Tag Archives: XBee

Ben Heck’s Hackbotz, part 1

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With the return of BattleBots and Robot Wars, The Ben Heck Show team produce a real-life Nintendo Mario Kart battle arena with robot kits. In this first of a three-part series, the robots are assembled -- and weaponized -- without instructions....

DIY Animatronic Iron Man Suit: Arduino Reactor

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This Iron Man suit replica was made by two Tony Starks. Greg Hatter built the suit itself, then he asked his friend Jerome Kelty to make some of its parts move. In his very detailed Instructables and Hack A Day posts, Jerome shares how he pulled off the complicated hacks.

animatronic iron man suit by greg hatter and jerome kelty 620x953magnify

The molded fiberglass suit’s moving parts are its helmet, forearm missile, hip pods and back flaps. The suit also has boots that light up and play a sound effect when the wearer takes a step. Of course, the suit also has an illuminated arc reactor on its chest piece. Jerome used three Arduino Pro Minis and an Arduino Pro to control the moving parts. He also used an Xbee radio to control the helmet wirelessly, making it easier to take off or separate from the suit. Finally, Jerome attached RFID tags and an RFID reader on the suit’s gloves to trigger the moving parts.

Now that the suit’s electronics are hooked up, Greg took back the suit to adjust how it fits and give it a new paint job. Head to Hack A Day or Instructables for Jeremy’s full walkthrough.

[via DamnGeeky]

Robugtix’s 3D-printed T8 spiderbot will terrify your friends for $1,350 (video)

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Robugtix's 3Dprinted T8 spiderbot will terrify your friends for $1,350 video

Whether they run, jump or swim, there are plenty of robots around to be fearful of. None have quite exacerbated our arachnophobia as much as Robugtix's T8 octopod, however. The 3D-printed spiderbot not only looks the part, but employs 26 servo motors to drive its unnervingly life-like movement. Bigfoot's baked-in "Inverse Kinematics Engine" deals with all of the background computations, so you don't have to be a coding genius to work it. Instead, users send "short and simple commands" to the bot via wireless XBee or any other method you can hook up to its Rx / Tx pins. Expected to ship at the end of September, the T8 is available now for a special pre-order price of $1,350, and you can add $85 to that if you want one of Robugtix's analog-stick controllers for real-time direction. If that sounds a bit pricey, there's another option in the much cuter $250 iitsii hexapod, which is predicted to ship late August. Check out the shudder-inducing video of the T8 below, then follow it up with the iitsii demo to help you forget.

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Source: Robugtix

Insert Coin semifinalist: Radiator Labs rethinks steam heat, we go hands-on

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If you've ever lived in a building that was heated by steam, there's a good chance that you've experienced comfort levels that were less than ideal. Now, Insert Coin semifinalist Radiator Labs is working to bring a solution to market that'll make your living space a lot more tolerable, and as an added bonus, it'll save energy at the same time. We took a moment to catch up with Marshall Cox, co-founder of Radiator Labs, here at Expand, who explained the elegantly simple solution that the company has in store.

At its most fundamental level, what you have is an oven mitt for your radiator that's augmented with a temperature sensor and an exhaust fan. Whenever the ambient heat reaches your set comfort level (which can be controlled from the web or a smartphone app), the fan will shut off and the insulating cover -- described to us as ironing board material -- will prevent additional heat from escaping. From here, steam is redistributed to other apartments that need it, rather than turning your unit into a sauna. Beyond this eco-friendly element, Radiator Labs is integrating a phase change material into its product that can store energy and heat an apartment for up to four hours without assistance from the boiler.

Going deeper down the rabbit hole, Radiator Labs is exploring some nifty technologies such as an Xbee mesh network, which it's using to evaluate the energy-saving benefits at play. While this component won't be integrated into the consumer version, we could see commercial installations that include wireless communications with the boiler itself. Combined with the phase change material, this would allow a boiler to fire much less often -- seems like a great idea, if you ask us. We're told that Radiator Labs will be seeking crowd-funding for its product this fall, which will be available in the $250 price range. For additional peeks at what's to come, be sure to check the gallery.

Jon Fingas contributed to this report.

Gallery: Radiator Labs cover hands-on

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Arduino project has Sega Rally cabinets steer RC cars: like the game with more bruised ankles (video)

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Arduino project has Sega Rally cabinets steer RC cars like the game, just with more bruised ankles video

We've seen attempts at recreating video game racing in real life. For Artica and The Arcade Man, there's no desire to preserve the illusion -- they've jury-rigged two Sega Rally cabinets to control the strictly real-world racing experiences of RC cars. Their two-machine setup from the recent Codebits VI event in Portugal yanks the original arcade computing power in favor of an Arduino-powered system that maps the steering wheel and pedals to the tiny vehicles through a wireless Xbee link. The setup does make a nod to traditional video games through the cameras, however: drivers can pick either an arcade-style overhead camera or jump to a cabin-level view. The only true challenge during the build process was to find viable displays for the rigs, as the original CRTs proved too problematic for the retrofit. Some might consider it sacrilege to gut a classic cabinet for the sake of some RC action, but the end result is a racing experience that's at once very familiar and yet surprisingly fresh. Spectators had better watch their feet, though -- the competition might get fierce out there.

Continue reading Arduino project has Sega Rally cabinets steer RC cars: like the game with more bruised ankles (video)

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Source: The Arcade Man

Q2 and Q4 Xbee controllers have the gimbals to handle your most unwieldy robotics projects

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Q2 and Q4 Xbee controllers have the gimbals to handle your most unwieldy robotics projects

Yes, we've seen an XBee radio interface with RC robots before, but Quantum Robotics' open-source Xbee handheld controllers have enough gimbals, push buttons and toggle switches to leave us starry-eyed. The Q2 and Q4, both open for funding on Kickstarter, use a XBee wireless transceiver to transfer data and a Parallex Propeller to act as the main processor, and both models put most controllers to shame with a ton of options. While the Q4 uses four PlayStation-style joysticks, the Q2 sports two RC gimbals, and both can be modified to add extra functionality based on the project at hand. Clearly, the more complicated the robot, the more fun these controllers are -- take a look at the Q4 interacting with a hexapod and a robotic arm in the video below.

Continue reading Q2 and Q4 Xbee controllers have the gimbals to handle your most unwieldy robotics projects

Q2 and Q4 Xbee controllers have the gimbals to handle your most unwieldy robotics projects originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 12 Jul 2012 06:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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