ROBOTMAK3RS Blog

Claude Baumann and his students have produced yet another outstanding combination of LEGO engineering, digital hardware prototyping, and innovative programming. Taking inspiration from some of the LEGO boats that have come along in the past, the team set out to make a LEGO boat that could cross a significant sized lake. The result was Serendipity, a autonomous waypoint-navigating craft with a custom GPS sensor. In their normal fashion, they've provided a detailed log of their progress on this project, from beginning to end - and it's something I'd really suggest any budding engineer (LEGO or otherwise) read. A lot of people look at an end result and are amazed by it... but the really amazing thing to me is the process to get to it. The inspiration, the wrong turns, the problems anticipated and the surprises learned the hard way. Claude's team has done an admirable job documenting all this, and for anyone who's been involved in such a project it's enlightening t...

Someday, the hardware police are going to come and take away my toys, citing me for criminal abuse. Until then, I'll continue to see what an NXT can handle... and what I can learn in the process. On a recent trip to Niagara Falls, I was fascinated again with this huge, impressive natural feature. And thinking about the foolhardy souls that over the years have tried to survive going over the falls in a barrel, I did what was natural for me - thought about the NXT doing it. Of course, getting permission to throw something over Niagara Falls is unlikely to happen... and it's dangerous, and retrieving it would be extremely difficult. But I could certainly do some test runs... so was born the "NXT in a barrel". I used an NXT slid into a 4" PVC pipe segment, sealed tightly at either end with re movable closeout plugs. To keep it from bouncing around inside, I used a hot-wire cutter to shape foam "bulkheads" to support and lock the NXT into place within the tu...

This is a fantastic looking boat that is controlled by a NXT. From what I can tell from the Brickshelf photos, steering is done with a NXT motor and the dual props are controlled by the NXT via some PowerFunctions motors. I love the pneumatic tubing that gives the boat some shape. The boat is controlled by a mobile phone via Bluetooth. More (italian) info here - hobbymedia.it/24101/lego-nxt-rc-boat-barca-radiocomandata-con-mindstorms-nxt -- Damien Kee www.theNXTclassroom.com via Make

I actually started wondering about LEGO robotic boats a while back, when some threads on the NXTasy forums brought them up (as well as submarines ). There were two main problems I could see for a "pure LEGO" water-craft: (1) Flotation (which could perhaps be solved by LEGO boat hulls, which re-entered the LEGO scene in a number of recent City sets, such as the Fireboat ( #7906 ), City Harbor ( #7994 ), and the Speedboat ( #7244 )), and (2) Propulsion. I did not want to deal with the risk of rotating seals for propeller shafts etc., so I figured on having all the electronics (including motors) above the waterline, with the propeller drive shafts either entering the water at an angle, or being driven by pure mechanical linkages to a completely submerged prop. But upon getting two of the Fireboat sets for the hulls, I decided to try using the stock LEGO underwater motors that come with these sets. The result was Serenity (posted on NXTlog) , a pure-LEGO robotic ( not remote c...