Rein's Cyberspaceplace » Robotics

TMABot 1.0 released

Rein — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 11:09:39 +0000

The TMABot is a small robot we have built to learn more about robotics, collision avoidance and detection, path planning, etc… This document describes how you can make your own copy of TMABot and how to modify it.

The latest version of this document is available from http://mechanicape.com/tmabot

Table of contents

Introduction
Functional requirements
Technical design
Parts
Putting the parts together
Electronics
Software

Introduction

The TMABot is our newest robot and is developed to learn more about different kind of sensors, collision avoidance and path-planning. We built the robot with parts we had available in our lab.

Functional requirements

We have a few functional demands:

The robot must be easy to build
It should be easy to modify to robot
The robot should be able to avoid obstacles and be friendly to the environment
The robot must be connected to other devices (microcontrollers, communication, etc) to extent the possibilities

Technical design

Below is a picture of all major components

Parts

Below is a list of the parts we used for the robot with supplier and estimated costs in euro’s

Part	Manufacturer	Type	Supplier	Estimated cost
Arduino duemilanove	Arduino	2009	Sparfun.com	euro 20
Ardumoto	Sparkfun	—	Sparfun.com	euro 15
DC motor (x2)	various	—	conrad.nl	euro 25
Battery 12V	various	—	conrad.nl	euro 50
Sonar (x2)	Sparkfun	SRF02	Sparfun.com	euro 15
IR distance sensor	Sharp	—	conrad.nl	euro 15
Microswitch (x2)	various	—	Sparfun.com	euro 1
wires & connectors	various	—	conrad.nl	euro 5
Wheels (x2)	various	—	conrad.nl	euro 15
Wheelhub (x2)	various	—	conrad.nl	euro 10

Putting the parts together

Find a piece of flat wood (triplex, multiplex, MDF) size: 25x25cm
Connect the motors to the bottom side.
Connect the wheels and wheelhub to the motor
Attach the arduino to the upper side.
Attach the battery
Attach the Sonar sensors (front-left and front-right)
Attach the Sharp sensor (front-center)
Attach the Compass on top (as far from the motors as possible)
Attach the Microswitches to the front-left and front-right side of the wood. They will be used as bumpers
Connect all devices to the Arduino (see electronics diagram)

Electronics

Below is a picture of the Arduino Duemilanove microcontroller with the connected devices/sensors. Please consult the datasheet of your hardware to check the pins before you connect them to the Arduino.

Software

The latest version of the software is free available from http://mechanicape.com/tmabot

The PHP ElePHPant gadget

Rein — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 13:21:48 +0000

The ElePHPant gadget is based on the PHP ElePHPant. It is a plastic ElePHPant-shaped casing containing an Arduino microcontroller board, some sensors and actuators. It is currently in the planning stage.

The ElePHPant gadget will be developed in coorporation with PHPBenelux. The design, hardware and software will be published under the Creative Commons License.

Please contact us if you want to join this project. We will appreciate it very much.

Robot Mobility Module design published

Rein — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 10:31:33 +0000

Yesterday, i published the first version of the design for the Robot Mobility Module. You can take a look at the documentation and feed us (the Mechanic Apes )with your comments. Now we started building the chassis for this robot (as specified in the design documentation). We will show you some photos within a couple of days. Stay tuned…or join us at the Alexander Gogelweg 12 in The Hague, NL

Arduino autonomous flightmachine firmware published

Rein — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:57:26 +0000

We are currently busy building a autonomous flying robot. Yesterday we published the first version of the software and firmware at our software repository.

The documentation is lacking at this moment, but within a week or two we will publish all documentation and specifications.

Please contact us for more information. We will be pleased to help you.

Read more

3D scanner prototype

Rein — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 11:18:50 +0000

Afgelopen weekend ben ik bezig geweest om het prototype voor een 3d scanner te ontwerpen en te bouwen. Het principe achter de scanner is vrij simpel. Je neemt twee servo motortjes, een voor de x en een voor de y-as, en maakt hiermee een pan/tilt module.Daarna neem je een sharp afstandsensor en die bevestig je aan het pan/tiltding. Het volledige apparaat kost ongeveer 60 euro, inclusief servo’s, sensoren en microcontroller.

Read more

PHP controlled robot arm

Rein — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 12:55:01 +0000

Images Scientific Instruments released the OWI-535 Robotic Arm Edge a few months ago. This 50 euro robotarm kit comes with a standard manual remote control (with wires). I slightly modified the controller. The arm is now controlled by a embedded webserver with PHP. All 5 axis and the gripper-light can be controlled by a webuser. It is quite useless but very cool.

Embedded PHP met Foxboard en FoXServe

Rein — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 16:03:25 +0000

Met dit artikel probeer ik duidelijk te maken hoe je PHP kunt installeren op een Foxboard embedded device. Verder wordt er verteld hoe je met PHP externe Ic's en microcontrollers kan besturen en uitlezen met behulp van het I2C protocol.
Door gebruik te maken van Foxboard, FoXServe en PHP kun je op een eenvoudige manier electronica aansturen om daarmee bijvoorbeeld een robot, een locatielogger/navigatiesysteem of je eigen home automation system te bouwen. Je kunt het zo gek niet bedenken of het is mogelijk.

De hardware: Foxboard ›