be fooled! They are about as conscious as your car or microwave.

Thanks again to Angelica for taking the time from her busy schedule to talk to us about her world of robots and especially for giving us some compelling developments to watch going forward. Pass this interview along to your friends, because you’re not going to find it anywhere else.

Via: Online Schools

The past few months have been a lot of fun, with us giving away nearly $750 dollars of awesome robot prizes. But, we’re not done yet! April is the official 10 year anniversary of GoRobotics.net and we’ve saved the best prizes for last! This month we’ll be giving away over $1,000 dollars of prizes from our sponsors Pololu, Zagros Robotics, Solarbotics , Vex Robotics, Apress, and No Starch Press. Our sponsors have been incredibly generous and we hope to be able to offer more contests in the future.

The final robot giveaway is going to be a little tougher to enter than previous contests. This is only fair because we’ve got some awesome prizes and we have confidence that you, our faithful readers, will rise to the challenge. To enter this month’s contest, post a link in the comments to a project that you’ve built. It can be a link to your own website, a forum, or something similar, but we suggest adding your project to RobotBox and posting a link to that (shameless promotion, natch!). One entry per person, so pick your best project.

Here’s how the prizes will be awarded:

1. First prize goes to our favorite project. Favorite will be voted on by a panel of folks TBA.

2. Second prize goes to the second place favorite.

3. Third prize goes to a randomly selected project – this means there’s no excuse for you not to submit your project no matter how “good” you think it is!

The contest ends April 30th, at 12AM EST. Comments are moderated to prevent spam. Your comment won’t show up till the moderator has approved it.

Prizes:

Grand Prize Vex Dual Controller Starter Bundle with RobotC (donated by Vex Robotics), Pololu Jrk 21v3 USB Motor Controller (donated by Pololu), Build Your Own CNC Machine (donated by Apress), LEGO Mindstorms NXT One-Kit Wonders (donated by No Starch Press). ($605 total!)

The GoRobotics 10 year birthday giveaway Grand Prize is a complete Vex Robotics Dual Controller Starter Bundle with RobotC included! Vex has done a fabulous job of creating a unique and powerful robotics development system that is used across the globe in several popular robotics competitions for high school and middle school students. This prize includes everything you need to get started constructing amazing robotic creations. It includes the basic Protobot Robot Kit with over 300 parts and plans for building two robots. It also comes with a microcontroller and RobotC for autonomous creations, and a transmitter and receiver pair for RC ‘bots. Note: Because of the receiver/transmitter this kit can only be shipped in the US.

Along with the Vex Robotics system, the Grand Prize winner will also win a Jrk 21V3 USB Motor Controller from Pololu. It is a highly configurable brushed DC motor controller that supports four input modes – USB, serial, analog voltage and RC control. It can be used with closed-loop feedback for speed or position control, or as an open-loop controller. It can continuously supply 3A from 8v – 28v.

Build Your Own CNC Machine is the book to get you started in fabricating your own parts. CNC expert Patrick Hood-Daniel and best-selling author James Kelly team up to show you how to construct your very own CNC machine for about $500 - $1000 USD. Then they go on to show you how to use it, how to document your designs in Computer-Aided Design programs, and how to output your designs as specifications and tool paths that feed into the CNC machine, controlling it as it builds whatever parts your imagination can dream up.

2nd Place Prize - Parallax Penguin Robot , Extreme NXT (donated by Apress),  Wall Hugging Mouse Kit (donated by Zagros Robotics), LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Thinking Robots (donated by No Starch Press) ($268 total!)

The Penguin Robot by Parallax is a unique walking robot. Using two micro servos and precisely CNC machined parts, the robot can walk via a tilt-stride action gait. The cute little penguin comes equipped with a digital compass to track its heading, two photoresistors for sensing ambient light and light tracking, and two infrared emitters and a detector for obstacle avoidance. The Penguin Robot comes with a 7-segment LED indicator and a piezo buzzer for making sound. This is a great kit for getting into robotics, and you should set aside about 4 hours to assemble him.

Extreme NXT shows you how to advance the NXT with more than 45 exciting projects that include creating a cool magic wand that writes words in thin air, building a remotely guided vehicle, and constructing sophisticated robots that can sense color, light, temperature, and more. All projects are explained with easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions, so you’ll be able to create them successfully whether you’re a novice or an expert. This book also shows you how to expand the programming software and use the alternative language NXC.

The Wall Hugging Mouse uses a simple two-motor system to scurry along the wall. It is quick and easy to assemble and makes great kit for kids to try out.

3rd Place Prize – Oomlout Arduino Experimenters Kit (donated by Solarbotics), Practical Arduino and LEGO Mindstorms NXT 2.0: The Kings Treasure (donated byApress), and The Unofficial LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Inventor’s Guide (donated by No Starch Press) ($165 total!)

The Arduino Experimenters kit from Oomlout comes with 11 electronic experiments along with all of the hardware to implement them. It comes with breadboard overlay cards to clearly illustrate where everything hooks up. Items in the kit include an Arduino Duemilanove, wire, LEDs, DC motor, a servo, speakers, buttons, a temperature sensor, and several others. This is an excellent way to get introduced to Arduino, microcontrollers, electronics and a little programming.

To go along with the Arduino Experimenters Kit, we’ve included the book Practical Arduino: Cool Projects for Open Source Hardware, by Jonathan Oxer and Hugh Blemings, which will tech you how to create your own Arduino-based designs, learn the arduino programming language, and will guide you through many practical projects from home automation to test equipment. This book is for hobbyists and developers interested in physical computing using a low-cost, easy-to-learn platform.

LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT 2.0: The King’s Treasure is written for children ages 10 and up who want to learn to design, build, and operate robots using LEGO’s immensely popular MINDSTORMS NXT 2.0 robotics kit. The book leads readers through a series of five projects centered on an engaging story line. It can be read by kids alone, or it can provide the spark for a wonderful series of parent/child activities.

The LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT set is a very powerful robotics toolkit, but it lacks a detailed user’s guide. This is the user’s guide that every MINDSTORMS owner needs. The Unofficial LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Inventor’s Guide begins by introducing the NXT set and directing the reader through setup. Following this is an in-depth discussion of the set’s electronic elements and other LEGO pieces as well as building techniques. Next, it covers the NXT-G programming environment and introduces several unofficial programming languages, providing examples of code and programming insights along the way. Finally, it presents a method for designing NXT robots in addition to a series of projects with building and programming instructions for creating complete robots.

Rules/Regulations/Fine Print:

• To enter the contest, you must comment on this post and include a link to a project you’ve built.
• First place winner must reside in the US (due to restrictions on shipping the receiver in the Vex kit). If the winner is out side the US, he/she can choose to take the 2nd place prize instead.
• Giveaway ends April 30th, at 12AM EST (9PM PST)
• One prize package per winner.
• No purchase is necessary to enter the contest. it’s free!
• Everyone is eligible, but shipping is free to only those in the Continental US: if you are outside this area, you will have to pay for shipping.
• PayPal is required to pay for shipping if you live out of the Continental US
• Winners will be contacted via email supplied in the comment form.
• You have 48 hrs to respond to the email and choose your prize package.
• GoRobotics.net makes NO WARRANTY or GUARANTEES about these prizes.
• GoRobotics.net can change the rules WHENEVER IT WANTS.

Special Thanks to Our Sponsors! BUY STUFF FROM THEM:

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The M3-Neony and M3-Synchy were developed as baby bots aimed at testing machine learning software, and specifically to take a look at fine motor skill development. The hardware on this adorable little bot are some typical cameras, a microphone, gyro, accelerometer, and tactile sensors.

I heard about the M3–neony and M3-synchy through this Engadget article but I was disappointed the coverage was so scant. When I began blogging for GoRobotics, I mentioned briefly my loved for HCI, and in particular human-robot interaction – naturally, this article inspired me enough for a second article today. But, as I was excited reading about it, it looks like the article only mentions briefly the research goals of the bots. There is, however, a lot of information about what was used to make them for you gearheads out there. I’m going to comb to find the Japanese lab site if I can, in the meantime here is what’s available so far:

This article at Plastic Pals seems to have more detailed specs on these two robots. The article is long, but features more detailed specs on the bot:

[...] it is 50cm (19.6″) tall, weighs about 3.5kg (7.7 lbs) – about the size of a newborn.  A pair of CMOS cameras for sight and microphones for hearing, as well as gyro and accelerometer sensors, and tactile sensors provide various feedback. The robot has a total of 22 degrees of freedom, powered by high torque (41kg/cm) servo motors sold by Osaka-based robotics company Vstone.

The main focus is on facial expressions and arm gestures, so it is an upper body robot only, with 17 DOF (2 eyes x3, neck x3, waist x2, 2 arms x3), measuring 30cm (12″) tall and weighing 2.5kg (5.5 lbs). The head is equipped with a single wide-angle lens CCD camera, two microphones, a speaker, and 15 LEDs which cause the robot to blush bright red.  Combined with object recognition, speech recognition, and speech synthesis, the robot will be able to communicate in a variety of ways.  The chest and arms appear to be based on Vstone’s Robovie-X hobby robot kit.

If anyone finds out more about what kind of tactile sensors are involved, I’d love to hear about it. Tactile sensors aren’t something I hear about a lot and I’d love to put together an article on what’s out there.

You can catch a video here, and do check out the Plastic Pals article – they have a great gallery of these baby bots.

Gåågle - It’s not as weird to pronounce as you’d think. It’s actually pronounced like Google and you’ll begin to see why soon enough. Gåågle Bot is a modified remote-control Roomba that bears a webcam, fueled by real-time AJAX calls that zips around taking pictures and indexing the real world as it sees it. Vacuum, index. I love efficiency!

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The name GåågleBot is a play on the words gÃ¥ and google bot. The Swedish word for go is gåå. Googlebot, is the name of Google’s web indexer. If you don’t know what Google is, you are either lying or out of luck. Hence GåågleBot is a “going” indexer, indexing the real world around us while vacuuming your home at the same time! Can’t find that library book that is due tomorrow? Relax, just Gåågle it!

Excited about this bot? Head over here and give it a try. There is also a pretty nifty video as well showing the bot in action. The main site has all of the components listed, the source code, and other tidbits to get you started building your own remote-control crawler.

The meat of today’s article is MIT’s MeBot.

MIT's MeBot

MIT has a pretty established humanoid robotics lab, meaning they’re at the forefront of our latent dreams to one day have cyborgs and robots walk the streets with our fellow man. (Call it whimsy, call it crazy, but I’m looking forward to an increasing number of robots in society. ) Anybody interested in robotics already knows of the legacy that MIT has for it’s robotics development, including Kismet – a rather impressive early attempt at robot-human social interaction (you can find more about Kismet here), and Cog – another human-robot interaction experiment that followed the reasoning that Cog should be able to learn from interacting with humans (more information about Cog here). MeBot comes to us from the Personal Robotics Lab.

Telerobotics is the area of robotics development concerned with – you probably guessed it – remote-control robots. The overarching idea of the field is that work needs to be done at a distance in some situations in life, and telerobotics is here to aim to answer those challenges.

The robot was presented at the Human-Robot Interaction conference in Osaka, Japan. Putting an OQO atop for a head plus some gesturing arms into the mix, it adds depth to the notion that you could really be there, and with a decent range of motion, rolling down the halls of MIT. Remotely. Via a robot.

The proposal here is that this mode allows the user to be more engaged through the movement of the head and arms. The head tracks  the face of of the user so that it can ‘look around’. The arms are moved by a set of hand-operated controls.

Gulper AUV Sub-Aquatic Robot

The group explains that it has ‘trained’ the robot to retrieve the highest-quality information back to them.

“We tell it, ‘here’s the range of tasks that we want you to perform’, and it goes off and assesses what is happening in the ocean, making decisions about how much of the range it will cover to get back the data we want.” says Dr Maughan of MBARI.

The Gulper AUV is used to help scientists keep tabs on various algae. In particular, these scientists are keeping watch for algae blooms that could means problems for the ecosystem.

It used to be the case that a ship would be sent out for a whole day every few weeks to retrieve the kind of information that the Gulper AUV can nab in one of its trips. They just take it out to the harbor, and away it goes on its mission. Around twenty-four hours later, it comes back, they hoist it away, and analyze the results.

The biggest flag to go off in my mind is that this must require some interesting exploration and path planning algorithms to deal with an undersea environment. Taking a look at MBARI’s website, the Gulper AUV is equipped with four sonar that operate simultaneously to provide a fantastic map of the sea floor in high resolution.

The multibeam sonar produces high-resolution bathymetry (analogous to topography on land), the sidescan sonars produce imagery based on the intensity of the sound energy’s reflections, and the subbottom profiler penetrates sediments on the seafloor, allowing the detection of layers within the sediments, faults, and depth to the basement rock. All components are rated to 6000 m depth. The vehicle is launched on programmed missions and runs on its own battery power until it returns to the ship, as programmed, for recovery – MBARI AUV Mapping Page

Head over to the article at BBC to hear an audio snippet about the Gulper AUV. it’s about halfway down the page. If you think that’s cool, then you’d also better head over to the AUV’s home page at MBARI to check out the technical goods.

In what has been an ongoing controversial move in the United Kingdom, police forces all over the nation will be able to draw on unmanned air drone robots for surveillance support. The units are remote-controlled and equipped with thermal imaging units, and they’ll set you back about $30,500. So far there is only one unit seeing action in the UK, and it’s already getting publicity for helping the police do their job.

The Merseyside police who happened to be lucky enough to have one of these $30,500 drones flicked on the thermal imaging on a tip that a suspected car thief was somewhere in the neighborhood. They managed to pinpoint the suspect from about three hundred meters away, and their actions also eventually led to the arrest of a second suspect shortly thereafter. Sky News has the coverage over here.

A young man was caught and arrested for breaking a law, which makes this a good day for robotics, and a good case for robots in a pragmatic, practical role. Still, speculation considers the increased use of robots within the police and military to be walking a rather fine line for safety, especially if future units are armed and are expected to operate with any sense of autonomy. Wired has an interesting article detailing the possible ways that police drones could be armed in the future.

A couple interesting submarine launched UAVs, one by Raytheon and another, VOLANS, built by a German company, are featured in this Register article. The Submarine Over the Horizon Organic Capabilities, or SOTHOC, built by Raytheon, is launched out of the waste disposal lock of a submarine. SOTHOC then decents to a preset depth where it rises to the surface and launches a unmanned flying vehicle to gather data. The UAV can relay the data back to the sub via antenna, or if the sub whishes to remain anonymous the data can be relayed via satellite back to the US. This system allows a submarine to lauch an UAV while remaining submerged, in contrast to the VOLANS, which launches via a mast attached to the robot. The VOLANS functions as a mobile periscope for the sub.