make a robot

In high school my class tried to win a national robotics competition. To build a robot right, one needs a design that is relatively simple that can later be expanded on. Out of the entire process this what ought to take the most amount of time. The supplies are expensive so be prepared. Remote control is a given, but be careful about range and power of the signal. Other than that, have fun with the design. It’s going to require a commitment to get the idea off the ground so stay positive. Happy building. ~ TM

an android

i wanna make this dream trueth

Some years ago I was in the university´s team to build a robot (as a bright kid, many years before reaching the age of a uni student). It didnt have any remote controls, was programmed and used sensors to find the right way, recognize colours, pick stuff up and turn it around. It meant long nights at the electronics lab but what could feel better than seeing a self-made robot actually working ;)

This is not going to happen anytime soon, so I am going to formally put it aside for a while. But I will try again. I think it’ll just have to wait until after my PhD is done.

Odd thought: People who use 43 Things and update their goals will eventually die, leaving behind a list of what they were working on and what they had set aside at the time of death. Weird lah.

I have been working on a dense one box networked system of computers that I call the WisdomCube. That is my most immediate goal—to at least get the design for that worked out.

I made a robot for school once ..it wasn’t all that kick ass ..but it was fun to watch it wander around the house …I used this remote control skateboard I found at good will for the transportation system, it got squirrely on the linoleum floors of my apartment, and then acted totally different on the carpet .. luckily, I only really had to write AI for the linoleum, because at the considerably lower carpet speeds, it just became smoother at navigation.. The thing sucked down batteries tho ..and has fallen into slight disrepair ..bad sonar unit maybe? ..I have 4 sonar units on the new bot I was making. ..bleh ..its all in the clothset right now anyway ..but its fun stuff …I’m down if I have time.

this was a fun, if not useless (for me I mean) class in my CS degree. we programed socker bots to hunt down raquet balls with a primitive camera mounted on them. pretty sweet actually.

how to buil a robot by not spending300

Robots are really fun to mess around with, but as others have said, they are only good for the purpose you built them for. So, building one to show off that you can do it, will always have that purpose. I helped build and program the robot found here: My Boebot Project .

I hacked an old Super Nintendo controller to control it, and just that part of it made it well worth it. For beginners I recommend the Parallax BASIC stamp microcontroller. For the more experianced I recommend the Atmel AVR microcontrollers, they are faster but take a little more skill to operate.