LEGO® kits in Space

Last Monday, the Space Shuttle Endeavour lifted off to its last journey to Space, and on board she has a very special pay-load: a bunch of LEGO® kits.
These are be the very first LEGO® kits that ever have travelled into space (there have been some pre-glued models so far only) as engineers were scared of loose parts floating around and getting sucked into the Shuttle's ventilation; Astronaut Cady Coleman (well-known for her recent ISS-Earth flute duet with Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson) will build some models from them in a clear glove box on board of the ISS in order to demonstrate to children the effects of zero gravity, both on single parts as well as on some simple LEGO® machines.

I'm looking forward to the videos!

The building instructions for these models will be available for download on LegoSpace.com so we earthlings can create them also on the ground.

Update 1: Joe Meno from Brickjournal hinted me to the fact that these are not the first LEGO® kits in space: on board of an earlier mission there were two CITY Space shuttle kits. However, the kits of the mission at hand will still be the first ones ever built in space.
Thanks, Joe!
Update 2: The information that all of the pre-built models that have been sent to Space so far have been glued seems to be unconfirmed also. Does any of our readers have additional knowledge about that fact? If so, please tell us.

Celebrating MINDSTORMS with a Remix - Part 3

The ROBOTMAK3RS continued their celebration of the 25th Anniversary of MINDSTORMS through these Fall and Winter remix projects. Each ROBOTMAK3R was tasked with selecting one LEGO set of their choice and combining it with a MINDSTORMS set. Below are the five amazing models they came up with. Braill3 by Jerry Nicholls Braill3 is an EV3-based LEGO Braille bricks reader. This robot uses its fingertip, made from three touch switches, to read messages written using the LEGO Braille bricks and will speak out what it detected. If it sees a simple maths problem it will attempt to solve it and give the answer as well. To learn more about the process of creating this machine, read Jerry's blog . Braill3 can be viewed here . Set Review: The Braille Bricks set is well thought out. The ratios of the letters is suitable for general use and the addition of some punctuation and arithmetic operators is excellent. There is a card showing what bricks there are and their quantities, but no form of sort...

Celebrating MINDSTORMS with a Remix - Part 2

The ROBOTMAK3RS continued their celebration of the 25th Anniversary of MINDSTORMS through these summer and fall remix projects. Each ROBOTMAK3R was tasked with selecting one LEGO set of their choice and combining it with a MINDSTORMS set. Below are the five amazing models they came up with. Remote controlled material handle r by Jozua van Ravenhorst (aka Mr Jo) This remix combines the LEGO Technic Material Handler (42144) with MINDSTORMS EV3 (31313) It uses the power of pneumatic cylinders to move objects around. By using a bluetooth remote control, very precise movements can be made with this model. Touch sensors in the base chassis prevent the turret twisting the cables that go through the turntable to much. The program has several protections to prevent over pressurizing the system for each of the 3 individual pumps and valves that control the 2 booms and claws. The real version of this machine is mostly used in waste material sites to bring the material to machines that sort and...

Celebrating 25 Years of MINDSTORMS

In celebration of the 25th Anniversary of MINDSTORMS, we take a trip through history. Please also visit ROBOTMAK3RS Community every week as we highlight different projects all through 2023 in celebration of the anniversary. Some of the early history is based on the content shared by Coder Shah in our MINDSTORMS EV3 Community Group . Some of the text and links may have been edited from his original posts for consistency and clarity. 1984 - Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen watched a TV program called "Talking Turtle," where MIT professor Seymour Papert demonstrated how children could control robot "turtles" using LOGO, a programming language he developed. 1988 - The collaboration between MIT and LEGO resulted in LEGO TC Logo in 1988, which allowed students to control LEGO models using computer commands. The video shows Papert demonstrating TC Logo. 1990 - LEGO TC Logo was hampered since the robots you built had to be tethered to a personal computer. LEGO and MIT...

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