ROBOTMAK3RS Blog

This week's inspiration is to build a robot that can play against you in a physical game, such as connect four, checkers, etc. The challenges with such robots can include not only the programming challenge of giving the robot AI (Artificial Intelligence) so that it can play skillfully, but also the building challenge of enabling the robot to maipulate game pieces. Of course, both of these challenges can be greatly reduced if you want. For example, instead of making the robot play "smart", you may be able to program the robot to simply move randomly; it will most likely be easier to beat, but at least it could still play. To get the minimum building challenge, the robot could have the user input the game status, and then tell you where to play for itself. There are several great examples of game-playing robots. Bryan Bonahoom made a Tic-Tac-Toe playing robot that can "read" the board and make moves all by itself. You can see his robot on the MINDSTORMS website, h...

This week's inspiration is to design a robotic candy or soda dispenser (or a whatever-you-want-dispenser). Can you make a robot that holds your candy/soda/snacks and dispenses them on demand? Such a robot can be as simple as a container with a door on it, or as complicated as something that requires coins or a password/secure card and drops items one-by-one onto an output tray while keeping the rest protected. And of course, after accomplishing such an engineering feat, surely your mom wouldn't mind donating some... "contents"... for your robot, right? :) -Jonathan P.S. The rest of the posts in this series can be seen here .

In the RIS days, it was hard to make a robot that could map out its surroundings using only LEGO's official parts, since there was no distance sensor like the US sensor. Now with the NXT, it can be a lot easier. This week's inspiration is to create a robot that can at least partially map out obstacles in its surroundings. For example, can your robot display a "map" of a room, showing where the obstacles are in it? If you wanted to take it even further, you could try to make the robot "store" the map in memory and then navigate around obstacles using the map (this might be pretty advanced, since you would need a system to tell the robot its position, so that it would know if it was getting near the position of an object on the map). One very nice example of a radar robot was posted on the blog earlier, here . This robot spun around 360 degrees and mapped objects within a certain range, like radar. This method seems relatively easy, but has the drawback of onl...

This week's inspiration is to build a robot that can be controlled by a human. Although remote controlled robots may seem relatively easy to program and perhaps build, they don't have to be. Building and programming the remote control system can be a big challenge by itself. In addition, a robot that is remote controlled can still have many autonomous functions so that the driver doesn't have too many things to keep track of. For example, since I'm competing in FTC, a competition involving remote controlled robots part of the time, I'm constantly looking for ways to program my team's robot to either help the driver or take care of functions entirely so that the driver doesn't need to worry about it. One fun application of remote controlled robots is a Battle Bots game, where multiple robots try to flip or disable their opponents. Once I made a remote controlled robot to battle with some of my siblings' Spybots. Racing is another possible application of r...

After spending so much time building robots, wouldn't it be nice to sit back and play some games... with your NXT! This week's inspiration is to make a game using the NXT. This could be a video game using the NXT display screen and sensors/motors for controls, but it could also be a more mechanical robot, such as a pinball machine. Some nice examples of robotic games include this Helicopter video game and this pinball machine . There's also a very extensive tutorial on making NXT video games here . -Jonathan P.S. You can see other posts in this series here .

Although LEGO doesn't like to sell or support weapon-products, let's face it... robotic weapons are lots of fun! Besides the "imagination" factor, weapons can have "practical" uses as well. For example, two or more zamor-shooting, repeating rifles/pistols can make for a great LEGO "Paintball" match! (even if it is a little close-range :) ) You can make many different kinds of NXT weapons. Some ideas include crossbows, pistols, rifles, machine guns, catapults, and slingshots. Below are some resources that you might find helpful if you want to make one. First, there's Forbidden LEGO by No Starch, which gives instructions for making some neat-looking LEGO weapons. Although it's not NXT-related, it looks like it would be easy to interface the models with the NXT. You can also get some great inspiration from the models. Some current NXT weapons include my Beam Weapon (scroll down) and robots entered in NXTasy's "Throw Me!" Contes...

Although there are many robots called butlers (which usually make drinks), I'm using the term more loosely. In this case, I'm referring to robots that assist you in any way related to meals/eating. For example, can you make a robot shake salt and pepper on your food where, when, and how much you want? Maybe the robot can mix up a drink for you? How about setting your place when you're almost ready to eat? There are many possibilities for this category. You could even try to make a robot help prepare a meal or clean up from it. One issue you may need to consider when making a butler robot is how to make it work with non-LEGO materials. For example, the robot might need to work with salt and pepper shakers, cups, utensils, etc. Since these objects' dimensions aren't made to work with LEGOs, you may need pieces that are pliable or elastic. Rubber pieces usually work well, such as the 1x2 rubber pieces that come with the retail kit. Tires can also come in handy. -Jonath...

One of the first robots I tried to make without instructions, back in the RIS days, was an all-terrain autonomous rover. These robots are nice in that they don't have to be too hard to build or program, but they can have many challenges and thinking problems to overcome, and they can stimulate many creative ideas and designs. Although an all-terrain rover should technically be able to traverse any terrain, we're talking about NXT robots, so you might want to limit yourself to inside your house. Since your robot needs to move around without you controlling it, you'll need to give it the capability to detect and respond to (or not be affected by) potentially problematic situations. Aside from the obvious one of walls and other simple obstacles, these may include: - Steep dropoffs - Short overhangs: sometimes a ledge or other object may block the top of your robot instead of the bottom. In this situation, a mechanism for detecting obstacles soley on the ground level would no...

EDIT : You can see a robot that does this sort of thing here . This week's inspiration is somewhat advanced: construction robots. Can you make a robot that builds something, on its own, out of LEGOs? It doesn't have to be another robot, or even something very complicated. You could have a robot build a wall, for example. Or you could have a pallet of pieces, arranged in the right order, that a robot selects and puts together on a workspace. You can see some (very) elaborate examples of construction robots in the Aircraft Factory and Car Factory . Obviously, you probably wouldn't make something like this, but maybe a small, simpler, version would be possible. Let us know if you make one! -Jonathan P.S. See other posts in this blog series here .

One interesting kind of robots is bionic robots, or robots that humans can wear to gain extra capabilities. Some examples of these robots are my A27 Bionic Glove and Bionic Helmet . So this week's inspiration is to build some sort of bionic apparatus that you wear and that gives you one or more extra capabilities. Some examples include extending grabber arms, night vision (or object detection at night), weapons, and decoders (make your own code, like a color code, and a robot that can read and decipher it). Some places to wear a robot include on your arm/wrist, in your pocket, on your leg, and on your back as a backpack. A couple issues to consider when making a bionic apparatus are fit and weight. With solid, blocky LEGO building pieces, it can be pretty hard to make a robot that fits securely and, especially, comfortably. And by the way, even if the robot seems to have a comfortable fit, wear it around for 10 minutes and you might change your mind! :-) When trying to get the fi...

A really cool LEGO project concept is the Great Ball Contraption ( video , recent blogs , Google ), where you design a series of modules ( general examples , NXT examples ) to move small LEGO sports balls around. Talking some inspiration from this, here is a variation that you might try for a fun challenge with your NXT set and any other LEGO parts you have to add to it: Move the larger NXT balls around, and for an extra challenge, make the motion continuous so that the balls each travel in a continuous path in, around, and/or through and back to the start of your machine without any human help. Never mind about modules and standards for multiple builders for now, just see how interesting of a way you can come up with to keep the NXT balls in continuous motion. Here is an example NXT Ball Roller Coaster with building instructions for a single NXT retail kit that does this: Obviously the more additional parts you have the more interesting it could get. I would love to see somebody do ...

This week's Robot Inspiration might sound a little advanced: make a robot that interacts with the computer. However, this can actually be quite easy, while opening up a host of new applications. As I posted about here and here , you can use RoboRealm to easily make robots interact with the computer in a variety of ways. Now RoboRealm has added more computer capability to their software. Keyboard: Besides taking input from the keyboard, you can make a robot control the keyboard. In other words, I could have my robot write a post on this blog! In terms of taking input from the keyboard, here's a video of a "NXT Messenger" I made using RoboRealm. With the range of BT, I can type a message up here in my room, and my mom can read it in the kitchen, two floors down, on the NXT brick! (sorry for the low quality of the NXT screen... putting the video in the blogger player made it much harder to read the text on the NXT screen) Mouse: Now RoboRealm lets you get the coordinat...

Kirk Backstrom did an excellent post on Saturday about self balancing robots. One of Kirk's points was that there are a lot of types of robots that can be made with this technology that hasn't been done yet with the NXT - so most people design robots that only balance or move (front / back and turn). But for me personally, after spending days working on my self balancing bike for the new Idea book , spending a whole weekend tuning the control system of a self-balancing robot is not my idea of fun: There are many ways you can achieve a self balancing robots even if you dont want to get your hands dirty with low level language programming and heavy control engineering theory. Here are some suggestions on how to achieve a self balancing robots without the complexity of having to implement a balancing algorithm in NXT: (1) For Segway type vehciles, Make the diameter of the wheel so big that it behaves more like the Hailfire Droid tank wheel. The secret here is to lower the centre o...

Last Saturday, Jonathan began a new blog series and discussed building robots that move in non-traditional ways, including vertically. We'll continue the series today by introducing the concept of Robosurgery. The picture shown here is the da Vinci Surgical System - the surgeon (on the left) uses a console to control the movements of the robot on the right. With this system, the surgeon "sees" what the robot sees, at a very detailed level. Imagine the surgeon needing to make a cut of .1mm depth - the human hand would most likely be incapable of performing this type of action - but the robot can do it with ease. You can download a PDF chapter (1MB) that was not included in the Idea Book by clicking here. This chapter discusses Robosurgery in more detail as well as provide a building challenge for you. My original concept for this chapter was to try and use 2 NXT kits - one would be my "console" which would consist of a remote control device using Bluetooth....

Have you ever had difficulty thinking of a good robot to make? Many times, some inspiration can help you think of a good idea. So we're starting a new blog series to provide ideas for robots. Each week, on Saturday, one of the contributors will post a robot idea on the blog. This may include examples, techniques, and anything else that might be helpful. We welcome any feedback on the posts, so please comment and tell us what you think. Any preferences for a certain type of robot ideas? (Such as simple or complex, programming- or building-focused, single-NXT or multiple-NXT, etc.). Here's the first inspiration: Vertical-Moving Robots Most mobile NXT robots move on the ground or something horizontal. So how about making something that moves in the other direction... up! There are several different kinds of robots that move vertically. Some examples include: "Chimmney-Climbing" robot: this kind of robot uses multiple walls surounding it (like the inside of a box) to move...