My first HummBot circuit

Today I started my first preparations for the HummBot electronics. I have created a circuit using the following components:

• Arduino controller
• one Hitec Servo
• two Sharp IR sensors
• a breadboard
• a 7.2V battery pack

Using these components I constructed the following circuit:



The IR sensors are connected to the 5V, Gnd and one of the analog pins.
The Servo is connected to the Vin (7.2V), Gnd and one of the digital pins.
I created a program that checks both sensor values, and if the right sensor detects something the servo is turned right and if the left sensor detects something the servo is turned left.
Very basic, but nice to start with!

Arduino has arrived!

Today my new microcontroller and IR sensors have arrived! I ordered these 9 days ago at Robotshop.ca.



The microcontroller is the Arduino Diecimila and the IR sensors are Sharp GP2D15 sensors. I plan to use the Arduino and IR sensors for my new HummBot project. The Sharp IR sensors will be used as proximity detectors. Their default range is 24 cm, but they can be configured to a range between 10 and 80 cm.
The Arduino has a nice small size, so it will perfectly fit in my HummBot car. I plan to power it by a 7.2V accu pack that also powers the DC motor of the HummBot. This weekend I will start the first prototyping. To be continued!

Society of Robots

Today I ran into one of the best robotics forums I have seen so far: Society of Robots.
The forum is visited by a large group of active robot enthousiasts from all around the world. The site also provides a large list of very interesting robotics tutorials. Check it out for yourself!

H1ghlander, the 'real' hummer robot!

In 2005 Carnegie Mellon University reached third place in the DARPA challenge with their h1ghlander robot. The h1ghlander is based on a 1999 Hummer H1, and thus provides a perfect example for my HummBot project!

HummBot, start your engine!

The last days I have been reading a lot about the DARPA challenge with all the spectacular robotic cars. See also one of my previous posts. This inspired me to start a new robot project: build my own robotic car! Of course I don't have the skills, nor the money to build a real car, but I will try to convert a RC car into a robot. In my attic I found the perfect RC car: a Tamiya Hummer! This 1:12 model provides enough space for the electronics.

The HummBot, as I will call the hummer robot, will be controlled by an Arduino board and I will start with a few IR sensors to sense the distance to surrounding obstacles. After that I plan to add more sensors like Ultrasonic sensors, compass module, accelerometer, camera, ... I think I should start saving some money!

Here two pictures of what the HummBot looks like today. This is still the bare tamiya kit. I will first give it some better painting and after that I will start integrating the first electronics. Will be continued!

The Arduino board

The 50 euro robot project that Albert van Breemen published on his Personal Robotics site made me enthousiastic for the Arduino microcontroller. The Arduino is a very cheap and very popular open-source microcontroller based on the ATmega168 processor. The main advantage of the Arduino is that there is a huge number of enthousiasts around the world that have build (robotics) projects based on the Arduino. So there are thousands of projects that can be found on the internet that are very useful to get you started. Here is just a short list of some interesting sites:

• Official Arduino site
• Arduino tutorial
• Electronics tutorial using the Arduino
• The Make blog Arduino overview

The Arduino can be programmed in a C-like programming language. Since the Arduino is open source, all development software is for free! The complete Arduino development environment can be downloaded from the Arduino home page. This environment will give you a great start with 160 MB of tools, tutorials and example code.

Last week I ordered dthe Arduino Diecimila USB board via Robotshop.ca. The price? Only $38,95 which is a little more than 26 euro!

If you're not enthousiastic yet, please have a look at this fun video that introduces the Arduino board:

More Volkwagen robots!

It looks like Volkwagen provides an ideal robot platform! In my previous post I already showed a video of a VW Golf GTI robot. Also Stanford University has chosen VW for their robotic cars. In 2005 they won first prize the yearly DARPA challenge with Stanley, a robot car based on a VW Touareg. In 2007 Stanford won second prize in the same contest with Junior, a robot car based on a VW Passat!

The winning Stanley:


The second prize winning Junior: