March 2012
7 posts
Make the Robot Bigger
I had a breakthrough last night as I was trying to figure out how all the robot parts are going to fit into the body I’m designing. The idea was simple: make the robot bigger. I somehow got it in my head early on in this project that I wanted the robot to have a 7” diameter. That’s pretty tiny considering everything I’m packing in there, so I decided to bump that up to...
Checking In
I’ve had a little time to work on my robot chassis design, but not nearly enough. I’ll post some more Google Sketchup designs next week for sure. Early indications are that it will be bitchin’.
Tonight I take the Basic Skills & Safety (BSS) class for the Epilog Helix 60w CO2 laser at The Mill. I hope to learn more about the laser’s capabilities and limitations, especially with regard to...
Brain 2.0
I decided to swap out my Arduino Uno R3 microcontroller for an Arduino Nano. It has the same functionality and accepts the same programs, but it’s very, very tiny. Also, instead of having pinholes that you plug wires into, the pins point straight down so you can mount it on a breadboard. And that’s exactly what I’ve done.
The entire circuit shown above is the size of a credit...
More Roving
Robots hate chairs. It’s a fact of robot life, at least for small rolling robots. I didn’t realize the seriousness of that hate until I set mine loose in my home.
My robot gets stuck, in all kinds of ways. Some of those are unavoidable, like bogging down on a thick rug, or making it halfway over a cable. Other ways of getting stuck are avoidable, I’ve learned.
I think I’m...
