Project Nibbles A Scratch built robotic lawn mower
Project Nibbles A Scratch built robotic lawn mower
by Reckless
Wed Dec 01, 2010 3:43 pm
While I've been waiting for parts to arrive for my Robonova I decided to start building a robomower.
I'm quite inexperienced with programming of robots but building machines is something I have been doing forever. Ive been looking around and the Arduino platform seems to be the way to go to keep the budget down and also popular enough to find plenty of on-line support when i need it.
So as inexperienced as i am i have put together a bit of a plan for the mower and ordered most of the gear to get it going, providing i can teach myself how to program it that is.
After doing a bit of research on whats currently available and what will suit my yard i have decided to make quite a simple robot for a start and then develop as i get a bit more skilled with the programming.
4X4 platform constructed from 10mm PVC sheeting 5inch wheels from RC car
basic bump avoidance using 4 corner bump sensors (my yard has walls all the way round)
12v gel cell
geared cutter motor with plastic cutting disc Stanley knife blades for blades.
eventually a solar pannel to charge it for a few days
Some way of using either a voltage sensor or a timer to tell it when its charged up and ready to start mowing again and low voltage cut out.
here is what i got so far
I'm quite inexperienced with programming of robots but building machines is something I have been doing forever. Ive been looking around and the Arduino platform seems to be the way to go to keep the budget down and also popular enough to find plenty of on-line support when i need it.
So as inexperienced as i am i have put together a bit of a plan for the mower and ordered most of the gear to get it going, providing i can teach myself how to program it that is.
After doing a bit of research on whats currently available and what will suit my yard i have decided to make quite a simple robot for a start and then develop as i get a bit more skilled with the programming.
4X4 platform constructed from 10mm PVC sheeting 5inch wheels from RC car
basic bump avoidance using 4 corner bump sensors (my yard has walls all the way round)
12v gel cell
geared cutter motor with plastic cutting disc Stanley knife blades for blades.
eventually a solar pannel to charge it for a few days
Some way of using either a voltage sensor or a timer to tell it when its charged up and ready to start mowing again and low voltage cut out.
here is what i got so far
