The University of Oklahoma wanted to get a good idea of what it is like to operate a robot using visual and aural sensors before they built one of their own. They started with the Pioneer 3-AT robotics platform. They added a Mac Mini and powered it using a 12V battery and an inverter (this was only a temporary setup). The Pioneer is controlled through a USB-to-serial connection. An iSight camera provides visual feedback. Turning control is jerky over the WiFi connection, but since this will eventually be an autonomous system it isn’t a concern. It is a nice quick proof-of-concept.

[thanks Jason Striegel]

Continue reading “Mac Mini Robot” →

This is another repurposing hack to help you along with your robotics projects. The guide shows you how to disassemble a polaroid camera to get the sonar sensors. Don’t worry, it also covers how to use them. The camera also has a lot of other parts you can salvage.

Continue reading “Polaroid Sonar For Robotics” →

I usually don’t feature LEGO projects because there is already a huge community and probably better places to get your LEGO info. That being said, I couldn’t pass this project up. It has an infrared sensor for detecting objects and only uses three pneumatic cylinders. The most interesting aspect of the hand is its underactuated fingers. The built in “mechanical intelligence” allows for shape adaptation even though there are fewer actuators than degrees of freedom. Don’t worry there’s a link to clear that last bit up.

[thanks ator1]

Continue reading “Lego Self-adaptive Hand” →

Scott Metoyer built this awesome telepresence rover using really cheap parts. He started with a Pentium II laptop that wasn’t being used. Then he picked up a relay board to connect to the parallel port. A servo board was connected to the serial port and a webcam was attached to the USB port. The drive wheels are powered by two windshield wiper motors. The rover runs a server application that talks to a wireless client computer for control. He says the control lag is minimal and you get 15fps from the webcam with pan and tilt. This is a great start and really shows how cheaply you can build a telepresence robot. Scott still has a lot of sensor connections he can use so I’m sure will see more interesting applications in the future.

Continue reading “Commodity Telepresence Rover” →

The Shadow Robot Company is now offering its Dexterous Hand for public sale. The joints are powered by the company’s Air Muscles, usually in pairs to provide a variable grip. The Air Muscle is a rubber tube encased in a “Chinese finger trap” style plastic webbing. When the muscle is inflated with compressed air it contracts. This simple system results in a 400:1 power to weight ratio. The bundle of muscles required to operate the hand makes for a very large Popeye-esque forearm so we probably won’t be seeing anything humanoid based on this anytime soon. They have GPL’d control code available though so anybody that wants to start developing for this will probably have a pretty easy time. You still have to justify paying an “arm and a leg” for a hand. The site has some good movement videos for you to check out. Just don’t mimic the movements; there’s a reason robots can’t feel pain.

[via Future Feeder]

Continue reading “Shadow’s Dexterous Hand” →

you’ll have to pardon me while i wax anthropomorhpic for a moment.  why is it that robots, designed or imagined, always exist solely to fulfill a purpose or pleasure for human beings?  don’t they have feelings too?  maybe it’s about time we made some robots whose sole purpose is to hook up with other robots, get a little freaky, and make some robot progeny.

in this article we’ll be exploring robot love.  i made a couple of simple lego mindstorms robots and programmed them to reproduce — i.e. they can swap code.  effectively, two robots come together, trade their genome, die, and two new robots are born in their place.

turn up the barry white.  get out your mindstorms.  let’s get it on.

Continue reading “Sex Bots” →