Spring RTS Engine

I've tested my beetle robot and it works! It has predator (like the tiger beetle it can chase down other bugs), herbivore, feeding, and photophobic instincts configured into it! It has infrared sensors and antennae that keep it from running into objects. It can recharge itself at the solar-powered sunflower recharging station that I made for it. It can chase down other robotic bugs and is very quick. It can be programmed. It likes to run away from me and is hard to catch when it tries to go under the dresser or bed. Yay! I'm now going to modify it to where it has wings and hairy looking legs!

Om nom nom!

ooo how did you build it? What tools can you program it with?

*looks tentatively at the NTai source code*

I had to use a lot of soldering and different robotic parts to build it.

In order to program it, it connect your computer to the the programming header and microcontroller.

I have not programmed robots in a very long time, so I would probably have to look at this program a little more to tell much about how it works, but this should do it: http://www.atmel.com/dyn/resources/prod ... oc2510.pdf

Mmmm, AVR assembly, my favorite flavor of machine code.

I should really switch to that software suite for my embedded experiments....the arduino IDE is dismal [java].

AVR studio has a great ICD and ICE.

cool, does it find the rechargething with infrared? how does it connect?

what's the max run time right now

its very cute :D

I built that same one in high school. But where are the antennae on yours? I remember it involved bending a piece of metal or coat hanger.

i think the antennas are the wires going through these hookthings so they close a circuit when they come in contact with a wall?

knorke wrote:i think the antennas are the wires going through these hookthings so they close a circuit when they come in contact with a wall?

Yes. And it can tell if it bumped a wall only on it's frontleft or its frontright and back up accordingly to get around a corner.

And so they started taking over the world.. can we have video of behaviour in action?

knorke wrote:cool, does it find the recharge thing with infrared? how does it connect?

Yes, it finds the recharging station with infrared sensors and connects with it's antennas

CarRepairer wrote:I built that same one in high school. But where are the antennae on yours? I remember it involved bending a piece of metal or coat hanger.

I built a moon walker robot, like one of the robots off of Star Wars, in high school. I need more robotic parts so I could build something really cool, maybe a flying robot. I had an easier time with robotics in high school because I got along really well with one of my teachers and she would basically let me go to her robotics lab as often as I want, use the robotics materials and practice manipulating the robotic arm.

The antennae are there. They're made of steel guitar string.

KaiserJ wrote:its very cute :D

I think so too!

PicassoCT wrote:And so they started taking over the world.. can we have video of behaviour in action?

Sorry, no time to make a video right now.

about flying.. maybe think about doing an air-ship.. zeppelin.. like the hindenburg.. you know. i've seen a robot like that. it is nice, cause staying in air does not need power, only maneuvering, and even that uses little. negative is, for indoor use, you need very light parts, and still need a big room. (eg. bigger then any regular home has), to do anything more then flying 5m with your 2m long robot. -> dull
and it is not suitable for outdoor use, except you have totally zero wind, allways.
edit: fixed worst typos (shit -> ship)

hoijui wrote:about flying.. maybe thing on doing an air-shit.. zeppelin.. like the hindenburg.. you know. i've seen a robot like that. it is nice, cause staying in air does not need power, only maneuvering, and even that uses little. negative is, for indoor use, you need very light parts, and still need a big room. (eg. bigger then any regular home has), to do anything more then flying 5m with your 2m long robot. -> dull
and it is not suitable for outdoor use, except you have totally zero wind, allways.

Thanks!

Nice sushi mat you have there!

Yeah and gj on robot thingy :)