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Category Archives: robotics
Do You Know Where Your Drone is Headed? HJWYDK Article Explores Limits of MEMS Sensors
Knowing in what absolute direction your robot is pointed can be crucial, and expensive systems like those used by NASA on Mars are capable of calculating this six-dimensional heading vector to within around one degree RMS, but they are fairly expensive. If you want similar accuracy on a hacker budget, …read more
Posted in compass, Hackaday Columns, heading, HJWYDK, MEMS, robotics, science
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A 3D Printed Robotic Chariot for Your Phone
As we’ve said many times in the past, the wide availability of low-cost modular components has really lowered the barrier to entry for many complex projects which previously would have been nigh-on impossible for the hobbyist to tackle. The field of robotics has especially exploded over the last few years, as now even $100 can put together a robust robotics experimentation platform which a decade ago might have been the subject of a DARPA grant.
But what if you want to go even lower? What’s the cheapest and easiest way to put together something like a telepresence robot? That’s exactly …read more
Posted in 3D printed robot, ESP8266, gear motor, L298N, Microcontrollers, robotics, robots hacks, rover
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Inventors Chasing Their Dreams; What It’s Like to Quit Your Job and Hack
The phrase “Hindsight is 20/20” is one of those things that we all say from time to time, but rarely have a chance to truly appreciate to the fullest. Taken in the most literal context, it means that once you know the end result of a particular scenario, you can look back and clearly see the progression towards that now inescapable endgame. For example, if you’re stuck on the couch with a bad case of food poisoning, you might employ the phrase “Hindsight is 20/20” to describe the decision a few days prior to eat that food truck sushi.
Then …read more
Welding Robot Takes on a Hot, Dirty, Dangerous Job
They used to say that robots would take over the jobs too dirty or dangerous for humans. That is exactly what [Joel Sullivan] had in mind when he created this welding robot. [Joel] designed the robot for the OSB industry. No, that’s not a new operating system, it’s short for Oriented Strand Board. An engineered lumber, OSB is made of strands (or chips) of wood. It’s similar to plywood but doesn’t require large thin sheets of lumber. To make a panel of OSB, a 5-inch thick matt of wood chips is mixed with glue and compressed down to 5/16″ at …read more
Posted in lumber, oriented strand board, osb, robotics, robots hacks, welder, welding
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SMORES Robot Finds Its Own Way To The Campfire
Robots that can dynamically reconfigure themselves to adapt to their environments offer a promising advantage over their less dynamic cousins. Researchers have been working through all the challenges of realizing that potential: hardware, software, and all the interactions in between. On the software end of the spectrum, a team at University of Pennsylvania’s ModLab has been working on a robot that can autonomously choose a configuration to best fit its task at hand.
We’ve recently done an overview of modular robots, and we noted that coordination and control are persistent challenges in this area. The robot in this particular demonstration …read more
One-Legged Jumping Robot Shows That Control Is Everything
Robots that can jump have been seen before, but a robot that jumps all the time is a little different. Salto-1P is a one-legged jumping robot at UC Berkeley, and back in 2017 it demonstrated the ability to hop continuously with enough control to keep itself balanced. Since then it has been taught some new tricks; having moved beyond basic stability it can now jump around and upon things with an impressive degree of control.
Key to doing this is the ability to plant its single foot exactly where it wants, which allows for more complex behaviors such as hopping …read more
Posted in inverted pendulum, jumping, motion capture, motion control, one-legged, pogo, robot, robotics, robots hacks, salto-1p, slip, uc berkeley
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Gesture Control without Fancy Sensors, Just Pots and Weights
[Dennis] aims to make robotic control a more intuitive affair by ditching joysticks and buttons, and using wireless gesture controls in their place. What’s curious is that there isn’t an accelerometer or gyro anywhere to be seen in his Palm Power! project.
The gesture sensing consists not of a fancy IMU, but of two potentiometers (one for each axis) with offset weights attached to the shafts. When the hand tilts, the weights turn the shafts of the pots, and the resulting readings are turned into motion commands and sent over Bluetooth. The design certainly has a what-you-see-is-what-you-get aspect to it, …read more
Posted in diy, gesture control, Joystick, motion control, pendulum, pot, robotics, robots hacks, The Hackaday Prize
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Turn Your Teddy Bear Into A Robot With Yale’s “Robotic Skin”
Despite what we may have seen in the new Winnie the Pooh movie, our cherished plush toys don’t usually come to life. But if that’s the goal, we have ways of making it happen. Like these “robotic skins” from Yale University.
Each module is a collection of sensors and actuators mounted on a flexible substrate, which is then installed onto a flexible object serving as structure. In a simple implementation, the mechanical bits are sewn onto a piece of fabric and tied with zippers onto a piece of foam. The demonstration video (embedded below the break) runs through several more …read more
Cat Robot’s Secret to Slim Legs? Banish the Motors!
The first thing to notice about [Bijuo]’s cat-sized quadruped robot designs (link is in Korean, Google translation here) is how slim and sleek the legs are. That’s because unlike most legged robots, the limbs themselves don’t contain any motors. Instead, the motors are in the main body, with one driving a half-circle pulley while another moves the limb as a whole. Power is transferred by a cable acting as a tendon and is offset by spring tension in the joints. The result is light, slim legs that lift and move in a remarkable gait.
[Bijuo] credits the Cheetah_Cub project as …read more
Posted in bio robot, biology, cat, cat robot, cheetah, cheetah_cub, gait, motors, pulley, robotics, robots hacks, serval
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Robotic Muscles from Fishing Line and Nichrome
Did you know that under the right conditions, nylon can be used as a type of artificial muscle? We certainly didn’t until we came across [Brandon T. Wood]’s Material Linear-Actuator for Robotics entry for the 2018 Hackaday Prize.
When [Brandon] first learned about Nylon Linear Material Actuators (NLMAs), he became determined to find a repeatable and practical method of making and experimenting with them. This is how it works: hyper-wound coils of nylon, when heated, will contract along their length while expanding in width. Upon cooling, they return to their original shape.
[Brandon] has been busy mainly with the kind …read more