I recently updated the blog to show a few videos of the working product as well as our initial design idea. These videos can be found in the "Youtube Demos" section.

Creating robot chassis

Towards the end of last week, heat sincs and H-bridges came in.I also went to home depot to purchase more material for the robot chassis. 

1/4" washers (12 in each package) x 10 = 112 pcs.

3 threadless rod USS/Coarse stainless steel, 1/4"-20 x36"

1/16", 3/4"x36" thick angeled aluminum rod (for mounting tracks to base platforms)

Hex Nut course thread zinc plated 1/4"-20 (100 pcs.)

3 packages of #8-32x3/4" zinc machine screws (8 pcs) x 3= 24 pcs 

pencil compactor for measuring the cardboard out (if need be)

caliper for measuring components on the fly

krylon fusion for plastic, metal, wood, wiker, and more tan paint 

storage organizer for parts

Picture of these materials and more can be found below. 

The actual mock-up should be finished this week. I figured out how to print out the mock-ups in Google Sketch to scale, so all I need to do is print those out and mark my cardboard where I need to cut. Then if everything fits as planned, I use that to cut the plastic and etc. 

Another change in the 3d mockup

Increased length width of robot deck to 10". Overall the robot is 5" Height x 14" wide. Also added some dimensions that were not specified the last picture.

John and I bought some thick plastic sheets (Acrylic Sheets x2 for $13.50) at Home Depot today.

The motor controller's H-bridge power N-MOSFETS came in yesterday.




























We also got in the mail today the crazy motors from DC Planetary Gear Brush Motor- PK32kd3b2100-027. The spec sheet is below the picture of the motors.

2nd mock of the Robot Chassis with Google Sketchup

After talking with my Senior design group, I found out a few ideas to increase space on-board the robot's deck. All I need to do is add another deck. I plan on sticking the camera material there. The second deck will be for the sensors and batter. The bottom deck is for the router. Here is the picture so far. John also added the pan/tilt head for the camera.

Designing the Robot Chassis with Google Sketchup

Today, I spent the majority of the day learning Google Sketchup and making the parts and models that belong on the robot. However, I am running into a few mechanical considerations.

1) the camera is LARGER than I expected. I need to consider taking the camera out of the bubble and/or extending it from the base.

2) the Router is also LARGE. Where should I stick this thing? We also need room for sensors and a battery. Crap... I only have so many links for the car, so it will be more difficult to increase the length of the robot.

Too bad I am not a mechanical engineer...

I hope my team members can give me some suggestions on how to fix this issue of space.

LCD for debugging- Graphic LCD 128x64 STN LED with Backlight

For future debugging, I would like to talk to John about purchasing this graphic LCD found on SparkFun (http://www.sparkfun.com/products/710). This could come in handy when we are trying to debug features during runtime/testing functionality.

Description: This is a framed graphical LCD 64x128 with LED backlight. This unit is a very clear STN type LCD with a simple command interface. This new module includes the negative voltage circuitry on board!

Utilizes the extremely common KS0108B parallel interface chipset (datasheet). Interface code is freely available. Includes LED Backlight.

Dimensions:

• Overall: 75x52.7mm
• Viewable area: 55.01x27.49mm

Documents: 

• GDM12864H.pdf
• App Note from Kronos Robotics
• Utility Meter App Note
• Serial Graphic LCD App Note
• 'Pong Clock' App Note

Finalized GPS Receiver and Antenna

Today, I finally picked the GPA module and antenna to use for our BSF (Bomb Sniffing Robot). Here are our previous considerations, the highlighted (Venus GPS with SMA connector - http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9133) one is the final GPS module picked.

As for the antenna, we are going to use the Antenna GPS Embedded SMA - http://www.sparkfun.com/products/177.

The VTourch antenna has the following specifications/features: 

• Gain 26dB
• VSWR <2.0
• Voltage 3.3V +/- 0.5V
• Current 12mA
• Weight 18g