Servo №1 2009

Moving On With Your Robot by John Frizell
So, you’ve got yourself some battery powered drills and have started to convert them into gearmotors to drive a robot.

Prototyping Autonomous Robots by John Blankenship Samuel Mishal
Building an autonomous robot is a goal of many robot enthusiasts. If you look up autonomous in the dictionary, you will see terms like “self directed” and “self sufficient.” If you apply the first term to a robot, it simply means that the robot is capable of accomplishing a task without human intervention. The second term suggests a deeper commitment. A self sufficient robot might be one that is capable of repairing itself, or at the very least, capable of recharging its own battery so that...

Software Platforms for Service Robots by Michael Somby
What is special about service robotics as compared to industrial robotics? Imagine it gets dark in the living room and you turn on the light. For most industrial robots, such a change in the illumination pattern would be a catastrophic event. Those robots are designed to work in closely controlled industrial settings. Their computer vision systems are not able to cope with such changes in the illumination without reconfiguration or reprogramming. On the other hand, interacting with the...

An Introduction to Pneumatic Sytems | Part 1 by David A. Ward
If you’re looking for a way to add muscle to your robots, then as Bob Dylan would say, the answer may be may be blowin' in the wind in the form of compressed air and pneumatic controls. I have wanted to incorporate pneumatics into some of my personal projects and (as an instructor) into my industrial control systems course for some time now, but wasn't sure where to begin. Pneumatic trainers are available for classroom instruction, but the ones I have checked into cost anywhere from $3,500 ...

Projects

Build The Ultimate Robot: Part 4 | Firebot by Michael Simpson
In this article, we are going to finish up the Firebot shown in Figure 1. Before I get into some of the construction techniques, I want to go over some of the components we will be using in this portion of the project.

BLDC Hardware | Part 2 by Fred Eady
Manually rotating the shaft of my Anaheim Automation BLY171S-24V-4000 BLDC motor with my fingers isn't making it. So, I've scrounged up and assembled some electronic components that I intend to use to force the BLDC motor shaft to rotate in lieu of my motor-shaft-driving fingers. If you take a look at the specifications for the BLY17 series of brushless DC motors, you'll see that every motor in the family has differing characteristics. With that, it will be useless for me to whip up a ...

Columns

Robytes by Jeff Eckert
Heavy-Duty Hauler
In many nooks and crannies of the bot industry, miniaturization is the name of the game. Not so at Caterpillar, Inc. (http://www.cat.com), which is working with Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute (http://www.ri.cmu.edu) to develop autonomous versions of haul trucks used in mining operations. Among them is the 793D haul truck, which can handle payloads of 240+ tons. Aimed at increased productivity and zero-injury safety levels, the behemoths will be fitted with an array of gadgets to keep...

GeerHead by David Geer
Open Robot Platform is Student’s Delight!
Open Robot is, not surprisingly, completely open source. Teachers and students may modify and distribute all the robot’s documentation, software, printed circuit board designs, and mechanical design files as long as credit to the inventor is maintained. Howell is eager to see an open source community grow up around the Open Robot, adding hardware, software, sensors, and “mechanical end-effectors" ...

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | January 2009
Your Problems Solved Here.

Twin Tweaks by Bryce Woolley Evan Woolley
The San Diego Job
We’ve all been there — you’ve outsmarted the alarm system, outmaneuvered the guards, and outmatched the inevitable laser security devices to finally arrive at the safe. You’ve smartly brought a robot along to do your dirty work, and just as your mechanical minion is twisting in the combination the police arrive because your robot was too slow! We’re talking about optimization, of course. You have an initial design, but things can always be improved through analysis and iteration...

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Kits for Learning About Electronics
In this month's column, we'll discuss learning more about the electronics side of things. To keep things as basic as possible this time around, we'll concentrate on using "learning lab" kits and the tutorials that come with them to learn more about electronics. These kits come with all the parts you need to follow the step-by-step guide that’s included with the product. These learning labs are a great way to begin your electronics education...

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
Government and Military Robots
I have long been interested in military weapons. The meanest, sneakiest, most powerful, and most complex weapons seemed to always attract my attention. Adding robotics to these types of weapon systems makes it just that much more appealing to me. Military robots — ground, sea, and air versions — have made the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan safer and more efficient for our troops. The Military Channel and History Channel’s Future Weapons make it clear that new military technology...

Combat Zone

A123 Battery Packs
in Combat Zone: Features
Batteries are one of — if not the most — important parts of a combat robot. They are what run the robots and bring them to life.

Roaming Robots Winter Tour
in Combat Zone: Events
The Roaming Robots winter tour made a late but exuberant start in Portsmouth. As usual, there were three weekend events over October and November, and three cities with each well advertised event attracting a paying crowd for two or three shows.

Combat Texas Cup At Maker Faire Austin
in Combat Zone: Events
Saturday October 18, 2008, 10:30 am and a 10 year old boy leans over the railing near the pits. “When does the fighting start?” he yells down to me. “Noon,” I shout back, “but you’ll probably want to get here a little earlier because the good seats should go fast.”

Devils Plunger
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
Devil’s Plunger has competed at Steel Conflict 2, Steel Conflict 4, Triangle Series Nationals, RobOlympics 2004, Southwest Division Championships, NPC Charity Open, 2004 RFL Nationals, WBX Premier, RoboGames 2005, Battle Beach 3, Robotic Revolution, 2005 RFL Nationals, RoboGames 2006, Game Developers Conference, and the 2005 February Fun Fest.

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №2 2009

Build The Ultimate Robot: Part 5 by Michael Simpson
If you are building the Megabot or a similar robot, you should have the base assembled at this point. In this article, we are going to add the electronics that will make our robot move. I’ll show you the techniques I used so that you can apply them to your own design...

An Introduction to Pneumatic Sytems | Part 2 by David A. Ward
Now that the basic pneumatic system is operating manually, let's add some electronics to control it. If we add an electromechanical relay and two limit switches, we can make the piston travel back and forth continuously; check out the electrical schematic in Figure 1. The limit switches being used are momentary SPDT miniature switches (Photo 1) and the electromechanical relay is a DPDT 24 VDC coil relay with a socket (see Photo 2). By adding electrical limit switches at the fully retracted ...

Projects

BLDC Hardware | Part 3 by Fred Eady
It's time to get cerebral with our BLDC motor project. However, before we transition our fingers from spinning the BLDC motor shaft to tapping out some BLDC motor code, I have a confession to make. Before I relate my experiences, though, let's have a moment of silence for the fallen Microchip TC4428 and Fairchild NDS9952A parts that are littered all over my workbench under a cloud of "magic smoke.”

Implementing a Digital PID Controller on the PenAeroBot by Carlos Montesinos Ricardo Toro
Our philosophy at the Control Systems Laboratory at the University of Illinois is to teach students through interacting and experimenting with their own designs. In our lab, we continuously develop experiments to implement the theoretical concepts learned in class. One of the projects we are currently developing is the Pendulum Aeronautic Robot (PenAeroBot). This system is an inverted pendulum and the idea is to control its angle of inclination, propelled by two motors...

A Practical Quadrature Encoder by John Blankenship Samuel Mishal
Building projects involving electronics and robotics is much easier today than in the past because many of the commonly needed subsystems are available as ready-to-use modules (we will call them HMs [helper modules]). For example, there are HMs for controlling nearly any type of motor (DC, stepper, servo) and HMs to collect environmental data (humidity, temperature, distance to objects). You can find switching power supplies, battery chargers, Bluetooth modems, and dozens more just by looking...

Columns

Robytes by Jeff Eckert
Stimulating Robot Tidbits
These tasty treats are big (up to seven inches [18 cm] long), fast (able to travel 1 cm/sec through wet sand), and highly desired for food (clammers are generally limited to 15 per day and must keep the first ones caught, regardless of size or condition). But as of lately, Pacific razor clams are of particular interest to Anette "Peko" Hosoi, an associate professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at MIT (http://www.mit.edu), for different reasons....

GeerHead by David Geer
Do Robots Scream for Ice Cream?
With two KUKA KR3 6 axis arms, an ice cream machine, a PLC, touch panel, toppings dispensers, and a camera and vision software, the team erected a fully robotic ice cream machine that vended scoops and toppings to about 500 customers in three days. (Now, that is how to make a popular robot!). The goal of the robotic construction was a unique demonstration of a computer vision controlled robot that constitutes a framework for developing strategies for bin-picking, which is a popular objective...

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | February 2009
Your Problems Solved Here.

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Building A Robot? Don’t Forget LEGO!
Take the Wayback Machine to about 2001 and you'll see thousands of eBay sales, hundreds of websites, and dozens of books on LEGO robotics. While the giddy heyday of the LEGO robot has come and gone, it's still a viable — and fun! — platform for learning all about desktop automatronics. What's more, publishers keep coming out with new and improved books on the subject, and the websites devoted to robotics and LEGO continue to be an active, if not mature, community of like-minded enthusiasts...

Beginner Electronics by William Smith
Introducing the AtomNano
Many years ago, Basic Micro, Inc. introduced the Basic Atom modules to compete with other popular modules. Basic Micro still offers the Basic Atom modules and the interpreter chips they’re based on. Now, Basic Micro is introducing the AtomNano which is similar to the PICAXE and it has many additional features. I've only seen a beta version of the chips; they are very similar to the Atom interpreter chips but at a much lower cost. Let’s take a look at the new AtomNano.

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
Robots: From Nano to Tiny to Small
I take a lot of magazines — most to keep abreast of a broad range of technical subjects — but I rely on Forbes for business and financial articles, at least until the November 12th issue. An article in the issue, “Interview With A Cyborg” by Courtney Myers caught my eye. I had heard bits and pieces about Kevin Warwick's experimentation with cybernetics and the implantation of a 100 electrode array that he had in his arm back in 2002. (Figure 1 shows Warwick with his 'bionic' hand controlled...

Combat Zone

Building a Better Battery System
in Combat Zone: Features
My 12 pound combat robot Scurrie was designed to use two battery packs that werre physically and electrically separate from each other.

Creative Armor: Sandwiching with Shock Mounts
in Combat Zone: Features
When building a combat robot, one of the first problems you encounter is how to protect it.

Halloween Robot Terrior
in Combat Zone: Events
long! As soon as the doors are unlocked at 10:00 AM, the evil known as the Halloween Robot Terror and Bot Costume contest will be unleashed on the world … BWUHAHAHAH !!!!

Roaming Robots UK Winter Tour Final - 2008
in Combat Zone: Events
The competition that began in Portsmouth and moved north to Nottingham finished back on the south coast in Maidstone in front of capacity audiences, with 1,200 people attending two shows.

Tourinho
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
Tourinho has competed at RoboGames 2007, Winter Challenge 3 ENECA - Recife, 7 ENECA - Recife, and Winter Challenge 4 ENECA - Recife.

Screwdrivers: Straight Up
in Combat Zone: Features
This month, we are reviewing two cordless screwdrivers from Bosch.

Departments

Symbiotic Robots by Bryan Bergeron in Mind / Iron
Symbiosis — an association of mutual benefit — is a popular strategy for survival in the biological world. Think humans and normal intestinal bacteria, the common behavior of smaller fisher cleaning larger fish, or even the seemingly fearless Egyptian plover bird that feeds on the leeches attached to the gums of a crocodile. Now, imagine how symbiosis could be useful in a large, 'host' robot — say a planetary rover. Wouldn't it be useful to have relatively small, internal robots that monitor..

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №3 2009

Computer Control and Data Acquisition: Part 1 by David A. Ward
An Introduction to National Instruments LabVIEW Software.

Projects

Robot Projects by Fred Eady
Robotics and electronics go hand in hand. If you're also a Nuts & Volts reader, you know that we assembled a working Silicon Laboratories-based USB microcontroller interface in the Nuts & Volts Design Cycle column. This month, we're going to pull that Nuts & Volts USB project into RoboLand and put its resources to work in a mechatronic kind of way...

EggBot by John Iovine

Egg-Bot is an egg marking and decorating robot, just in time for Easter. It uses two standard Hitec HS-322 servos. The brain for Egg-Bot is the SMC-04 USB servo controller. However, if you have a programmable servo controller that can control two Hitec hobby servos simultaneously, you can use it instead. Graphic designs and/or text is programmed into Egg-Bot using the GUI interface of the SMC-04 USB controller...

Build The Ultimate Robot: Part 6 | An Arm for Megabot by Michael Simpson
This month, we will add an external webcam to a fully articulated robot arm. We then will add buttons on our desktop controller program to allow us to control this arm.

Emancipating Your SERVO TankBot by Ron Hackett
Kit Available in the SERVO Online Store! In last December's issue of SERVO Magazine, we implemented a simple project that enabled us to control the TankBot's movements with any universal TV remote control capable of transmitting the Sony Infrared Control (SIRC) protocol. This month, we're going to take the opposite tack and enable the TankBot to explore the environment on his own, without any intervention on our part. In order for the TankBot to avoid ramming into any obstacles, we're going...

Columns

Robytes by Jeff Eckert
Automated Blade Inspection
Back when oil was selling for $4 per gallon and US banks still appeared to have money, T. Boone Pickens' announced a $10 billion wind farm project that would have added 2,700 wind turbines to the grid and 4,000 MW of generation capacity. The old skinflint has since changed his mind, but as of the end of 2007, the USA already had nearly 17,000 MW of installed wind capacity, ranking it no. 2 in the world. Nr. eine was Germany, with better than 22,000 MW, so it is perhaps not surprising that the...

GeerHead by David Geer
What is a DAGSI Wheg?  An adaptive wheel-leg robot!
Doctors Roger Quinn (engineering), Roy Ritzmann (biology), and colleagues at the Case Western Reserve University (Case) collaborate in the neuro-mechanical research of cockroaches. In 2001, their studies lead to the birth of the Whegs (wheeled legs) robots, a product of the Case Center for Biologically Inspired Robotics. Research (or, the Biorobotics Lab)...

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | March 2009
Q. I'm interested in the Dinsmore electronic compass circuit and I want to build one for myself. Can you provide more information about how I can get the parts for it?

Twin Tweaks by Bryce Woolley Evan Woolley
Living Off The Land
This month, we have the pleasure of presenting the Surveyor Drive Base kit from Inertia Labs. Readers may recall our adventure with an already assembled Surveyor robot from a few months ago, which sported a unique method of teleoperation over a wireless network. The drive base, on the other hand, is a tabula rasa as clean and pristine as Descartes could have imagined. A kit with such potential is both exciting and intimidating, with the only limit to the possibilities being your imagination...

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Setting Up Your Own Robotics Workbench
With the right tools, you can make just about anything. That certainly goes for the fine art of robot building. With proper tools, your robots are more dependable and accurate, and they'll probably look better, too.

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
Large Robots
Large robots, on the other hand, are usually easier to construct as basic tools can normally be used to cut metal, fasten fasteners, and position the parts. However, due to the larger size, large machines of any type need large motors and more beefy power supplies. These larger items cost more money and that may limit going larger. Some of my best robots were in the hundred to two hundred pound class, human-sized anthropomorphic machines. I've always enjoyed building large bots that can move...

Combat Zone

An Introduction to Wedges
in Combat Zone: Features
Since the inception of robotic combat, the wedge has been viewed as one of the most successful and easy to build designs, though it has also become among the most hated.

Attaching Wheels to Your Robot’s Drill Motors
in Combat Zone: Features
Here, I will show you a simple way to make press fit hubs to mount Colson wheels to your drills.

Robotic Competition, Southern Style
in Combat Zone: Features
There have been many articles and books written over the years trying to untangle the murky pre-history of robotic combat in the United States.

Flipper Calculators Turn “Cut and Try” (nearly) into Science
in Combat Zone: Features
Irecently ran across a couple of very well written websites that show how to design pneumatic flippers.

Cheap Speed
in Combat Zone: Features
You can control your robot with a simple relay H-bridge that gives you just three settings: off, full forward, and full reverse. These controls — sometimes called “bang bang” for the way they drive your machine — are cheap and easy to make.

Ziggy
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
Ziggy has competed at RoboGames 2008, RoboGames 2007, RoboGames 2006, Battle Beach 4, Game Developers Conference 2006, February Fun Fest 2006, ComBots Cup I, RoboGames 2005, and MMER.

Departments

Unintended Consequences by Bryan Bergeron in Mind / Iron
In the world of robotics, advances in one application area often have unintentional, beneficial consequences in other areas, regardless of whether the initial application is a commercial success. Case in point — the Japanese robotic strawberry picker, touted as one of the prominent engineering failures of 2008 . The autonomous robot is considered an economic failure by some because it's too expensive, too slow, and is restricted to a specially configured...

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №4 2009

Navigation and Tree Measurement by Jaakko Jutila
Finland — the land of a thousand lakes and forests — is located in northern Europe. Water covers 10% of the total area of 338,000 square kilometers, and forests cover up to three fourths of the area. The country is the most forested one in Europe. The population totals approx. 5.3 million and in every square kilometer there lives approx. 15.5 inhabitants in average (1). In the US, for example, there are approx. 30.6 inhabitants per square kilometer (2)...

A3950 DC Motor Controller Tips and Tricks by Jose I Quinones
DC motors are plentiful. My favorite source for heavyweight robotics projects is electric scooters. A motor capable of transporting a 250 pound human can move a lot of robot. However, DC motors require significant current handling at startup, and during increased load conditions and direction reversal...

Projects

Unwinding the AX-12+ Communication Protocol by Fred Eady
I love to write robotic driver firmware and scratch build PIC microcontroller-based robotic hardware to run it. In this edition of SERVO, we’re not only going to sharpen our driver authoring skills, we’ll also get some flight time on the handle of a soldering iron...

Computer Control and Data Acquisition: Part 2 by David A. Ward
Part 2: An Introduction to National Instruments USB-6008 Data Acquisition Hardware. Part 1 introduced National Instruments LabVIEW software and had the reader build a very simple VI (virtual instrument). This article will introduce National Instrument’s most affordable computer interfacing hardware — the USB-6008(9) data acquisition units — and show how to use the digital features of the units...

Robot Vision for Everyone by John Blankenship Samuel Mishal
If you have ever tried to add vision to one of your robotic projects, you probably appreciate why you seldom see articles exploring the subject at the hobbyist level. The ability to experiment with vision — especially in the past — has generally only been accessible to university researchers or the rare hobbyists with advanced tools and capabilities...

Columns

Robytes by Jeff Eckert
Robot Theme Park on Track
A few weeks ago, the South Korean government authorized construction of the “world’s first robot theme park,” emphasizing the country’s view of the robotics industry as a prime area for economic growth. The Ministry of Knowledge Economy has set aside a 767,286 m2 (about 8.3 million ft2) development area in the Incheon Free Economic Zone for the park, which is budgeted at 784.5 billion won ($562.3 million)...

GeerHead by David Geer
The Ultimate WALL-E Robot Toy
On the big screen, WALL-E (the last, functional Waste Allocation Load Lifter-Earth class robot) is a curious, blue-collar working trash compactor robot tasked with cleaning up mountains of consumer garbage from the Earth’s surface. WALL-E is completely alone in this mess because human beings have moved off the world on a permanent vacation, due to pollution and the inability of the planet to support life...

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | April 2009
This column marks one year for me answering your questions and hoping that I am helping you along with your aspirations towards building useful or entertaining robots. The fact that you are still reading the column makes me believe that I’m doing something right. Please keep those questions coming; they inspire me to keep researching and writing about what I have learned to help you with your projects. Life is all about constantly learning. One of my favorite authors, Robert A. Heinlein...

Twin Tweaks by Bryce Woolley Evan Woolley
Bug Sport
This month, we have the pleasure of presenting another robot kit from esteemed Korean company Robotis, who brought us the incredible Dynamixel and Bioloid. The kit is the Ollo Bug — a kit targeted at that elusive demographic of young budding roboticists. Inspiring youngsters to become interested in science and technology is an admirable goal, but it is a competitive niche already dominated by the LEGO Mindstorms and NXT kits. Does the bug have what it takes to carve out a segment in this...

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Organizing Your Robotics Workbench
In last month’s Robotics Resources, we looked at the major electronics tools and supplies used in building robots, such as volt ohmmeters and soldering irons. Like all workbenches, how tidy you keep your robot building home goes a long way to how much you’ll enjoy the process. There are a number of solutions for organizing the bits and pieces of your robotics hobby, including all sorts of toolboxes, chests, cabinets, drawers, boxes, bins, bags, and more. We’ll cover many of these in this...

Beginner Electronics by William Smith
Basic Atom & Robotics
I introduced the new Atom Nano chips from BasicMicro.com in my last column, and now there are more new development tools to help the beginner. There is also a great robotics platform based on the Atom that is a great platform for the beginner so I’ll give it a mention later since it’s built around the 28 pin Atom interpreter chip. Let’s start with the Atom Nano chips...

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
European Robots
Rather than delve into 18th century ‘clock-work’ automatons that were famous across Europe (and ones that I’ve written about before), I’d like to center on the past few decades of more modern robotics. We have to admit that our neighbor across the Pacific — Japan — inarguably has implemented more robots into their industries than any other nation. We seem to forget that the European Union across the Atlantic has long been in the forefront of robot progress. Nations in Europe have designed ...

Combat Zone

T6 - Evolution of a Full Body Spinner
in Combat Zone: Features
The most distinctive and defining feature of a ring spinner is also the biggest challenge to get to work effectively: how to support the ring so that it would spin freely, and transmit power to get it spinning?

2009 Chattanooga Robot Battles
in Combat Zone: Events
The 2009 Chattanooga Robot Battles were held on Saturday, January 24th at the Chattanooga Choo Choo Holiday Inn.

Custom Colson Wheel Hubs
in Combat Zone: Features
It is very important to make sure your motors are mounted as firmly as your wheels are.

Upheaval
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
Upheaval has competed in: Franklin, Institute Robot Weekend, Motorama 2008, Franklin Institute Robot Conflict, Motorama 2007, and House of NERC 2006.

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №5 2009

Servo №6 2009

Implementing A Low Speed, Low Cost Communications Protocol by Fred Eady
LIN is a relatively young network topology used in automobile mechatronics. See how you can apply it to your robotic needs.

A Virtual Laboratory by John Blankenship Samuel Mishal
Simulate mechanical systems to streamline the designing process.

Computer Control And Data Acquisition by David A. Ward
Part 4: Working with analog signals.

Projects

The CheapBot-14 Robot Controller by L. Paul Verhage
Add this controller to your robot base of choice for an efficent and cheap learning enviornment.

How To Make Bi-Directional Flex Sensors by John Frizell
Flex sensors have a lot of applications in robotics. Here's a simple approach to making your own.

Hagetaka: Bipedal Combat Robot by Andrew Alter
Follow the journey of designing and building your own MechWarrior inspired robot.

Columns

Robytes by Jeff Eckert
Robytes | June 2009
Wings Over Mars, Bot With An Appetite, UAV Employs Fuel Cells, String Climbing Bot, and More!

GeerHead by David Geer
First Robot For Cleaning Solar Cells
When the solar energy producer cannot bring the panels to the car wash, it is time to bring the car wash to the panels!

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto |  June 2009
Your problems solved here.

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Blogging Your Way to Robotics Stardom
In this installment of Robotics Resources, we’ll discuss what you need to start your own robotics blog and how to keep your blog fresh and useful to anyone visiting it.

Beginner Electronics by William Smith
Build Your Own Atom Nano Board
In this month’s article, we’ll use the Atom Nano 28-pin chip and build our own Ultimate OEM Atom Nano development board.

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
Automated Guided Vehicles
Automated Guided Vehicles or AGVs never seem to make the headlines in news stories these days, as they go quietly about their business on factory and warehouse floors around the world.

Combat Zone

The Intro Ant
in Combat Zone: Features
Thanks to Travis Schmidt, Dan Wiseman, Donald Sung, and Dennis Beck who provided information for this article.

RioBotz Combot Tutorial
in Combat Zone: Features
SERVO Magazine, as a service to the building community, is summarizing the tutorial in a series of articles beginning with part of Chapter 2, “Design Fundamentals.”

Banebots P60 1:16 Gearbox Review
in Combat Zone: Features
My P60 gearboxes have arrived and so far, they look very promising. The overall machining quality is vastly improved when compared to the Chinese produced versions.

Black Death
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
Black Death has competed in: Motorama 2007, Motorama 2008, Motorama 2009.

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №7 2009

Implementing a Low Speed, Low Cost Commmunications Protocol: Part 2
by Fred Eady
Our goal this month is to assemble a set of software routines to take advantage of the LIN protocol we learned last time.

Computer Control And Data Acquisition: Part 5
by David A. Ward
Building a Thermal Cycling System.

Projects

The Navigator
by John W. Molnar
If you've ever wanted to send your rover or R/C boat out to complete a mission all on its own, check out this GPS based navigation system.

Hagetaka: Bipedal Combat Robot
by Andrew Alter
This installment covers the build itself, the mechanics behind the leg design, and the theory behind the walking gait.

Columns

Robytes
by Jeff Eckert
Robytes | July 2009
When Penguins Fly, Aquabots Ensure Clean Water, Robot Bartender, and More!

GeerHead
by David Geer
Rose-Hulman Robot Shoot Out
The Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology is a four year college which offers academic majors relevant to robotics including computer science, computer engineering, software engineering, mechanical engineering, and electrical engineering.

Ask Mr. Roboto
by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | July 2009
Your Problems Solved Here.

Twin Tweaks
by Bryce Woolley Evan Woolley
Universal Serial Bust
Just about every robotics kit that we’ve reviewed for SERVO uses a serial connection for programming, so we’ve been forced to invest in a serial-to-USB adapter.

SERVO TankBot
by Ron Hackett
Adding Sonar Capabilities to Your TankBot
In the previous TankBot column, we simplified our IR obstacle detection system to make it smaller so that the IR circuitry could coexist on the breadboard with the next project (or two) that we would construct. This month, we’re going to make good use of the extra space we created.

Robotics Resources
by Gordon McComb
Fast and Cheap Prototyping
In this month’s column, we’ll concentrate on just mechanical hardware prototyping, as this tends to be an expensive and time-consuming task for many custom projects.

Then and Now
by Tom Carroll
Law Enforcement Robots
The two companies discussed here and their line of remotely controlled robots represent just a handful of the many companies producing state-of-the-art ‘assistants’ to serve law enforcement agencies and the military.

Combat Zone

Today’s Beetle – Tomorrow’s Champion?
in Combat Zone: Features
Choosing the “value” options lowers the cost quite a bit, with the Value Beetle costing about half the Ultimate.

A Color To Dye For
in Combat Zone: Features
UHMW (Ultra High Molecular Weight) polyethylene is an increasingly popular plastic for use in robotics in general, and combat robotics in particular.

Ideas Festival, Australia
in Combat Zone: Events
The Ideas Festival is a government sponsered "future thinking" event held in Brisbane, Australia every three years.

RioBotz Combot Tutorial - Part 2
in Combat Zone: Features
The iNDi 16x4 Pro Charge has both 110V AC and 12V DC inlets so that you can use it both indoors with the lincord provided or outdoors with the separate 12V leads.

BattleBots Returns!
in Combat Zone: Events
During April 21-26, about 64 bots brought their owners to Vellejo, CA for the much anticipated return of BattleBots to the public stage.

Original Sin
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
Original Sin has competed in the following events: RoboGames 2006, 2007, & 2008, ComBots Cup I & II, and Combots Texas Cup.

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №8 2009

Doing Big Things With Little Micros by Fred Eady
This month, we’re going to move away from the mechanics of robotic arts and focus on basic electronic principles that can be amplified to form the soul of a subservient mechatronic being.

RoboGames 2009 by Camp Peavy
This year, “Agus mulyana” and “Akbar Alexander” from Indonesia took the gold with a Tarantula-legged robot called “NEXT-116.”

Projects

The Navigator: Part 2 by John W. Molnar
Last time, we introduced the concept of a user friendly, self navigation system for larger vehicles such as rover platforms and boats. Now, let’s build the system! Here are the construction details for the three boards involved, plus a detailed overview of the software that makes it all tick.

Hagetaka: Part 3 by Andrew Alter
In this article, we will cover the advanced Gumstix-based onboard controller, power management system, supporting telepresence electronics, and the weapons system.

Accessories For The CheapBot-14 by Paul Verhage
I really enjoy using the CheapBot-14 robot controller that I described in my SERVO article in the June ‘09 issue. It’s a nice entry-level robot controller and I think it makes a great robotics kit (the Lawrence, KS 4H also seems to agree). However, if the CheapBot-14 is going to behave like a robot, then it needs to sense the world around it. So, this time I’ll describe some of those sensors.

Columns

Robytes by Jeff Eckert
Robytes | August 2009
Pneumatic Robotic Hand, The Crane of the Future, Ferreting Out Contraband, and More!

GeerHead by David Geer
Co-operative ASV Robots Autonomously Investigate Harmful Algal Blooms
The Robotic Embedded Systems Lab at USC, lead by Professor Gaurav Sukhatme, regularly deploys two ASVs into the Redondo Beach Marina to monitor the sea and take samples.

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | August 2009
Your Problems Solved Here.

Beginner Electronics by William Smith
Programming Microcontrollers
Learning to program microcontrollers is what every electronics beginner needs to put on their to-do list. Unless you’ve been living in a cave without Internet access, you have probably heard of the BASIC Stamp 2.

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Collecting Robot Memorabilia
Robotics tends to be a consuming passion. When we’re not building them, we often watch movies about robots, or read books or collect posters, or scout for art, toys, and other artifacts.

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
The Evolution Of Experimental Robots
Awhile back, I wrote about how we’ve built robots over the years and also wrote about the historical perspective of experimental robots. But what actually drove the designs? Page

Combat Zone

Mr. Self Destruct
in Combat Zone: Features
Mr. Self Destruct is a complete overhaul of my first large combat robot: a 60 lb angled bar spinner that fought at RoboGames in 2006.

Top Tips For Taps: Part 2
in Combat Zone: Features
In Part 1 (SERVO May ‘09) of this guide, we examined the theory of cutting threads and the different types of taps. This month, it’s time to get practical and learn some tricks and techniques for tapping!

Mounting Weapons: Blades and Pullys
in Combat Zone: Features
Alot of builders dream of creating a bot with an active weapon but are put off by the apparent complexity. How do you attach a blade to the axle?

Ohio Robot Club Holds 9th HORD Event
in Combat Zone: Events
Thirty insect weight robots clashed at the 9th House of Robotic Destruction (HORD) hosted by the Ohio Robotics Club (ORC) — a member of the Robot Fighting League (RFL) — and Cuyahoga Valley Career Center (CVCC) in Cleveland, OH in May.

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №9 2009

Robotics Software Engineering by Fulvio Mastrogiovanni
Get an introduction to the benefits of software engineering for robots, particularly the best practices in the development stages and specifically in complex robotic systems.

Creepy Hybrid: Part 1 by Alan Marconett
This unique “walking” robot combines wheels and legs to create a cost-effective platform.

Projects

Pulse Width Modulation Goes Digital by Bill Axsen
With this circuit, you can control the speed of a motor with a computer, connect a sensor array to track a light source, or just control speed without a variable transformer.

CCS Robotics by Fred Eady
Custom Computer Services is now offering a robotics development kit ... see what’s all inside!

Columns

Robytes by Jeff Eckert
Robytes | September 2009
Stimulating Robot Tidbits.

GeerHead by David Geer
The Draganflyer X6 UAV Copter
The Draganflyer X6 UAV is the lightest, most maneuverable unmanned miniature helicopter for its price, specially produced for the rigors of commercial applications inside and outside the military.

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | September 2009
Your Problems Solved Here.

Twin Tweaks
by Evan Woolley Bryce Woolley
Are You Ready To iARoC?
This year, we were once again brought back to the Del Mar Fairgrounds by the incomparable allure of a robotics competition, though this time we were only spectators. Yes, 2009 witnessed the second annual iARoC event — the International Autonomous Robotics Competition.

SERVO TankBot by Ron Hackett
SERVO Tankbot | September 2009
Adding an LCD to Your TankBot.

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Simple Brains - Going Back To The Basics
Microcontrollers like the BASIC STAMP, BasicX, Arduino, AVR, PIC, and all the others make short work of just about any robotics task.

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
Underwater Remotely Operated Vehicles
The name ‘Remotely Operated Vehicles’ can really apply to any vehicle that is controlled from a distance, which can include law enforcement robots, military robots, aerial vehicles, combat robots, and even remotely-controlled boats and planes.

Combat Zone

Your Robot Assignment Is Due
in Combat Zone: Features
You never really think of robot building and school work as similar, but you may be surprised. Consider this: Homework is given and the due date is established; a competition task is given and the competition date is listed. You the builder are like the student; wanting to do well but a victim to the evils of circumstance.

RioBotz Combat Tutorial: Materials
in Combat Zone: Features
Original Text by Professor Marco Antonio Meggiolaro; Summarized by Kevin M. Berry

Bay Area Robot Flights
in Combat Zone: Events
MetroCon is an Anime Convention that is held annually in Tampa, FL. This was the seventh annual year that MetroCon has been held, and it is the largest Anime Festival in the state of Florida.

Wheels For Drills
in Combat Zone: Features
Iwrote an article for the November ‘06 issue of SERVO that outlined how to convert the motors and gearboxes from cheap cordless drills for use as the drivetrain in smaller combat robots.

The Big B
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
The Big B has competed in: BattleBots 4.0, BattleBots 5.0, Steel Conflict 2, RoboGames 2005, February Fun Fest, RoboGames 2006, ComBots Cup II, RoboGames 2007, ComBots Cup III, RoboGames 2008, ComBots Texas Cup, and RoboGames 2009.

Departments

Bots In Brief | September 2009
Ghost Rider? Attack Of The Hornworm. Don't Drink The Water. Moth Head Bot.

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №10 2009

Rockin’ Robot Style by Joe Shearer
Former showbiz PIzza animatronic band members reunite in a "Rock-afire Explosion."

Robotics Software Engineering - Part 2 by Fulvio Mastrogiovanni
Current trends in software development for robots are discussed.

Projects

CCS Mechatronics by Fred Eady
This time we'll take a look at the softer side of robot construction and write some basic machine control component code using Custom Computer Services' C compiler.

Creepy Hyrbid - Part 2 by Alan Marconett
This time, we'll program the microcontroller and the servo controller board to complete this unique platform.

Build a Building Block: A Dual Serial Motor Controller by Martin Weiss
A serial interface will be used to facilitate commincation between the master and the motor controller, making this a great building block for a variety of applications.

Columns

Robytes by Jeff Eckert
Robytes | October 2009
Stimulating Robot Tidbits

GeerHead by David Geer
Adept Quattro Handles Solar Cells With Care
The Adept Quattro s650H is an industrial robot with four parallel arms mounted on a rotational body. The arms are extensions of four motors, one motor per appendage. These arms are a good fit for processing crystalline silicon wafers for solar cells as they produce more solar cells per hour than human employees do.

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | October 2009
Your Problems Solved Here.

Beginner Electronics by William Smith
PICkit 1 Programmer
The PICkit 1 is a leaded design so you can see all the components that make up the programmer, so things can easily be fixed if something fails on the board.

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Here Come the (Paper?) Robots!
At least once a month, I get email from a mom or grandparent asking for my advice about the best robot kit for their seven year old. Oh, and they don’t have much money to spend, so can the kit be under $20, and preferably under $10?

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
Robot Animal Strive to Match Humanoids in Realism
It didn’t take inventive designers and experimenters long to determine that creating realistic robot human beings was close to impossible.

Combat Zone

Shaka
in Combat Zone: Features
In late 2007, I began the design and construction of my first combat robot over three pounds: a 30 pound featherweight.

RioBotz Combot Tutorial summarized - Materials: Part 2
in Combat Zone: Features
Last month, SERVO summarized the first part of Chapter 3 — “Materials” — focusing on commonly used metals in combat bot building. This month, we switch focus to non-metals.

Coloring Titanium
in Combat Zone: Features
A curiosity about titanium is that its surface can be colored without paints or pigments; just using Coke (or Pepsi) in a technique called electrolysis or anodizing.

Gulf Coast Robotics Sports 2
in Combat Zone: Events
July 11th was the second Gulf Coast Robot Sports event at the Robot MarketPlace in Bradenton, FL. Fifteen robots showed up for a chance at one of the prizes, totaling over $150.

Thoughts of a New EO
in Combat Zone: Features
So, you’ve been building robots for a while and now you want to put on an event. Sounds easy enough, in theory.

Professor Chaos
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
Professor Chaos has competed in: RoboGames 2008 and RoboGames 2009.

Departments

Bots In Brief | October 2009
A Battery Of Balance, EyeBot Can See Y ou, 'Plane' And Simple UAV, Give Us A Hand, And More.

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year

Servo №11 2009

Servo №12 2009

Cerebot by Fred Eady
Meet Digilent's 32-bit PIC32MX-based learning tool that will serve as a controller for things like your robot's servos. Plus, there's a ton of peripheral modules for things like joysticks, LCDs, LEDs, and switches, to name a few.

Simulated Mars Mission with the GEARS-IDS Platform by R. Gene Turchin
GEARS "heavy-duty erector sets on steroids" made for the pefect platform as part of an Engineering Challenge Day at the STEM Innovation Center.

Projects

It’s About Time(ing)!  by Chuck Baird
Learn some different techniques using single and multiple virtual timers to fulfill a variety of robotic applications.

A Robot and Its CheapBot-08 Controller - Part 2 by L. Paul Verhage
Now that you have the cutest small robot ever created, it's time to find out about its line follower, proximity detector, and some future designs.

Columns

Robytes
Robytes | December 2009
Stimulating Robot Tidbits.

GeerHead by David Geer
Chiara - The Evolving Education-Research Robot
Chiara is a six-legged, arachnid/crab-like robot with a pincer arm that was born from the mind of Carnegie Mellon University Professor Dave Touretzky, along with PhD student Ethan Tira-Thompson and mechanical engineer/ product designer Gaku Sato.

Ask Mr. Roboto by Dennis Clark
Ask Mr. Roboto | December 2009
Your Problems Solved Here.

Robotics Resources by Gordon McComb
Looking Ahead, Looking To You
This issue marks the seven year anniversary of Robotics Resources. After some 85 installments, we’ve covered everything from yapping ‘bots to lighting up your creations with glow wire, to being the ultimate cheapskate, finding the best deals wherever they happen to be.

Beginner Electronics by William Smith
Microcontroller Fundamentals
As this is my last column, I wanted to finish with a topic I think needs to be covered. Many of the programming books I’ve read over the years tend to skip over a major concern for the beginner, which is how a microcontroller works and how to interface other electronics to it. This final article will cover the fundamentals of working with a microcontroller. I’ll use on one of my favorites: the Atom Nano.

Then and Now by Tom Carroll
Segway Inspires Balancing Robot Research
I normally jump right in, discussing the history and development of a particular type of robot and how that robot or the robot’s use has changed over the years. I’m going to digress away from my usual format and start with a technology and an individual who has changed robotics and the learning of robot science in a way that I personally feel no other individual has done before.

Combat Zone

Szalor 2.0
in Combat Zone: Features
The first thing I did when building my Antweight robot Szalor, was establish a design. After I had a design, it was time

Screws For You!
in Combat Zone: Features
For this month’s Parts Is Parts section, we dip once again into the bottomless well that is known as the RioBotz Combot Tutorial.

Franklin Institute 2009
in Combat Zone: Events
The 2009 Franklin Institute Robot Conflict was held by NERC on October 4th in Philadelphia, PA. This was the third annual competition at the institute, with numerous robots competing in the one, three, 12, 30 lb, and Sportsman classes.

Fighting Robots Invade Classic RC Raceways
in Combat Zone: Events
The Ohio Robotics Club (ORC) — a member of the Robot Fighting League (RFL) — held its tenth event, “House of Robotic Destruction Fall 2009” (HORD) at Classic RC Raceways in Akron, OH on September 19th 2009.

Pyromancer
in Combat Zone: Robot Profile
Pyromancer has competed in Fall W.H.R.E 2006, Mechwars 10, Rotunda Rumble, Motorama 2007, ComBots Texas Cup, and RoboGames 2009.

Free Download Servo magazine for 2009 year