A hobby of mine that takes up a fair amount of my free time is robotics. Here are a few projects I’ve conceptualized and built.
Inspired by a video I watched by Daniel Shiffman of The Coding Train (toot toot) about Inverse Kinematics. Daniel mentioned he liked the idea of a Kinematic robot. So, I created an application which utilizes Inverse Kinematics to control a dynamically scalable multi segment robot.
Here’s a video of it, it’s one of my favorite projects.
2 channel servo control from an Android phones head phone was a concept I created from July 1, 2015 – July 7
The application generates a stereo phase modulated PWM signal through the phones head phone jack.
Inside the project box is a bread board with power and signal wire connection, no other electronics are used to control the servos.
4 pole TRRS plug that is used to transmit the signal.
After completing the servo control I decided I could use the phones sensor data and servo app to make a stabilized camera.
I’ve been knocking around the idea of using this application to control and RC aircraft.
Screen shot of AndroPilot, my most recent project.
AndroPlane utilizes the phone on board audio hardware(as well as a multitude of on board sensors) to generate a low latency PWM signal that can be interpreted by RC servos via the Audio headphone jack. The application can also act as the remote via wifi, if signal is lost by the plane it has the capability to autonomously return to where it was launched as well as loiter and travel via GPS way points.
Testing AndroPlane’s shortest turn decision with autonomous “Return to Home” feature.
Testing AndroPlane’s PID settings.
Brobot was concept of my younger brothers. It is a web controlled raspberry pi rover that you can use to explore our house. I designed the original frame and drive programming.
Version 2 became a bit more flashy when my older brother decided to help design the body. I added a grabber for obvious reasons.
And (messy) version 3, after my younger brother decided it needed a longer battery life as well as charging and battery monitoring capabilities. The batteries used are LiFePO4, they have a high energy density with superior safety when compared to a more energy dense LiPo battery. With the new batteries Brobot can run for 8-10 hours before needing to be docked for charging
This is my arduino based quadracopter project. The frame was made using a FDM style printer and some cheap screws from home depot.
The brains of this machine is a micro controller named the ardupilot. Here you can see the 6 axis MPU6050 gyro/accelerometer sensor used for orientation.
An arduino based fixed wing aircraft which will utilize the same controller as my quadcopter.
This is a more refined version of brobot. With calculated wheel sizes, motor rpm and torques, as well as power consumption, weight and battery capacities.
This project is still in the very early stages, I am currently trying to use a small transceiver to communicate from my computer to the MicroQuad.
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