FEZ robot

While waiting for my FEZ kit to arrive I ran into the following short video which gives a nice idea of what I can expect:

FEZ Mini Robot Demo from Szymon Kobalczyk on Vimeo.

Microsoft DevDays

Last week I visited the Microsoft DevDays in Den Haag. During this two day conference Rob Miles was one of the speakers. He introduced me to the .NET Micro Framework which allows us to develop embedded (robot) code in .NET with C#.
Rob's enthusiastic lecture relit the smoldering robotics fire in me. Having spent many hours with robots in 2007/2008, I somehow lost interest and got caught up with other stuff in life. It's about time to resume my robotics journey and the .NET Micro Framework will be the first new step.
As a start I read through the TinyCLR web site and ordered the FEZ Mini Robot Kit that allows me to start experimenting with NETMF.

Unmanned vehicles

The next video shows them all: robot planes, helis, rockets, boats, submarines, cars, tanks and more!
This very impressive video is made by the AUVSI - The Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International. Have fun!

Birth of a HummBot!

Have a look at this very funny video and witness the birth of a HummBot :-)

Arducopter

This guy has attached an Arduino board to a RC helicopter. Using the accelerometer of a Wii controller the Arduino adjusts the position of the main rotors based on the tilt position of the heli. Very cool, I can't wait to see it flying!

Robot Robin Hood

The manufacturers of the popular i-SOBOT have made a cool extension: the robot archer! The robot uses a miniature bow and arrow to shoot some targets. Very nice.

Helicopter Robots

Although the HummBot project is far from finished, I do like to think about future projects from time to time. One idea that came to mind is to create an autonomous helicopter.
I found the following videos on youtube that gave some inspiration.

These guys have attached two colored balls to their helicopter such that a computer can follow the movements of the heli and make adjustements via the remote control.



In the following video an array of IR lights is aimed at the helicopter which has reflectors attached to it. This again allows a computer to track the movements and make adjustments via the remote control.