microcontrollers

[Logicalsifter]

Hey thank's for that lil tip Robo1 i have away better understanding on how to use soildworks! but agan thanks for the tip's and i'll be back oh here for more questions later hahah take it easy guys.

[Humanoido]

Indeed the BoeBot is a good robot from Parallax, and their Toddler robot biped is outstanding. It can walk using only two servos and a Basic Stamp microcontroller, which has a lot of ports available for expansion, sensors, and various add-ons. You can even get a color object following cam, inclinometer, sonar, and other cool things. And, as always with Parallax, you get simple instructions for hookup and wonderful support. Ok, I don't work there and I have no affiliation with Parallax, I just like their products.

http://www.parallaxinc.com
http://www.parallax.com/html_pages/robotics/shop/robo_comparison.asp

humanoido

[koko76]

I started using Solidworks as they (at one point long ago) provided a sponsorship program to combat robot teams to give them a copy. It's since expired, but now I use the full version for work as well.
The program has a steep learning curve, no doubt about that. There is a reasonable tutorial that will get you a little ways, and from then on it's really just a lot of playing around with it.
I've got about 3 years of almost daily use of the program and I still am finding lots of cool things.
Not sure what your problem is with dimensioning, for basic shapes I use "smart dimension" on the sketch prior to extruding or cutting, for hole wizzard, I use the smart dimension in the postitions tab. The program can be a little picky about where you need to select to create dimensions. You will get better at "knowing" where you need to pick points. Hard to explain, but it will come with time.

[Logicalsifter]

Hey Koko76 I'm doing so much better on solidworks now. I just got lost one a bit but back on the right track! So tomorrow is the day my boe bot is going to be in! I so can't want to get working on it, haveing all thurday to have some time to build it! I'm lover thos humanoid bots, I was on Youtube.com waching the Robot - One battle's and i was SUPER impressed on what you can do with these incredible robots and i was like wow i so want to get in to building my own humanoid bot so i order (Build Your Own Humanoid Robots : 6) book on Amazon.com so i cant want to that come in but i frist want to playing around with my boe bot frist befor i jump in to building my humanoid bot!

Oh is (Build Your Own Humanoid Robots : 6) is a good book on Amazon.com poeple on there say it a awesome book what do you guys think ?

[Logicalsifter]

Sorry if i'm going off topic!

[Humanoido]

Oh is (Build Your Own Humanoid Robots : 6) is a good book on Amazon.com poeple on there say it a awesome book what do you guys think ?

I have the book - it's very good with lots of useful information such as building a controller, interfacing pic chips, a project in Visual Basic, PicBasic Pro, etc. so there's lots of stuff to round up if you want to complete any of the projects. There's lots of mechanics to make, aluminum to bend, screws to drill, printed circuit boards to etch, speech recognition board to purchase, etc. and the walking mechanism is a lot different from a Robo-One. It reminded me of the Parallax Toddler Robot, which comes as a kit but you have all the parts needed for assembly. It really depends on what you want to do, how much time and money you have to invest, or maybe use the book as a reference, or build any of the projects that interest you. My decision was to buy the book and also get the Toddler Robot. See link below.

http://www.parallax.com/html_pages/robotics/toddler/toddler_robot.asp

humanoido

[Logicalsifter]

Well hey Humanoido thanks for the info and everthing but for now i'm just going to play around with the boebot and just read up on the books to get some idea and my be do some projects.

[Humanoido]

I also have a BoeBot and put one together before doing the Robonova-1 assembly. The BoeBot is a great learning platform and doing projects is the best way to get some experience. Whenever I need to test a new sensor, frequently I install it on Boe. The last project was a vision system that could follow a red ball. I also use the platform for testing other forms of vision, touch sensors, infrared, sound, speech, and ultrasonics with the Ping))) for example.

humanoido

[Logicalsifter]

I also have a BoeBot and put one together before doing the Robonova-1 assembly. The BoeBot is a great learning platform and doing projects is the best way to get some experience. Whenever I need to test a new sensor, frequently I install it on Boe. The last project was a vision system that could follow a red ball. I also use the platform for testing other forms of vision, touch sensors, infrared, sound, speech, and ultrasonics with the Ping))) for example.

humanoido

Nice "Humanoido" yah just got my Boe-Bot last night! this this is great! just over here playing right now i'm on chapter 4 now! so what add ons you u have on your boe bot ?

[Humanoido]

I did some experiments with the PING))) and also the CMUCam, plus added some additional microncontrollers (Basic Stamp 2), and experimented with the IRs, and now doing some speech along with an expansion that adds serial ports for more servos.

Also built an autonomous platform on it which has ultrasonics for vision, extra BS2s for intelligence, more memory, an LCD, a keypad, encoder, decoder, and multiple platforms for various other things added on like speech boards, sound boards, etc. It's an ongoing BoeBot project. Well, I love the BoeBot, and all robots, what can I say?

I got a reasonable deal on numerous SPO256 speech chips off ebay, and built those into some test boards and breadboards. Everything was done step by step over time as my pocketbook allowed. The Boe manual is outstanding for learning and very educational, well, Parallax is the leader in the education field.

BTW, my Boe is one of the original ones first made, and since then the bot has gone through several revisions, even the wheels look different now. I've moved several times and lost some robots in the process, however this is the one robot that has survived everything.

It's a very trusted platform, and I think it will always be by my side. I would love to do a web site on it in the near future and offer numerous download treasures for supporting hardware and software. What do you think? Is a web site the way to go, or just put up a blog at a blogger site?

humanoido

[Logicalsifter]

I thing humanoido put up a blog at a blogger site would be better because you dont have to go about makeing a site and thats takes time to do. And i would love you see your work on your boe bot i'm in the processes of buying the EmbeddedBlue Transceiver AppMod from Parallax so i can use it wirelessly. and take it a step fearter! I made it to chapter 6 so far and i haveing a killer time with my boe bot dude hey i really want to see your work! keep in touch!

[Humanoido]

Congratulations on going so far with your studies! You're really making good progress. I tried Bloggers.com, and for some reason the menu turned into another language which I cannot read, so all my work on setting it up was wasted. It looks like a lot of people are having the same problem. So its back to the drawing board on the blogger thing.

The transceiver AppMod is a great idea. Parallax has offered a GUI which maybe can be integrated into wireless. That would be cool to have Boe roam around under GUI control, and with some kind of vision screen too. You can see all the software and downloads for the CMUcam at Parallax - as you know, they have a BoeBot version complete with software.

http://www.parallax.com/detail.asp?product_id=30051

There is a Boe-Bot GUI Interface by Amulet (.zip) at

http://www.parallax.com/dl/docs/prod/audiovis/BoeBotGUI.zip

Here's a video of a "following" applicaton.

phpBB [media]

and here's a sample of using the PING)))

phpBB [media]

humanoido

[Logicalsifter]

Wow dude yah, i'm a noob to the modern robotics to my goal is to build my own humanoid robot! i purchased the boe bot to learn a bit about robotics and i just purchased this book called (Build Your Own Humanoid Robots : 6) from amazon.com! to get start slowly in to building my robot! and for the designing" i'm going to use soildworks 2007 to make this happen! but they only thing that i'm going to run in to is that i dont have a CNC milling machine to cut out aluminum! but i just going to start out but buying an PIC microcontroller and some servos just to get started and learn how to program some more in C#! So those are my plans.

I'm just dont have the money right now to buy a complete humanoid robot!

[koko76]

"but they only thing that i'm going to run in to is that i dont have a CNC milling machine to cut out aluminum!"

Very few people NEED CNC to do anything. Those people generally produce many of certain items and CNC helps make every item the same and in a timely fashion. Besides this, CNC is not a magic bullet. You don't simply get access to a CNC machine and then are able to cut metal. If you don't know how to cut metal without it, you are only going to make an expensive mess with it.
If you have to pay someone else to do your CNC work, you'll be at or worse than what you would have paid to buy the robot kit in the first place, as you'll pay for setup charges that wouldn't happen when people are doing runs of a part.
I have a CNC at work that I can use whenever I want. It's an excellent machine and it does good work. The first version of Morbo was done mostly on it. The next version, which is far more complex, is being done on my manual machine at home. The manual one is coming out better and I'm learning far more in the process.
I guess the bottom line is that fabrication doesn't NEED to rely on any particular process. You can always adjust the design to tools you have or can get. Sometimes it takes a while to play with things, juggling design and tool purchases and learning new skills, but with a little patience and effort anything can be built. I just learned to cut gears for example, on a totally manual machine, I even made the cutter myself. http://www.geocities.com/kokop76/morbo/morbo2.html
Don't fall into the trap of "I can't proceed without CNC", there's always a way.

[Humanoido]

Great job on the biped! The precision work you did without CNC is amazing! Would sure like to see some walking videos of your masterful creation.

humanoido