DominoBotNXT w/MotorMux
This page is dedicated to the further enhancements that I have done to DominoBotNXT. For more info on the original DominoBotNXT, have a look here. One of the drawbacks of the original was that due to the 3 motor limit, it had to backup to properly place dominos. This was because the domino-placing component was tied directly to the drive wheels. So, as it drove forward, a domino would make its way to being placed…
Review – TechnoStuff PIR (Passive Infrared) Sensor
ne of my early Mindstorms projects was to build a fire extinguishing robot. I did this using the parts I had at the time. It was based on a walker platform and used a pneumatic circut to "blow" the fire out when detected. It worked reasonably well with the provided light sensor. Recently, I discovered the PIR (Passive Infrared Sensor) from TechnoStuff. This sensor was built to detect infrared heat and seemed to be a…
Review – TechnoStuff DIRPD Sensor – Review
One of the my challenges was to build a bot that could effectively avoid obstacles before it hit them. My first attempt was to use the Lego Light sensor and the RCX to do this. The RCX would send out IR pulses and the Light Sensor would be used to read them and, based on how long they took to get back to the Light Sensor, could determine proximity. This worked realively well, with the…
Sets
Below is a list of some of my collection. It consists primarily of Technic and Mindstorms medium to large sets. It does not contain a listing for all the parts that I have accumulated over the years. I estimate that I have over 50,000 parts in my collection. Set Number / Name Pcs. Own Total Pcs. 3800 Ultimate Builders Set 316 1 316 3801 Ultimate Accessory Set 45 1 45 3803 RIS Upgrade Kit 65 1…
Climber
Climber - One day while browsing the LEGO Mindstorms site, I noticed some pictures about a show in Germany. LEGO had built 2 cool wall climbing robots to help market the product. I was amazed at the design and capabilities that they had and wanted to find out just how hard it would be to build something like this and have it actually work. It was quite a challenge. Building the components was the easy…
DominoBot 2
DominoBot 2 was my take on re-creating my original DominoBot. After I had finished the original, I found ways to make it more efficient and better at what the original did. I also did not have the limitations of the parts supplied with the RIS and UBS sets. One of the parts that needed re-designing was the mechanism used to force domino's out of the chamber. The original tended to have difficulties at times. I…
WallFollower
Wall Follower was one of those "proof-of-concepts" robots. The intent was to build something small and compact that was fast and versatile. Wall Follower can navigate around a room, on a table, in a maze, whatever. It is built from one of the basic robot platforms in the Mindstorms Contructopedia. Motion is done by 2 motors, each of which can steer by removing power to one. The main sensor is the DIRPD sensor (grey) mounted…
Spaz
Spaz is my take on the famous LegWay robot first built by Steve Hassenplug. The version here is not quite the same as Steve's, but more like the one built by Philo called "Yet Another LegWay". The difference being, I did not have the special distance sensors that LegWay uses. Instead, Philo built a version that uses the regular Lego light sensors. (more…)
RopeClimber
Rope Climber has been built for the rtlToronto Lego Robotics Event - Rope Climbing. In a nutshell - build a robot that can find and climb a rope. Sounds easy right? Not! In the tradition of rtlToronto, there are some interesting rules to make this more challenging. First off - the robot must fit within a 8x8x8 square on start. The trick - the rope is hanging 12 inches off the ground. The robot must…
PicoCam
PicoCam was built as a proof of concept. Its purpose was simple, navigate an area using typical avoidance routines while capturing live wireless video/audio and transmitting it to a receiver. The was never really completed because I had other ideas The pictures shown here are of the final version, with working navigation, but I did not bother going the last step to get the live video to display (even though it will work). (more…)