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National Robotics Day/Week: What Did You Do? — Parallax Forums

National Robotics Day/Week: What Did You Do?

ercoerco Posts: 20,256
edited 2014-04-27 17:24 in Robotics
Me? Nada, I was busy driving 2070 miles on vacation.

You?

Comments

  • bomberbomber Posts: 297
    edited 2014-04-26 00:31
    On the robotics side of things I was working on some performance optimization of the GUI code on my Eddie robot platform. That and seeing how possible it would be to get Eddie to be able to deploy a Boe-Bot. Also, working on getting the robotics club local to us acquainted with Parallax bots (They currently use Vex and want to move on to something more 'real-world' style).
  • RobotWorkshopRobotWorkshop Posts: 2,307
    edited 2014-04-26 05:36
    erco wrote: »
    Me? Nada, I was busy driving 2070 miles on vacation.

    You?

    I spent some time updating and adding more content to my new robot website:

    http://www.robotworkshop.com/robotweb/

    Also pulled out some unfinished robot projects to try and get them wrapped up and documented.

    Robert
  • WhitWhit Posts: 4,191
    edited 2014-04-26 06:20
    Nothing this year either - It was the week before Holy Week. I hated to miss all the action.

    @Robert - Amazing website!
  • Beau SchwabeBeau Schwabe Posts: 6,566
    edited 2014-04-26 13:47
    Does this count? ...

    I was able to 3D print a few things last night ... A couple of different sized bobbins for an RFID project (White), Parabolic Sound Triangulation (PST) project (Green), Electret microphone holders for PST project (Black) <-- Thinking on re-printing the MIC clips so that two or four MIC's can be used differentially on the same Parabola. Right now Proof of concept will use just one to determine the amount of gain the parabola contributes.
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  • RobotWorkshopRobotWorkshop Posts: 2,307
    edited 2014-04-26 14:24
    Does this count? ...

    I was able to 3D print a few things last night ... A couple of different sized bobbins for an RFID project (White), Parabolic Sound Triangulation (PST) project (Green), Electret microphone holders for PST project (Black) <-- Thinking on re-printing the MIC clips so that two or four MIC's can be used differentially on the same Parabola. Right now Proof of concept will use just one to determine the amount of gain the parabola contributes.

    Hey Beau,

    This page may give you some good ideas for sound triangulation!

    http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/COMMS/ear/ear.htm

    Nothing like learning from the past. I know they used something similar in WWII to help position Anti-aircraft searchlights but that page above has all sorts of others as well.

    In particular someone out to use these in a movie somehow:

    http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/COMMS/ear/German%201917a.jpg

    http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/COMMS/ear/personal%20parabolic.jpg

    Robert
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    edited 2014-04-26 14:48
    Didn't someone make a nice clear acrylic reflector for the PING to increase its range and make it more directional? IIRC it was pricey, but that would be a nice thing to 3D print.
  • Beau SchwabeBeau Schwabe Posts: 6,566
    edited 2014-04-26 14:58
    RobotWorkshop, thanks... already saw that link ... funny.

    erco, I think it was more of an acrylic parabolic ribbon or trough. Ultimately what I would like to do is re-print the MIC holders so that it would hold 4 of them on each parabola dish and differentially compare opposite microphones. That way common mode noise would drop out, and the signal to noise ratio should be really high and be able to pinpoint sound position within each parabolic field to a reasonable accuracy.
  • TtailspinTtailspin Posts: 1,326
    edited 2014-04-26 20:12
    Does winding a radio coil, and planning the "Parts Containment System" count?...
    AM_Radio_Cabinet_Parts.jpg
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  • W9GFOW9GFO Posts: 4,010
    edited 2014-04-26 21:15
  • Ken GraceyKen Gracey Posts: 7,392
    edited 2014-04-26 21:47
    W9GFO wrote: »
    This is what I was doing...

    Hmm - Columbia River Gorge just west of Hood River, looking east?

    Ken Gracey <= holy robots, I just made my 5,000th post on our forums
  • jazzedjazzed Posts: 11,803
    edited 2014-04-26 22:09
    @W9GFO, that is soooo awesome! Thanks for sharing.
    Ken Gracey wrote: »
    Ken Gracey <= holy robots, I just made my 5,000th post on our forums
    LOL! Stop posting now before it's too late ;-)
  • W9GFOW9GFO Posts: 4,010
    edited 2014-04-26 22:25
    Ken Gracey wrote: »
    Hmm - Columbia River Gorge just west of Hood River, looking east?

    Ken Gracey <= holy robots, I just made my 5,000th post on our forums

    Yay - five stars for you!

    But no, it is looking west over Riffe lake 19 miles due north of Mt St helens. The site is called Dog Mt, and has been flown by hang gliders since the 70s.
  • Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi) Posts: 23,514
    edited 2014-04-26 22:41
    I made rubber band gun kits for my HS robotics students' latest ActivityBot project, "Search 'n' Destroy."

    attachment.php?attachmentid=108373&d=1398576976

    It uses a scanning Ping))) to locate the cardboard targets and the 12-shot repeating rubber band gun to take them out. The ultimate goal is an autonomous program that does it all. But the intermediate goal is to teach them to think algorithmically by letting them find and shoot the targets "blind" via an XBee link (i.e. scan 160 degrees for a list of distances, locate the center of the the first target, turn the bot to face it, move to the optimum firing distance, fire, then make sure the target has fallen, etc.). IOW, they will not be allowed to watch their robots, except through the XBee data link, forcing them to deal with the sensor data only. From there, they can modify their programs to do the actual decision making.

    -Phil
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  • Martin_HMartin_H Posts: 4,051
    edited 2014-04-27 04:11
    I disassembled a broken printer to harvest parts. Stepper motors and some belts looked good, but there was no metal rods worth salvaging.
  • prof_brainoprof_braino Posts: 4,313
    edited 2014-04-27 10:05
    Tried to get in on a group build of Cerberus delta printers.
    Worked on I2C drivers for GY-80 IMU.
    Tried to move a pile of super accurate very expensive long range distance sensors.
    Proof read a bunch of documentation for a lady writing a book on fractals. (I assume she's a lady, she's not my wife)

    Didn't actually touch any of the robots, unless we count tripping over the ones in front of my workbench (placed there so I don't forget to work on them for national robotics week).
  • NikosGNikosG Posts: 705
    edited 2014-04-27 10:59
    I worked with an Egg-bot and I painted some eggs using SVG files from thingiverse.com


    attachment.php?attachmentid=108377&d=1398621088

    And of course I started the Hacking of the eggbot
    The interesting thing is that trying to empty the eggs I made a new device: An egg-blower! borrowing some electric parts from the Artist painting mechanism.....
    All the stuff is still in experimental stage....

    P.s All the eggs were from my parent's farm. I kept the inside of the eggs and I ate a lot of omelets!
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  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    edited 2014-04-27 17:24
    Wow, a lot of amazing individual efforts here, kudos to you guys. Especially Nikos, who's not even in the USA for "National" (USA) Robotics Week!

    Curiously, nobody so far mentioned participated in an "officially sanctioned" NRW event. I still say the low participation is due to a poor choice of a week, constantly colliding with Tax day (April 15) and occasionally spring break and Easter. If this country wants to get robotics in high gear, they need to reschedule. Some lady at iRobot who sits on the board for NRW and does the coordination vigorously defends the current schedule for some reason.
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