Make: Robot Build: Robot round-up

The Make: Robot Build crew poses with the Jameco team in front of the winning robots during Maker Faire. (Fourth place entry, Tortellini the Turtle Bot, is on the far left in display case.)

Whew! That was fun. We’ve had a great time with the robot contest, and judging from the creativeness and quality of the entries, are guessing that you did as well!
8 newsletters, 22 posts, countless forum discussions, and 25 outstanding entries later, we’re a little sad to call the Robot Build a wrap. Now that we’ve had a little time to recuperate from all the excitement of judging the contest, here is a more detailed look at the ‘bots:

First Place: Jartron

[Video] [Robot Plans]

Four legs! curly toes! six CDs! kindly face! LASER nose! multi-chromatic mouth! stereoscopic ranging vision! bias for action! protective headgear!
Jartron the robot seeks distant places, but will take momentary interest in very close things. He is known to spontaneously perform LASER light shows and draw on the wall.

Bill of Materials:

• 6-CDs
• 1-Arduweenie
• 1–PC Board–RadioShack part #
• 27 pin headers (3x 5 servos, 3×2 three wire connectors)
• 1-28 pin IC socket
• 2–servo connector wires, 3 wire double female
• 5 standard servos
• 2 infrared rangefinders
• 1 laser pointer
• 1 PNP transistor
• 11 150 ohm resistors
• 1 270 ohm resistor
• 3 tricolor LEDs (RGB) common cathode
• 1 LED any color
• 1 plastic jar–the kind that once held 5 lb of liquid barley malt for making beer
• 1 one inch by 2 feet (or more) strip of aluminum
• double sided foam tape
• 2 three AAA battery holders
• 6 AAA batteries
• 1 on off switch
• 3 5v Voltage Regulators

Don’t miss the excellent plans that describes how he was constructed using Imprecision Engineering.

Second Place: UFO

[Video] [Schematic]

This is for those who appreciate the beauty of a simple design that is efficient, beautiful and graceful in performance. The UFO (Unidentified Floor Object) is my first creation ever with a DVD Disc and the results were quite amazing as I designed it to be capable yet still holdable within one hand. It is a sporty obstacle avoiding creation that runs along the ground at a good speed with the impression of almost hovering as it moves. A Red-Green-Blue LED flashes to give it some life as it traverses or glides from side-to-side and makes it’s way around the course. The sensor is only a couple of millimeters from the ground and yet the UFO is fully aware of it’s surroundings and finds it’s way through it’s most challenging corners. A design that is not only beautiful to look at but also great to watch in action. All hardware is perfectly mounted right beneath the Disc and the battery I chose was a Lithium Cylindrical design which has a whopping 2600maH rating for runtimes in excees of 1 hour! So if it’s built right it will not only look good but will surely be at the finish line……….

Bill of Materials:

• Maxsonar EZ1 Ultrasound Sensor
• Motor Driver 1A Dual TB6612FNG
• Pololu Wheel 32 x 7mm
• Micro Metal Gearmotor Brackets Extended
• Pololu 50:1 Micro Metal Gearmotors HP
• Picaxe 08M Microcontroller Board
• Rear Dual Tail Wheels
• Tamiya Mini Battery Connectors
• TDK DVD+R
• Davis Glass Plastic Marble Holder
• Red-Green-Blue Flashing LED
• Blue Vinyl Sticker Sheet
• Chrome Vinyl Decals
• Tenergy 4.14V Lithium Cylindrical Cell 2600mAh
• 22AWG, 24AWG, 26AWG Stranded Hook-Up Wire
• SPDT Switch
• Telephone Butt Connectors
• Wire Ties
• Various Size Screws

Third Place: HUL-10

[Project Site] [Video: Obstacle avoidance] [Video: Seeking light] [Schematic]

HUL-10 is a coasterbot that uses two infrared sensors for obstacle avoidance and two photoresistors for phototropic behavior. We built the coasterbot in two versions. Since this is our first robot, we weren’t sure what we were getting ourselves into, so we wanted to keep things simple for the first version, and use the second version to try out some of our crazier ideas.

Bill of Materials:

• 10 CDs
• 2 rubber bands
• Small caster wheel
• ShapeLock plastic
• Stiff wire (10 gague aluminum, I think)
• 3/8″ plastic conduit, about 6″
• 15 4-40 1/4″ hex spacers (male/female)
• 3 1/2″ 4-40 screws
• 4 1/4″ 4-40 screws and nuts
• 7 small wood screws
• Arduino Nano v3
• Half-size protoboard and jumper wires
• 2 GWS S35 STD continuous rotation servos
• 2 Sharp GP2D120 IR sensors
• 2 photoresistors
• High-intensity green LED
• 100 Ohm resistor
• 3.3 kOhm resistor
• 10 kOhm trim pot
• 4 AA NiMH rechargable batteries
• 4xAA battery holder
• Dimension Engineering AnyVolt Micro switching DC-DC converter
• Heatshrink tubing

All Coasterbot Entries

Here is a list of all of the entries submitted, in the order they were received:

• Caroll: [Project Site] [Video] [Photos]
• Roby the Costerbot: [Project Site] [Video] [Schematics]
• Black Dog Robotics Coasterbot: [Project Site] [Photos] [Source Code]
• Crepton the coasterbot: [Video] [Photos]
• CoasterBot: [Video] [Photos]
• CD Avenger: [Project Site] [Video] [Photos]
• Curl: [Project Site] [Video]
• Gimpy the CoasterBot: [Video] [Photos] [Source Code]
• Tobor/DC-3: [Video] [Photos]
• Spider V1.1: [Video] [Photos]
• Tortellini the Turtle Bot: [Project Site] [Video] [Schematics] [MAKE Feature]
• Robie the Robot: [Project Site] [Video] [Schematics]
• RobotBuild: [Video] [Photos]
• Coasterbot Contest: [Video] [Photos]
• ScoutBot: [Video] [Schematics]
• Protocol Error: [Video] [Photos]
• 3pi Coaster Bot: [Photos]
• Ránerindë the coasterbot: [Video] [Photos]
• “R: 2-D” (Robot: Two-Dimensional): [Project Site]
• Kasor, the CD Bot: [Photos]
• Wiggly Snail: [Project Site] [Video] [Photos]
• Twitch: [Project Site] [Schematics]