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Full Page.indd 2 12/6/2016 2:46:47 AM

Full Page.indd 3 12/6/2016 2:51:27 AM
TOC - Jan 17_TOC SV Mar 15.qxd 12/6/2016 12:03 AM Page 4

01.2017 VOL. 15 NO. 1

Subscription Information
SERVO Magazine PO Box 15277
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Subscribe Gift Renewal Change of Info
Columns Its
new back
Mr. with
22 Ask Mr. Roboto Rob a
oto
60 Then and Now
with Eric Ostendorff ! by Tom Carroll
Mr. Roboto returns with answers to questions that The People Behind the Evolution of Robotics
involve PID loops, different means of locomotion, and DIY A discussion on why the evolution of robotics occurred the
methods to create indoor navigation. way it did, and who drove the latest growth activity in
PAGE 22 robotics with newly-formed companies.

PAGE 60

The Combat Zone

42 The Art of the Bot
44 Builder Tip: Going to Events
45 EVENT REPORT: NERCs Battle on the Parkway:
10 Years of Fighting in Philly

Departments
30 Bots in Brief 06 Mind/Iron 28 New Products
The Robotics Cottage
Industry Is Alive and Well 57 RoboLinks
Chain Smoking
Walk What Way? 14 Events Calendar 58 SERVO Webstore
Winging It 14 Showcase 65 Advertisers Index

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4 SERVO 01.2017
TOC - Jan 17_TOC SV Mar 15.qxd 12/6/2016 12:03 AM Page 5

In This Issue ...

PAGE 08 PAGE 37

08 The Multi-Rotor Hobbyist 37 Symbiont Sensors

by John Leeman by Dave Prochnow
Adding Telemetry to the ELEV-8 Heres an easy way to add sensors to your robot with no
Pilots of regular aircraft have a panel of instruments that battery, no wires, and no switches, plus you get Bluetooth.
indicate important parameters such as the aircraft altitude, Meet the Cypress solar-powered Bluetooth Low Energy
air speed, attitude, and engine system status. So, this (BLE) beacon.
month, we are going to add a telemetry kit to the ELEV-8
v3 to get real time aircraft data sent back to our tablet in
the field. 48 Nomad: The Evolution of an
Autonomous Robot
16 Building the KReduCNC by Jeff Cicolani
by Michael Simpson This is an update to my March 2015 review of the Nomad
In this session, we are going to install the clamp table. The chassis kit from ServoCity. The project is on-going, and I've
clamp table is the surface you use to attach your stock. In learned a lot along the way.
addition to the table, we will be mounting the KReduCNC
electronics inside the frame. We will also be doing some
cable management in order to get our machine ready for 54 Roll Your Own Turtlebot
action. by Alan N. Federman
What if you could easily build the equivalent of a Turtlebot
for under $300? Im going to show you how easy it is.
32 Animatronics for the Do-It-
Yourselfer
by Steve Koci
Power to the Robots 07 MaxRoboTech Comics
Although getting power to your props is not one of the
most exciting parts of the building process, it is crucial that Semi-Autonomous Robotics
it is addressed in order to be sure your characters have the
power they need to perform at their best.

SERVO 01.2017 5
Bergeron - Mind-Iron - Jan 17_Mind-Iron - Feb15.qxd 12/6/2016 7:37 AM Page 6
Mind / Iron
by Bryan Bergeron, Editor
The Robotics Cottage Industry
is Alive and Well
love visiting the Kickstarter site for
I inspiration and a glimpse of the
worldwide robotics cottage industry.
At last count, there were over 1,400
Kickstarter robotics projects listed
mainly from the US, EU, Australia,
and Canada. Most are toys with an
educational bent, with a focus on
teaching some robotic and/or
programming skill to kids.
Some are quite serious high-end
projects, such as sophisticated 3D
printers, robotic arms, and
underwater tethered drones. Buy-in
prices range from $5 for small toy
robots to over $3,000 for the
underwater drone.
If youre new to Kickstarter, you
owe it to yourself to take a look at
the site. Individuals or groups pitch a
project and estimate a cost for
producing a certain number of
systems. If you want one of those
systems at some future date, you
have to pledge the requested
amount.
If the full pledge amount isnt
received, everyone walks away from
the deal and you owe nothing. The
especially exciting deals are the ones
that receive multiples of their required
buy-in a great sign for the project
and the project area.
Based on multiples of buy-in, the
hottest robotic project on the site the
day I looked at it was a table tennis
robot at 320% buy-in (100% being
fully funded), and over $250K raised.
The pledge period wasnt even
finished yet.
There are a few dozen projects
with zero interest, and a few dozen
more hovering around 10%-15%
funded. Thats whats so great about
the Kickstarter business model. Why
waste time bringing a robot to
market only to find that there is little
to no interest? Better to know before
6 SERVO 01.2017
ERVO
FOR THE
ROBOT
INNOVATOR
Published Monthly By
T & L Publications, Inc.
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you start, and rethink the design and
start another Kickstarter offering.
Of course, raising the funding is
Outside US 1-818-487-4545
P.O. Box 15277, N. Hollywood, CA 91615
just one step in the process. The PUBLISHER
Larry Lemieux
robot has to be built, tested, and publisher@servomagazine.com
shipped to the customers. The
ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER/
Kickstarter site is also littered with ADVERTISING SALES
road kill projects that were funded Robin Lemieux
but for one reason or another never robin@servomagazine.com
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The notes from these projects Bryan Bergeron
make for great reading. Theyre a techedit-servo@yahoo.com
practical lesson on what not to do or VP of OPERATIONS
what to look for in terms of potential Vern Graner
potholes. vern@servomagazine.com
For example, notes on one
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
robotic project reveal that the Tom Carroll Kevin Berry
developers had no idea of the cost or R. Steven Rainwater Michael Simpson
time required for machining titanium Steve Koci John Leeman
parts. After designing and building Eric Ostendorff Dave Prochnow
their first prototype, they realized that Jeff Cicolani Matt Spurk
Alan Federman Nate Franklin
the cost for machining each robot
was more than they were asking from CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT
contributors. Thats a good lesson to subscribe@servomagazine.com
learn as long as someone else is WEBSTORE MARKETING
paying for the lesson. COVER GRAPHICS
Kickstarter is also great for Brian Kirkpatrick
assessing the relative popularity of sales@servomagazine.com
various microcontrollers. At the time WEBSTORE MANAGER/
of this writing, the Arduino is in the PRODUCTION
lead for US robotics projects, closely Sean Lemieux
sean@servomagazine.com
followed by the Raspberry Pi. The
Arduino is hands-down the most ADMINISTRATIVE STAFF
popular for robotics in the EU. Re Gandara
Kickstarter changes daily; this is Copyright 2017 by
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just one snapshot. By the time you All Rights Reserved
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different and dozens if not We are not responsible for mistakes, misprints,
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Gross - Robot Cartoon - Jan 17_Robot cartoon - Feb15.qxd 12/6/2016 7:38 AM Page 7

SERVO 01.2017 7
Leeman - Drones_ELEV8_Telemetry - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:45 AM Page 8

Adding Telemetry
The to the ELEV-8
Multi-Rotor By John Leeman
Post comments on this section and find any
associated files and/or downloads at

Hobbyist
www.servomagazine.com/
index.php/magazine/article/
January2017_MultiRotorHobbyist_Telemetry.

Pilots of regular aircraft have a panel of

Introduction
In the October 2016 issue of SERVO, we built the
Parallax ELEV-8 v3 kit and began to explore its capabilities.
The ELEV-8 has since made appearances as an instrument
platform for a meteorology package and has other projects
planned. One of the first things I wanted to add was the
capability to send vehicle data back to the ground.
Before we go any farther, I must stress that as the
pilot, your first priority is safe operation of the aircraft, but
having your spotter glancing at a screen full of vehicle data
could be very valuable if you lose your orientation or would
like an altitude check. Recording the telemetry data could
be useful when performing a post-crash analysis, or trying
to measure and improve the vehicle performance.
This month, Ill walk you through the process of adding
the ELEV-8 900 MHz Telemetry Kit (Figure 1)
(https://www.parallax.com/product/32480) and go
through the troubleshooting that occurred when things
didnt work on the first (or second) try. While this article is
specifically about using the kit and software from Parallax,
the telemetry system is based on XBee radio modules, so
theres something to learn here no matter what kind of
multi-rotor or radio system you
choose to use.
XBee
Introduction
XBee is a series of modules
from Digi that lets you easily
make connected devices in
everything from a complex
mesh network to a simple
wireless serial port type
configuration. They use the IEEE
802.15.4 networking protocol,
and are a really nice and
inexpensive way to add a
wireless component to many
projects. If you want to learn
more about using wireless
instruments that indicate important parameters
such as the aircraft altitude, air speed, attitude,
and engine system status. As multi-rotor pilots,
we are often operating by look and feel. We can
estimate our altitude through experience and
the aircraft attitude through the use of colored
propellers or motor struts. This month, we are
going to add a telemetry kit to the ELEV-8 v3 to
get real time aircraft data sent back to our tablet
in the field.
protocols and peripherals in your project, check out the
book, Building Wireless Sensor Networks by Robert Faludi
(http://amzn.to/2eJ6FMl).
The radios used here are the 900 MHz models. This is
important as the radio system we are using to control the
quad is a 2.4 GHz system. Using multiple 2.4 GHz systems
on the same quad would likely result is lots of interference
and possibly losing control of the vehicle.
I have had no previous experience with the XBee
products other than reading articles about projects that had
used them in Nuts & Volts and SERVO. This was a good
chance to dive in and learn a little bit about how they work.
Im thinking that they could be an even simpler solution
than Wi-Fi for sending data
from sensor packages down to
the ground, but they are slightly
more expensive. The kit that
well install this month retails
for $149. The Pro 900HP
modules that were using sell
for $39 individually.
XBee
Configuration
We need to set up the
parameters the XBee radios will
use to communicate. Digi
Figure 1: The complete telemetry kit from
Parallax includes two XBee radios, antenna,
USB adapter, USB cable, zip ties, header, and
RPSMA extension cable.

8 SERVO 01.2017
Leeman - Drones_ELEV8_Telemetry - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:45 AM Page 9
Figure 3: The Discover Devices button is in the upper
left-hand side of the XCTU window (circled in red).
provides a configuration utility
called XCTU on their website Figure 4: Select the appropriate COM
port for your USB adapter. In my case,
(https://www.digi. com/ it was the only device plugged into my
products/xbee-rf-solutions/ Microsoft Surface at the time.
xctu-software/xctu).
Download and install this tool. It
is available for Windows, Mac,
and Linux systems. Digi has
even produced a short
introduction to XCTU video that
is helpful to watch (https://you
tu.be/EA-2Xa5OAY8). Using
XCTU, you can easily upgrade
the firmware of XBee radios,
check the signal strength and RF environment, and
configure settings of all devices on an XBee network.
By now, you probably have the FTDI Virtual COM Port
(VCP) drivers installed on your system, but if you dont, go
ahead and do so. The drivers are available on the FTDI
website for most operating systems (www.ftdichip.com
/Drivers/VCP.htm). Youll need this to communicate with
the flight controller and the ground side radio.
While youre dealing with software, go ahead and
make sure your flight controller and ground station are up
to date. Just after the publication of the ELEV-8 v3 review
article, the flight controller and ground station received
updates with the release of version 2.0 of the software.
This software offers some great stability improvements and
is worth taking the five minutes to upgrade.
If you need some help uploading the new firmware to
the flight controller, be sure to check out the instructions in
the October 2016 article. The most recent versions of all of
the software can always be downloaded from the Parallax
GitHub repository (https://github.com/parallaxinc/Flight-
Controller). Just click on the Releases tab and download
the most recent set of files. You must be running the same
version of the flight controller firmware and ground station
software for things to work.
It is worth keeping an eye on the repository as there
are always changes being made to the software (the
ActiveDevelopment branch containing the most bleeding-
edge versions). There is also an Issues section where you
can see what bugs are currently reported and what new
features are coming down the pipeline. The Parallax forums
(https://forums.parallax.com) are also a good place to
visit. Most of the ELEV-8 discussions there occur in the
Robotics section of the forum. First, we need to set up the
correct baud rate on each of the two XBee radios. To do
this, well put each radio in the XBee USB adapter board,
connect an antenna, and connect it to the computer
(Figure 2). Never power up an XBee without an
Figure 2: Clip one of the radios into
the USB adapter, add an antenna,
and it is ready to plug into the
computer for configuration.
Remember that you should never
power up an XBee with the antenna
removed.
antenna attached! Powering the radios
without an appropriate antenna connected can
cause permanent damage to the radio.
So, connect an antenna (included in the kit) to the
RPSMA connector and plug in the adapter board with a
mini USB cable. Open up the XCTU application. Once
inside, click on the Discover Devices icon that looks like an
XBee module outline with an hour glass (Figure 3). A
window will come up asking you to select which COM port
to look on select the port associated with your USB
adapter board (Figure 4). If youre unsure, disconnect the
board, click Refresh Ports, then reconnect and click
Refresh Ports again. The port that disappeared and then
reappeared is the one you want.
Once done, click Next and set the parameters to use
when connecting. With new modules, the defaults will be
fine. If you have already configured the modules or are
reusing modules, adding more baud rates to the list could
be useful. I generally added 57600 and 115200 baud for
future use (Figure 5). Once done, click finish and XCTU will
scan for any attached radios.
After the scan completes, the module will show up in
the left-hand pane of the application. Click the module and
wait for the software to load up and display the settings for
Figure 5: Select the search
parameters used to discover
devices. I add 57600 and
115200 since those are
common settings used and
ones that we will use later.
SERVO 01.2017 9
Leeman - Drones_ELEV8_Telemetry - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:45 AM Page 10

Figure 8: Write the new settings to the radio by clicking on the

pencil icon in the upper left of the radio configuration pane.

Figure 6: Once the radio is

discovered, click on it and wait keeping a couple of old espresso cups on the bench is
for all of the settings to be read
out and displayed. perfect for this task.) Remove the panel nut and lock
washer from the RPSMA antenna connector since they are
not needed for this application. Carefully align the radio
with the plug-in headers on the flight controller and insert
the module (Figure 9). The direction is marked on the
board and the location of the antenna connector makes it
relatively obvious as well.
I sandwiched a foam block that helps baffle the air
around the pressure sensor under the edge of the module
to help hold it and to be sure it is indeed covering the
sensor. I would hold off on replacing the top cover for now
until everything is working, but dont forget it at the end of
the process! The antenna provided is of the rubber ducky
type, but is relatively rigid. You can attach it directly to the
radios RPSMA connector, but I would advise against it.
When you crash, any force on the antenna will be directed
to the RPSMA connector and will very likely break the XBee
PCB. If the crash is bad enough, I could even imagine the
flight controller PCB becoming damaged.
Figure 7: Set the radio baud rate (BD setting) to 57600 baud. Parallax includes a small extension cable with the
telemetry kit that provides one possible solution to this
the radio (Figure 6). In the settings, we need to change the problem. You simply connect the cable to the radio and
BD Baud Rate field to 57600 (Figure 7). (Be sure to read route it through the frame of the quad to the edge of the
completely through this article before doing this yourself, as base plate by leg number four. You can then connect the
there are several modifications that well make to this antenna to the cable and use zip ties to secure the antenna
procedure.) to the landing gear (Figure 10). I think this solution looks
Once you have changed the much cleaner and is more crash-
radios settings, click the pencil icon proof. On the Parallax website, they
to write the settings to the radio show using a short piece of heat
(Figure 8). Unplug the USB cable shrink to make the ground side
and swap out the radios, then make radio/USB adapter setup more
the appropriate changes to the permanent and eliminate any
second radio as well. I find it helpful shorting hazard from use on metal
to label the radios Ground and surfaces. While this is a good idea, I
Air to keep things straight when would again hold off until
working with them. Doing the everything is working. If you intend
ground side radio second also to keep up with development of the
means one fewer swap of the software/hardware, it could also be
modules! inconvenient as the radios may
periodically need to be
Hardware reconfigured. A small project box is
a nice solution or a 3D printed
Installation bracket.
Installing the hardware on the I designed a 3D printed bracket
ELEV-8 takes just a few minutes. with a monitor clip that attaches
Remove the smoked acrylic cover the radio to your laptop/tablet
from above the flight controller PCB Figure 9: Install the air side XBee by inserting it screen. You can download the STL
(printed circuit board). (Dont forget into the headers on the flight controller PCB. Dont
forget the piece of foam below it to provide an air files at the article link. My main
to keep track of the screws! I find baffle for the barometric pressure sensor. goals were to keep the solder pads
10 SERVO 01.2017
Leeman - Drones_ELEV8_Telemetry - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:45 AM Page 11

accessible, make it easy

to pack in a way that it
wont break apart in my
field bag, and to keep it
simple!
A T shaped
bracket with recessed
areas for 4-40 nuts Figure 10: Route the RPSMA
extension cable through the
seemed like a good frame and install the antenna.
solution. I printed one Mount the antenna to the
Figure 11: The clip landing gear with zip ties. This
out, press-fit the nuts, is a loose fit so is much more resilient in a
and installed the XBee that it can be crash than having the antenna
easily removed for installed directly onto the
USB adapter with some transport and XBees antenna connector.
4-40 machine screws. storage without
breaking any
The clip for the bracket parts. I havent
is easily installed for use had any problems and have used it multiple times when troubleshooting
and removed for storage with it slipping out RF links. I saw some peaks during packet transmission
when in use.
(Figure 11). I thought (Figure 13), so I immediately jumped to this being a
that this added a nice software issue and began a discussion on the Parallax
professional touch (Figure 12) and still allows for easy forum.
changing of the radios for development. Its also one less With the help of several people at Parallax and forum
thing for your spotter to hold or prop up in the field. moderator, Publison, we determined that there was a bug
with the numbering of the COM ports in the Windows
Troubleshooting ground station software. Changing the COM port number
to 5 or higher should solve it. So, I connected the radio,
In theory, if you plug in the ground side radio, open up went into the Devices and Printers settings of Windows,
the ground station software, then power up the ELEV-8; the and found the device.
radios should connect and data should start flowing almost In the hardware tab under USB Serial Port and
instantly. Unfortunately, this didnt happen for me. I spent Properties, there is a button labeled Change Settings.
the better part of an afternoon going over all of the steps, After clicking that, a properties window came up; in the
verifying that the radios had saved the settings, and didnt Port Settings tab under Advanced, you can change the port
get any leads. It was time to breakout the test equipment number. (Windows is seemingly famous for these
and see what was happening. convoluted settings windows what a pain!) I set my radio
The first rule of troubleshooting is Thou shall check to COM10 and fired everything back up ... Nothing. Still no
voltages, so I did. Everything looked fine. Next, I dug out communication at all.
my TI (Texas Instruments) SA430 spectrum analyzer. I I tried sending the BEAT command to the setup using
picked this up several years ago on special for about $50 a terminal program to ask the quad to send its data. I even
wrote a Python script to do this multiple times, but did not
receive a response from the quad. We finally decided that it
may actually be a hardware problem. So, Publison sent me
Figure 12: The clip is
designed to fit on pretty
much any screen, even with a
thick case. It sits nicely on
my Surface that I use as a
field computer. Figure 13: At least one of
my XBee modules was
putting out power during
the handshake data
transaction, but I couldnt
tell if the handshake was
actually taking place.

SERVO 01.2017 11
Leeman - Drones_ELEV8_Telemetry - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:45 AM Page 12

After some work, the folks at Parallax

Figure 14: Change the ground side radios routing/messaging mode to be a Non-
Routing Module.
Figure 15: Set the destination address high and low fields to the serial number high
and low fields of the other radio in the pair. This reduces the communication
overhead and makes the latency of the telemetry much lower.
Figure 16: Change the retry count from A to 3 on the flight controller radio. The
ground radio can be left at A.
his working XBee radio set to try. By doing some
component swapping, we determined that one of my
radios in the kit was faulty and sending virtually no signal
on transmit.
Parallax quickly sent a replacement and I was getting
connection between the quad and the ground station in no
time. Whew! I thought I was home free, but Publison and I
quickly realized that the telemetry was locking up very
frequently and may or may not resume after 15-30 seconds.
Parallax was just about to release version 2.0 of the flight
controller software and the ground station, so we waited
for the release. After upgrading, the problem persisted.
Figure 17: Change the XBee baud rate in the flight controller
firmware if you decide to use 115200 baud communication.
The field to change is highlighted.
12 SERVO 01.2017
and forum members were able to reproduce
the problem. It looked like some of the XBee
settings needed further modification. The
most crucial was changing the CE
Routing/Messaging setting on the ground
side radio to be a Non-Routing Module
(Figure 14). After saving the settings to the
XBee, I once again fired things up and it
worked! I was able to maintain a solid
connection to the ELEV-8 with no dropouts
or other problems.
Developer Jason found out that the
latency of the system could be greatly
reduced by setting the radios up in a point-
to-point mode instead of broadcast mode.
To do this, you note the DH/DL and SH/SL
ID of each radio and set them equal to each
other (Figure 15). This makes the XBees
only talk to each other and removes some of
the overhead associated with each data
transmission. He also recommended setting
the RR (retry count) on the base station to
A (10), but setting the flight controller to a
lower value, like 3 (Figure 16). This means
that well get more current data at the
expense of sometimes dropping an older
packet a perfectly reasonable tradeoff. It
was also found that the serial data rate of
the XBee radios can be set to 115200 baud
(this must be done on both radios). If you
choose to do this modification, youll need
to change the line of code in the firmware
that sets the serial communication rate of
the Propeller microcontroller with the XBee
(Figure 17).
This troubleshooting effort really shows how great
forums and open source collaboration (and really the
GitHub issue tracking) can let companies iterate and
problem-solve very quickly. After the changes, things are
running pretty smoothly.
Viewing Telemetry
Once you have the XBee radios talking, you can easily
view a lot of information in the ground station software.
You can even perform tasks like calibrations without the
need to connect to the flight
controller with a USB cable!
The Status tab of the
application shows you the
commanded and actual orientation
of the quad, power to each axis of
rotation, inputs from the radio,
battery voltage, and the standard
altimeter, virtual horizon, and
heading instruments (Figure 18).
Leeman - Drones_ELEV8_Telemetry - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:45 AM Page 13

This is the one your spotter will likely be looking

at. Holding your quad and tilting it around helps
you get a sense of how the instruments work
and how much latency there is.
The other tab thats interesting to look at
for telemetry is the Sensors tab. Here, you
can view a time-series graph of whichever
sensors are selected on the left side of the
window. Scrolling the mouse wheel zooms in
time and you can drag the plot around. Viewing
everything on one plot is generally too much,
but looking at all components of the gyro,
magnetometer, or accelerometer (Figure 19) is
very useful. An attitude plot can be nice as well
(Figure 20).
If youre anything like me, you want to
collect data about everything. The more data,
the better. There was a request on the GitHub
Figure 18: The status tab of the ground station software has all of the essentials
page for a way to log the received telemetry in an easy-to-follow layout. Your spotter can read it with a quick glance.
data to a file for later analysis. It was
implemented in the ActiveDevelopment branch
to be available with the next major release. I thought
this would be a good opportunity to learn how to
build the software from the development branch so
we could play with new features. I must stress that
this means working with under development
software that could very well have bugs and cause
issues for you. So, experiment at your own risk.
Most readers of this magazine arent afraid of
bleeding-edge software though!
I managed to build the ground station from
source, but decided thats a bit beyond where most
people would be comfortable working. There has
been some discussion on GitHub about ways to
improve the telemetry logging, and I hope that it will
be in the next release of the software. When that
happens, well probably come back to the topic and
Figure 19: A plot of the three-axis accelerometer Z component during a very
look at ways to plot the large amounts of telemetry short demonstration flight. Notice the takeoff acceleration and slow decent.
data from different flight controllers.
Tools that many people are familiar with (like
Microsoft Excel) wont handle the large files
generated, but there are a plethora of other tools
available many for free!

Closing Thoughts
Now you have data flowing from the air to the
ground! Your spotter can call out your true heading,
altitude, and other information to you in real time.
Im anxious to get my hands on the flight logs
because I can think of several really interesting uses
for them, including wind speed estimation, improved
battery endurance calculations, and black box style
investigations of crashes, just to name a few.
In the meantime, remember to keep your eyes
on the quad, talk with your spotter, and collect lots Figure 20: The attitude of the quad shows me rolling (cyan) and pitching
of great data! SV (purple), but leaving the yaw (yellow) relatively constant.

SERVO 01.2017 13
Rainwater - Events - Jan 17_Events - Aug 15.qxd 12/6/2016 7:47 AM Page 14

JANUARY
EVENTS BITS Pilani KK Birla Goa Campus, Zuarinagar
Goa, India
18-19 Singapore Robotic Games Events include RoboKombat, RoboSumo, Line Following,
Republic of Singapore RoboRace, and RoboKick.
Events include Picomouse, Sumo, Robot Soccer, Wall www.bits-quark.org
Climbing, Pole Balancing, Underwater Robots, Legged
Robot Marathon, Robot Colony, and Humanoid 4-9 AAAI Mobile Robot Competition
Competition. San Francisco, CA
http://guppy.mpe.nus.edu.sg/srg See website for details on this year's event.
www.aaai.org/Conferences/conferences.php
26-29 ION Autonomous Snowplow Competition
St. Paul, MN MARCH
Robot snowplow must remove snow along a
designated path. 10-11 Midwestern Robotics Design Competition
www.autosnowplow.com University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL
See website for details on this year's event.
27-29 Robotix http://mrdc.ec.illinois.edu
IIT Khargpur, West Bengal, India
Events include Bomb Disposal, BRICKS, and Conquest. 23-26 Apogee
www.robotix.in BITS Pilani KK Birla Goa Campus, Zuarinagar
Goa, India
FEBRUARY See website for details on this year's events.
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14 SERVO 01.2017
Full Page.indd 15 11/1/2016 8:50:22 AM
Simpson - CNC build - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:54 AM Page 16

Building the By Michael Simpson

KReduCNC
Clamp Table
In this installment, we are going to
install the clamp table. The clamp
table is the surface you use to
attach your stock.
Post comments on this section and find any associated files and/or downloads at
www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/January2017_
Build-CNC_Clamp-Table.

ou will need your PC connected to your controller and
Y motors to move the Y carriage into favorable positions
to make securing the table a little easier.
In addition to the table, we will be mounting the
KReduCNC electronics inside the frame. We will also be
doing some cable management in order to get our machine
ready for action.
A better table has 15/16 wide slots that are 3/8
deep as shown in Figure 2. These slots hold mini T-tracks
(Figure 3) that will allow you to secure your stock with
movable clamps.
The mounting holes for the table are countersunk on
Figure 2

The Table
The table is 15-3/4 wide by 16-1/2 deep. Its
constructed from 3/4 stock and can be made from particle
board, plywood, plastic, or MDF (medium-density
fibreboard). The basic table (Figure 1) consists of a single
sheet of 3/4 material with countersunk holes for securing
the table to the Y carriage. In this case, you screw your
hold-down clamps into the table to hold your stock while it
is being machined.

Figure 1 Figure 3

16 SERVO 01.2017
Simpson - CNC build - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:54 AM Page 17

the top so that the Figure 5

1/4 x 2 carriage
bolts dont interfere
with your stock. I
have found that
.28 deep works
well for these.
The T-tracks are
secured to the table
with 19 #6-32 x
5/8 countersunk
screws, lock
washers, and hex
nuts as shown in
Figure 4. Most T- Figure 6
track does not Figure 4
come with
mounting holes, so
you must drill and
countersink them yourself. Simply clamp the T-track to your
table and mark the holes with a marker.
On the bottom of the table, the T-track mounting holes
will need to be countersunk and the screws cut so that they
dont interfere with the Y carriage.
To install the T-track, place them in the slots and insert
screws into the holes. Secure with a lock washer and nut.
You will have to use a rotary tool to cut the ends of the
screws flush with the bottom of the table (Figure 5). The
drawing files for both the plain and slotted table will be
made available on my website listed later in this article. Turn off the power to the controller and remove the
As an option, you can forgo the metal T-tracks and use motor connectors. Carefully tip the machine on its side and
a router to mill some T-slots into the table directly. add a 1/4 washer, lock washer, and hex nut to each of the
bolts; see Figure 8. Tighten the nuts. Place the machine
Attach the Table upright, reattach the motor connectors, and power up the
controller. Move the table all the way to the back of the
Start by moving the Y carriage forward as shown in machine and then back to the front to make sure the table
Figure 6. This will make inserting the carriage bolts a little doesnt contact the sides of the machine.
easier. Line the 12 holes in the table with the holes on the
Y carriage and then insert 12 1/4 x 2 carriage bolts into
each of the holes as in Figure 7.

Figure 7

Figure 8

SERVO 01.2017 17
Simpson - CNC build - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:55 AM Page 18
Figure 9
Figure 12
Figure 14
Mount the Electronics
Now that the table is secured, you can mount the
electronics inside the KReduCNC frame. Start by removing
all the connectors on the controller.
Next, reattach the parallel cable to the controller. Drill a
5/32 hole in the position shown in Figure 9, then add a
#6 washer to a #6-32 x 1 machine screw and insert it
through the hole. Secure with a #6-32 hex nut and lock
washer as shown. The actual position of the machine screw
in not critical.
Secure the cable on the parallel port to the screw with
a cable clamp as in Figure 10. Use another #6-32 hex nut
18 SERVO 01.2017
Figure 10
Figure 11
Figure 13
Figure 15
and lock washer to secure the clamp. Here, I am using a
3/8 cable clamp.
Cable clamps can be purchased from most home
centers, and are available in the electrical section.
Attach the board holding the controller to the bottom
side of the cleats (Figure 11). Use six #6 wood screws to
secure the board. Drill 3/32 pilot holes to make the job
easier.
On the power supply panel, add two #6-32 x 1
machine screws to the positions shown in Figure 12. As
before, add clamps and secure with #6-32 hex nuts and
lock washers as shown in Figure 13.
Secure the panel to the bottom of the cleats with six
Simpson - CNC build - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:55 AM Page 19

Figure 17

Route the controller power leads as in Figure 16 and plug

it into the power connector on the controller.
Secure the controller power cable as you see fit using
some wood screws (Figure 17). Note that you can also use
the panel screws to attach clamps as needed.
Figure 16 Route the cable from the three motors through the slot
in the back of the frame and then connect them to the
controller as shown in Figure 18. Dont worry about the

#6 wood screws; see Figure 14.

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Route the power cable over the parallel connector and
secure it to the machine screw with a clamp (Figure 15).

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SERVO 01.2017 19
Simpson - CNC build - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:55 AM Page 20

layout of the cables just yet as we will come back

later and secure them. For now, flip the KReduCNC
back over, power up the controller, and connect it to
your PC. Start Mach3 and test each axis to make sure
its working properly.

Cable Management
Cable management is very important on CNC
machines. Loose cables can be dangerous and cause
Figure 19 unexpected shorts and lost connections. On larger
machines, we use a cable support system called an E-
chain or drag chain. Figures 19 and 20 show a
couple of these cable transports on some of my
larger units.
On the KReduCNC, we only need to worry about
the movement of the Z axis cable. Its a short run, so
Figure 20
we can get by with a simple system using split loom
cable.
Start by attaching a piece of 3/8 split loom
cable over the Z axis wires as shown in Figure
21. It only needs to be about 34 long as we
Figure 23
dont need to cover the complete length of the
wires.
Secure the cable to one of the shaft
support screws using a cable clamp (Figure
22). You want enough cable between the
motor and the clamp so that it can move the
full range of motion along the X axis; see
Figure 23.
Add some split loom cable to the X axis
wires. Attach the Z axis
A complete bill of materials, as well as additional motor cable to the X axis
information can be found on my website at
motor cable using some
www.kronosrobotics.com/kreducnc. For any
questions or comments, please visit the SERVO small tie wraps as shown in
Magazine forums at http://forum.nutsvolts.com Figure 24.
/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=17408. You can also use a
large cable clamp attached
to one of the frame bolts as
in Figures 24 and 25.
Add a small piece of split loom cable to
the Y axis motor wires (Figure 25). Slip all
Figure 21
the excess motor cable into the slot on the
back of the frame.
Figure 22 The last step is to secure the wires
inside the frame with some tie wraps; refer
to Figure 26. Use a cable clamp to secure
the wires to the corner machine screw
holding the controller in place as in Figure
27.

Conclusion
This completes the table assembly,
20 SERVO 01.2017
Simpson - CNC build - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 7:55 AM Page 21

Figure 25

Figure 27

electronics mounting, and cable management. We are just

about ready to put the machine to work. Before closing, I just
want to re-emphasize that you dont have to add the slotted
table to your machine to start.
In many cases, I often just add a slab of particle board or
MDF for a quick table to get a new machine up and running.
This lets me work out the final table later.
Next time, we will look at connecting some spindles to
our KReduCNC. SV

Figure 26

Personal CNC Mills

Shown below is an articulated humanoid
Shown here with
optional stand robot leg, built by researchers at the
and accessories.
Drexel Autonomous System Lab (DASL)
with a Tormach PCNC 1100 milling
machine. DASL researcher Roy Gross
estimates that somewhere between 300
and 400 components for HUBO+ has
been machined on their PCNC 1100.

Figure 24
PCNC 1100 Series 3
starting at:
$8480
(plus shipping)

www.tormach.com/servo

SERVO 01.2017 21
Ostendorff - Mr. Roboto - Jan 17_MrRoboto - Sep 15.qxd 12/6/2016 12:13 AM Page 22

Ask Mr. Roboto by Eric Ostendorff

Tap into the sum of all human knowledge and get your questions Our resident expert on all things robotic
answered here! From software algorithms to material selection, is merely an email away.
Mr. Roboto strives to meet you where you are and what more roboto@servomagazine.com
would you expect from a complex service droid?

Hi! My name is Eric, but you can call me Mr. Roboto. Ive been a robot nut my whole life. I grew up
playing with toy robots and watching Lost in Space, learning that any mistake can be undone by
reversing the polarity. The toy robots I collected in the 1960s were all mechanical: Bump & Go
Mystery Action robots and Rotate-O-Matics which would walk straight, rotate about the waist,
and fire light-up machine guns. Since then, my collection of vintage toy robots has grown into a small
army you can see online at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMOtGYprBRQ.

got my BS in Mechanical with like-minded robot folks.

I Engineering from Virginia Tech in

1982 and promptly went to work
for Mattel Toys designing Hot Wheels
track sets for the next 30 years. I have
a knack for scratch-building and
prototyping new electromechanical
concepts. I built my first
programmable robot in 1994 using a
then-new Parallax BASIC Stamp 1 with
a whopping 256 bytes of program
memory. That ugly old robot in Figure
1 won the very first Robot Firefighting
Contest in Connecticut, which later
became the Trinity College Home Fire
Fighting Robot Contest still going
strong after 20+ years. Highly
recommended, contests are lots of
Im a compulsive hoarder of all
robotic treasures I find online: chassis
from China, sensors from Shenzen, H-
bridges from Hong Kong, motors from
Macau, and transistors from Thailand.
Im into simple clever
electromechanical solutions: one servo
robots, combining I/O pins, using the
odd relay, direct drive, dead
reckoning, flamethrowers, and, in
general, breaking the rules!
I hope youll find some useful
information here. If you have any
specific or general robot questions,
email them to me at
roboto@servomagazine.com and Ill
do my best to answer them.
out of jail free card as many of my
college textbook authors: It shall be
left as an exercise to the reader to
prove that ...
You can watch https://www.
youtube.com/watch?v=0vqWyram
Gy8 for a helpful tutorial. Everything
is better with an Aussie/Kiwi accent!
Closed-loop control systems come
in many flavors. They are dynamic
(always changing) and the output has
a desired setpoint. The actual output
is measured by one or more sensors,
and the error is used by the control
system to nudge the output in the
proper direction through electrical
power adjustments.
Mechanical systems have a

Q
fun and you meet some great people.
. I have seen the term PID
Figure 1. loop used in describing
motor/sensor relationships.
Can you explain what a PID loop is
and why it would be needed for
robots?
Derrick Stuart
Birmingham, AL
response time an indicator of how
quickly the output responds to a
change in input. Overshoot and
oscillation are visible measures of
control system effectiveness. In
robotics, PID is useful for smooth
motion control. One particularly
demanding PID application is a
balancing robot (inverted pendulum).

These days, Im an independent
inventor and freelance designer, and I
scratch-build robots and
electromechanical gizmos almost
every day. I still like and use Parallax
products. Some of my minimalist
robots use tiny PICAXE chips. Im
erco in both of those online forums,
swapping ideas and comparing notes
A
. PID is an acronym for
Proportional, Integral, and
Derivative control. These are
three separate components of a
closed-loop (feedback) control system,
the purpose of which is usually to
deliver smooth and stable control to a
mechanical system. There are books,
websites, and college curriculum on
control systems, so I can only scratch
the surface here in hopes of whetting
your appetite. Ill play the same get
Gyros, accelerometers, sensor fusion,
Kalman filters, the works. Thats a
complicated subject worth spreading
over several magazine articles. Lets
start with a more graspable
application: a line following robot
(LFR). There are LFR contests at robot
shows where the fastest bot wins.
Consider curvy courses instead of
straight lines with 90 degree turns.
You can find plenty of Line Follower
Competition videos on the web.
Its not difficult to make a slow

22 SERVO 01.2017
Ostendorff - Mr. Roboto - Jan 17_MrRoboto - Sep 15.qxd 12/6/2016 12:13 AM Page 23
Figure 2.
LFR using just two
optical sensors
straddling the line,
banging back and forth.
I recently bought just
such a kit online for $6.
Its in constant
oscillation, alternating power between
two drive motors to wiggle along the
line, demoed at https://www.
youtube.com/watch?v=BcUCDADz
ndw. The onboard LM393
comparator functions as a digital
(bang-bang) controller, not a PID
controller. Its certainly simple and
educational, but not a contender in a
speed contest. The particular circuit
used limits top speed since only one
motor is ever on; the mechanical
oscillation is hardwired. The other
limiter is that since only two sensors
are used, there isnt enough input to
implement a PID system.
Competitive LFRs (https://www.
youtube.com/watch?v=7omDkur_f
k8) use more sensors; often a linear
array of five or more sensors spaced
widely as shown in Figure 2A. When
sensor 3 is triggered, the robot is
centered on the line. Clearly, more
sensors give a better view of the line
and provide more error information
about how far off we are from center.
A Proportional controller would not
change its output if sensor 3 was
triggered (zero error sensed). It would
change the output slightly if either
sensor 2 or 4 was triggered (trying to
correct a small error). It would change
the output more if either sensor 1 or
5 was triggered (trying to correct a
large error).
Thus, a small error generates a
small output signal change, and a
large error generates a large output
signal change. This simple
Proportional control may work at low
speeds but will lead to overshoot and
oscillation as we move faster.
A full PID system examines
previous sensor data to determine if
the error is changing, in what
Post comments on this article at
www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/January2017_MrRoboto.
direction, and how quickly in order to
predict where were heading.
Consider the sensor/line orientation
shown in Figure 2B. The sensor/LFR is
headed left off of the line, but the
Proportional controller is fat, dumb,
and happy at that instant since all it
cares about is that center sensor 3 is
triggered. It doesnt know or care that
the line is rapidly moving relatively
right. Enter the Derivative controller,
which looks at the rate of error
change. So, when the sensor history
indicates that the line is moving left or
right, the Derivative controller reacts
accordingly.
Consider the case when the LFR
goes around a curve to the right
(Figure 2C). Ideally, sensor 3 is
steadily triggered, indicating that we
are tracking properly and centered on
the line. Proportional and Derivative
controls are both happy; no need to
change output control to our drive
motors.
Now consider Figure 2C, when
sensor 5 is steadily triggered. Our LFR
is measurably left of center but we
are tracking properly. Derivative is
happy (steady reading), but
Proportional wants to steer us to the
right to reduce error and get back to
center. Experimentation and
calibration are required to find the
proper balance of control inputs,
either from hardware adjustments or
software coefficients Kp and Kd.
Integral control stores and
accumulates sensor data to tally the
average error over a time period. In a
line follower robot, its main use is to
accumulate line last seen data.
Consider if the LFR in Figure 2C
skids left and loses the line
completely. While Proportional and
Your robotic problems solved here.
Derivative have no live
data, Integral informs
that the line was
consistently last seen
(and likely still is) off to
the right and will
contribute toward
steering in that direction.
A better way to visualize the
usefulness of the Integral control
component is to consider the general
system of a balancing robot (BR). First,
consider adding an off-center weight
to a BR previously in equilibrium. The
CG changes as well as the angle of
equilibrium. The Integral control
system detects that the old setpoint
no longer works, and accumulates
new data to establish a new setpoint.
Second, lets manually push the BR in
a given direction.
While the Proportional and
Derivative control systems work to
maintain balance, it is the Integral
control system which keeps track of
how far the bot was displaced from
its original position (setpoint) and will
bring it back. As with Kp and Kd,
experimentation and calibration are
required to determine the best value
of Ki for a given system and operating
environment.
In a nutshell, Proportional control
uses the current value of the output.
Thats enough for some low speed
applications, but when things start
moving fast and furious, we need
Integral to look back at past values
and Derivative to know where the
values are going. PIDs three amigos
work together to deliver a stable
control solution.
Q
. I have been learning about
robotics using rolling robots
of sorts for the last few
years. I started with the typical two-
servo skid steer desktop offerings
and moved up through several
iterations to a six-wheel rocker bogie
chassis. I now want to explore other
means of locomotion. I have looked at
SERVO 01.2017 23
Ostendorff - Mr. Roboto - Jan 17_MrRoboto - Sep 15.qxd 12/6/2016 12:13 AM Page 24
Omni wheels, Mecanum wheels, and
various numbers of legged robots
(from two to six). I cant determine
what would be the next logical step in
terms of the learning curve.
Suggestions?
Dennis Martin
Flowery Branch, GA
A
. Much depends on how big a
robot you want to build, and
where and how you plan to
operate it. Indoor, outdoor, tabletop,
outdoor, smooth, grass, rocks, and
curbs are very different environments.
I think dead reckoning using wheel
odometry or calibrated timing
commands is a great and worthy
challenge. It works best indoors on
smooth floors with 2WD differentially
steered robots.
Mecanum wheel robots are
amazing and consistently wow the
crowds, but they only work properly
on smooth flat floors. To improve
Mecanum wheel function on less-than-
flat surfaces (notice I didnt say bumpy
or offroad), articulate the chassis in
the middle (as my video shows at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=rAgiYtwuWB4) to ensure that all
wheels touch the ground. VEX
Mecanum wheels are the best value
Ive found.
Treaded robots are also visually
dramatic, and there are many
different chassis types to pick from. Be
aware that treads consume much
more power than wheels even
driving straight on smooth surfaces.
Turning in place scrubs off lots of
energy and tread material. Although
treads may seem to imply lots of
power and all-terrain performance,
not all chassis work equally well.
Some treads will fall off or jam
when even a small pebble wedges
under a bogie. Tamiya makes kits for
Figure 4.
24 SERVO 01.2017
Figure 3.
some nice small treaded vehicles
which can become steerable robots by
adding a dual gearbox (as delivered,
they have one motor and cant turn). I
just assembled their arm crawler
shown in Figure 3, which has some
amazing climbing ability. My only
complaint is that the bottom-mounted
dual gearbox has exposed gears and
would wear quickly in a dirty
environment. Id suggest fabricating
an enclosure for the gears if you plan
to take it outside.
Four-wheel drive bots are another
option for tackling offroad terrain if
the gear ratio is low enough. There is
no shortage of inexpensive 4WD bots
online using undergeared 48:1
gearmotors which will disappoint in
both power and controllability since
there is lots of wheel scrub with skid
steering. For best control, I prefer
120:1 gearmotors even on indoor
robots.
Outdoor robots climbing terrain
might even benefit from 256:1
gearmotors for big wheels. All these
ratios are available in the familiar
Vigor/Solarbotics gearmotors shown
in Figure 4. However, be aware that
online cheapies are likely 48:1 units.
Legged bots are a labor of love.
How many servos do you want to buy
/ calibrate /
maintain / repair /
replace? There are
mind-blowing bipedal humanoid
walkers, quadrupeds, hexapods, and
octoped spiders with up to 32 servos!
Complete kits are plentiful and the
selection and availability of robot
servos, brackets, and hardware
improves every day.
One of my favorite bots is the
nine-servo PICAXE walker, powered
only by four AAA batteries shown at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=imq0HPXiQmM. Walkers are
captivating and beautiful to behold; I
can only imagine how many hours of
behind-the-scenes labor are required
to support one hour of operation. If
you have that much passion and time,
you command my total respect.
Remember, Im a toy guy and I always
gravitate toward the simplest possible
solutions yielding the most dramatic
results (bang for the buck).
Figure 5 shows a pair of my two-
servo robots, featured in construction
articles right here in SERVO Magazine.
Spiderbot (left) made the cover of the
March 2014 issue and Theobot (right)
appeared in April 2014. In both cases,
I hacked $8 toys with fantastic
walking mechanism kits into robots
which drive and steer just like a
wheeled robot, using just a pair of
continuous servos.
I recently met Dutch inventor,
Theo Jansen (Photo 1) and showed
him my Theobot robot, which was
based on his amazing wind-powered
Strandbeest you can see at https://
www.youtube.com/watch?v=99hM
P6Dzzgg.
Q
. I have been experimenting
with a small robotic mobile
platform based on the
Parallax Activity board, a digital
Figure 5.
Ostendorff - Mr. Roboto - Jan 17_MrRoboto - Sep 15.qxd 12/6/2016 12:13 AM Page 25
compass, and a GPS
module. Though these
work great outdoors, I
dont get GPS signals
indoors, and the
compass is nowhere
near enough data to
do a good job
navigating around the
living room. I recall
reading somewhere
about a system for
indoor navigation that
used infrared dots
Photo 1.
projected on the
ceiling and an upward
facing sensor on the robot to read
those dots for navigation purposes. I
cant seem to find anything like that in
my searches. Do you know of a DIY
method to create this form of indoor
navigation?
James Roth
Camden, NJ
A
. You are likely referring to
Evolution Robotics Northstar
system, which indeed projected
an IR constellation on the ceiling.
The most widespread commercial use
of this system was on WowWees
Rovio telepresence robot (Figure 6).
I still have one somewhere, but
havent used (or seen) it in many
years. It was an amazing robot and
worked very well.
You could drive it from your PC
and receive streaming video. The
Northstar system worked to enable
Rovio to reliably return to and dock
with its charging base. Each room or
hallway required another charger or
Figure 7.
True Track beacon for
free roaming. Ultimately
not a commercial
success, the $299 MSRP
robot was eventually
discounted to $100. Today, it can be
found used for $75-200 on eBay and
Amazon. Rovio PC software is no
longer supported but available for
download from www.wowwee
zone.com/kb/faq.php?id=75 and is
listed as compatible with Windows
XP/2000/Vista/7. I just tried a quick
test installation on two different
Windows 10 PCs. It loaded on my old
32-bit Acer netbook but not my 64-bit
machine, so if you have a 32-bit
machine and a sense of adventure,
dive right in.
I cant comment on the
hackability of the Northstar system,
but overall the Rovio system was
surprisingly robust and fun to
experiment with. My own experiments
for indoor robot navigation have used
multiple ground-based IR beacons to
allow line-of-sight tracking
between beacons. Figure
7 shows my schematic to
make simple LM556 based
pulsing beacons which can
be detected by most
common 38 kHz IR
receivers.
Different values of
resistors (R) will yield
different pulse rates for
each beacon, which can be
detected by most
microcontrollers using a
COUNT command to
Figure 6.
uniquely identify each beacon. With
several beacons spread around, a
robot can navigate in the same way
an airplane uses VOR stations. I have
demo videos at https://www.you
tube.com/watch?v=3rHuFFe6HRc
and https://www.youtube.com
/watch?v=_jKoE_LQ0Iw, so be sure
to check them out.
Q
. I would like to add
feedback control to a
windshield wiper motor so it
can be similar to a giant servo. I
found a couple of online guides but
they were either over my head or
used parts I couldnt find. Do you
happen to know of a recent example
of how to do this with lets say, an
Arduino or a Raspberry Pi?
Bill Lopez
Phoenix, AZ
A
. What a great project! YouTube
has a fantastic servo tutorial at
https://www.youtube.com/w
atch?v=v2jpnyKPH64 which shows
how to do just that. For position
feedback, youll need to install a
rotary potentiometer inline with the
output shaft, just like most servos use.
That will require some mechanical
fabrication on your part. Id suggest a
full-sized 5K or 10K linear taper pot,
not a tiny trimpot.
While you could build a circuit to
SERVO 01.2017 25
Ostendorff - Mr. Roboto - Jan 17_MrRoboto - Sep 15.qxd 12/6/2016 12:13 AM Page 26
Figure 8.
make it function using standard servo
pulses, it sounds like you prefer a
quick and straightforward solution,
probably using 12V if this is a real
wiper motor. If you can use three
microcontroller pins, then you can
read the potentiometer position using
an analog-to-digital converter (one pin
to ADC, built into most micros) and
use two pins to drive the motor via an
H-bridge. You can buy an L298N H-
bridge for a few bucks on eBay or roll
your own if you like relays as much as
I do.
Figure 8 shows how to use two
SPDT relays in an H-bridge
configuration to drive a motor. The
right diagram allows power-off motor
coasting or dynamic braking.
Another approach to making a
big powerful servo would be to copy
ServoCitys power gearbox format
shown in Figure 9. Put a pinion on a
servo to drive a much larger output
gear. In this case, you would modify
the servo to allow 360 degree
rotation, and you would connect the
servo electronics to an external
potentiometer on the output shaft.
This would be controlled exactly like a
regular servo, but keep your fingers
out of those gears!
More info is available at https://
Figure 10.
26 SERVO 01.2017
Figure 9.
www.servocity.com/
bm-805bb-180-servo-gearbox.
Q
. Back when I was in school
(I rode my dinosaur up hill, in
the snow, both ways!), we
had an Apple II computer hooked up
with a tether to a small robot called a
Turtle and it was programmed in a
language called Logo. I would like
to get my grandson such a robot to
help his technical education. Is there a
Logo programmable Turtle robot you
would recommend?
Leon Campbell
Houston, TX
A
. The Valiant Turtle was a
recent LOGO based drawing
robot, sold from 1983-2011.
They turn up on eBay occasionally. I
certainly want one for my vintage
collection! Honestly for your
grandson, you may prefer a more
modern expandable PC based robot.
Parallaxs line of Scribbler robots other features. It can be programmed
(Figure 10) is fantastic.
They are not kits, but come ready
to roll with built-in programs to drive
around, avoid obstacles, seek light,
flash LEDs, make sounds, follow lines,
and more. They can all draw on paper
with a marker (Figure 11 courtesy
Figure 11.
Carol Hazlett)
much like a
Turtle robot.
Plus, they
can do so much
more with
sensors, LEDs,
and sounds.
Kids can learn
programming in
several different
languages. Parallax has a fantastic
education program.
The green S3 is their latest robot
and has an entire STEM education
course built around it.
Check it out at https://www.
parallax.com/product/28333.
Its hackable and expandable, and
can be programmed using either a
drag and drop GUI (great for kids),
BlocklyProp, C, or Spin, which is
Parallaxs own language for the
Propeller processor which runs the S3.
Highly recommended, I own one and
my seven year old twin girls can use
the GUI to drive the S3 around, flash
lights, and make sounds. Its a great
value at $179; youre getting a LOT of
robot plus a giant 4,000 mAh
rechargeable LiPo battery.
The red Parallax S2 is easily found
on eBay, and it is also a great
Propeller based robot platform which
can draw, and has many of the S3s
using a simple GUI or Spin language. I
own several. The original blue
Scribbler is BASIC Stamp 2 based.
Also available on eBay/Amazon, it
can be programmed in BASIC or using
a GUI. It also draws, but with less
accuracy than the S2/S3 since it lacks
wheel encoders. Nonetheless,
Old Blue came first and
holds a special place in my
heart and collection. I own ...
you guessed it ... several.
Thats all for now, folks.
Like I said, Im passionate
about robots so ask away if
you have questions. If I dont
know, Ill try to find out. See
you next month! SV
Page 27 - Jan 17_Dev Perspectives - ReadFeed Feb15.qxd 12/6/2016 12:29 AM Page 27

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SERVO 01.2017 27
New Products - Jan 17_Mar15 - NewProd.qxd 12/6/2016 8:11 AM Page 28
NEW PRODUCTS
Pattern Plates from 2.25-12
A ctobotics new pattern plates are identical to a
single side of the Actobotics channel (hyperlink
to channel). These plates are an excellent addition to
an extensive building system as they allow you to box
in your channel for added strength; build in space-
limited areas; and save weight and cost where the
strength of a full piece of channel is not a
necessity. Pricing ranges from $1.39-$3.99.
Clamping D-Hubs
S ervoCitys clamping D-hubs are a
noteworthy solution for transferring
power from a shaft to a hub. While
conventional clamping hubs with a
cylindrical bore rely solely on clamping
force to keep the hub from slipping on the
shaft, these new D-hubs have a D-shaped bore to perfectly
match a D-shaft of the same diameter.
This means that even without tightening the pinch bolt,
the hub is prevented from slipping on the shaft. The 6-32
pinch bolt (when tightened) will tighten the hub around the
Upgraded 100 MHz Bench DSO
B &K Precision has replaced their former 2190D bench
digital storage oscilloscope (DSO) with the model
2190E. Offering the same measurement capabilities of the
previous 2190D, the 2190E continues to add more features
to the entry-level 100 MHz DSO. New upgrades include a
higher resolution display and standard LAN interface at no
additional cost. The 2190E gives technical schools and
hobbyists the advantage of buying a higher bandwidth
oscilloscope with todays latest features at a low budget
price point.
28 SERVO 01.2017
D-shaft for added security, and to
keep the D-hub from sliding up
and down the shaft. Price is
$6.99.
Set-Screw D-Hubs
N ew set screw D-hubs from ServoCity
also offer a solution for transferring
power from a shaft to the hub. While
conventional hubs with a cylindrical bore rely solely
on the set screw to keep the hub from slipping on the
shaft, the new D-hubs have a D-shaped bore to perfectly
match a D-shaft of the same diameter. This means that
even without a set-screw, the hub is prevented from
slipping on the shaft.
The 10-32 set-screw, when tightened, will apply
pressure to the flat of the D-shaft for added security and to
keep the D-hub from sliding up and down the shaft. Since
the set screw contacts the flat of the shaft, it makes
removal of the hub very easy no marring of the cylindrical
surface which would interfere with the installation/removal
of parts such as ball bearings. Price is $5.99.
For further information, please
contact:
ServoCity www.servocity.com
The 2190Es new 7 widescreen color display increases
the previous models resolution from 480 x 234 to 800 x
480 pixels, and offers a significantly larger viewing area
than 5.7 screens typically found on economy scopes. The
DSO provides 100 MHz bandwidth with 1 GSa/s sampling
rate, waveform memory up to 40,000 points, pass/fail limit
testing, digital filtering, and a waveform recorder. A USB
host port is provided on the front panel to quickly save
setup and waveform data, screenshots, or CSV files to a
USB Flash drive.
The newly added LAN interface is another feature not
New Products - Jan 17_Mar15 - NewProd.qxd 12/6/2016 8:11 AM Page 29

typically found in oscilloscopes at this price

range, and provides users another method
of remote PC connectivity through software
or SCPI commands. The DSO continues to
offer standard USBTMC-compliant USB and
RS-232 interfaces. An optional USB-to-GPIB
adapter can also be connected to the USB
host port for GPIB connectivity.
For educators, the 2190E provides a
context-sensitive help feature and the ability
to disable the Auto Set button, along with
Measure and Cursor menus for training.
Additional features include advanced
triggering capabilities, 32 automatic
measurements, and FFT function along with math functions For further information, please contact:
to add, subtract, multiply, and divide input channels.
B&K Precision's 2190E 100 MHz DSO is listed at a price
of $399.
B&K Precision www.bkprecision.com

MicroVector Flight Controller + BLHeli ESC configuration via the V USB port.
OSD Compatible with most PDBs, including those with
built-in current sensors.

W hether youre into FPV racing, freestyling, or serious

camshipping, the MicroVector (V) integrated Flight
Controller and OSD from Eagle Tree Systems can be a
welcome addition to your small FPV multi-rotor or fixed-
wing model.
This flight controller offers easy configuration. You can
fully set up and tune your V in three convenient ways:
Windows GUI
OSD stick menus at the field
Optional InfoPanel LCD
Features include:
Built-in OSD with color graphics and fully
customizable screens.
Programmable video power control: Turn on/off your
video camera and/or video transmitter using a radio
switch, on arm/disarm, etc.
SkyGates Virtual Racing (experimental augmented
reality, optional GPS required).
Built-in flight data recorder helps take out the
guesswork if something goes wrong.
For performance, the V offers:
Fast 32-bit microcontroller.
DMA enhanced control loop running at up to 8 kHz.
Advanced PID and filter tuning from either the GUI
or stick menus at the field.
Oneshot and multishot ESC protocols.
The V offers the following compatibility:
Standard 30.5 mm mounting hole centers.
PWM, SPPM, Spektrum Satellite, and S-BUS receivers
are supported, with four types of RSSI.
Multi-rotor airframes: racing quadcopter, standard
quadcopter, tricopter, Y6, hexacopter.
Fixed-wing airframes: traditional, Elevon, V-tail.
To expand this system, these are some available
options:
Add a dual band GPS module for advanced GPS
flight modes, RTH, and waypoints.
Antenna tracking and laptop position display
available with the EagleEyes FPV station.
Other accessories include 12V/5V PSU/current
sensor, alerter LED/Buzzer, Pitot tube for airspeed,
and InfoPanel LCD display.
UART for telemetry, including ET Open Telemetry,
DragonLink, and Taranis (pigtail cable included).
Each V is fully tested and undergoes an 18 point hand
calibration for best performance. Check the website for
current pricing.
For further information, please contact:
Eagle Tree Systems www.eagletreesystems.com
Is your product innovative, less expensive, more
functional, or just plain cool? If you have a new product
that you would like us to run in our New Products
section, please email a short description (300-500
words) and a photo of your product to:
newproducts@servomagazine.com
SERVO 01.2017 29
Bots in Brief - Jan 17_Bots in Brief Mar15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:13 AM Page 30
bots
IN BRIEF
CHAIN SMOKING
R esearchers working to discover more about how smoke
impacts people's health have developed an artificial human
lung "airway on a chip" and a smoking robot to carry out
more accurate tests.
The work will help further our understanding of
conditions like Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
(COPD) an irreversible inflammatory disease of the lung's
small airways and will aid with investigations into newer
smoking-related trends like vaping.
"It's like a Gatling gun; a round turret with 10-12
cigarettes mounted in it," is how Dr. Donald Ingber, director
of the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at
Harvard University, described the cigarette-smoking bot. "We
then use an automated car cigarette lighter to touch the
cigarette to light it. The machine puffs the cigarette as a
30 SERVO 01.2017
human would. You can tune its puffing frequency,
intensity, and intervals, and then observe what happens
as the smoke is fed from the machine and passed
through the airspace of the small airway chip."
The lung airway chip technology is just the latest in
a series of "organs-on-chips" microengineered cell
culture devices that are sweeping the medical research
world. These artificial human organs have previously
included kidneys, intestines, lungs, and placentas, and
allow approximations of specific organs to be created
for testing without requiring potentially harmful studies
on living animals or people.
In the case of the airway on a chip, a hollow
microchannel is lined with living human bronchiolar
epithelium, taken from either healthy individuals or patients
with COPD. As a recent press release about the news stated:
"Cell culture medium is continually flowed through a parallel
running channel separated from the first by a porous
membrane to support the epithelium for up to four weeks,
and to create a so-called air-liquid interface similar to that
present in [the] actual lung airway."
While it's no secret that smoking is bad for you, the new
research can help make more accurate personalized
evaluations about just how bad it is.
"One of the biggest advances is that you can more
accurately answer the question of what smoke does to a
particular patient," Dr. Ingber continued. "We can use the
same patient's chips and see what happens before and after
smoke exposure. Previously, clinical studies on smoke
exposure simply analyzed a certain number of patients who
had a history of smoking and an equal number who didn't.
The problem with this is that you're dealing with different
people with their own histories, home environments, work
environments, and so on. This gives us a much more direct
idea about cause and effect."
Blast from the Past: This "Walking
Machine" at the National Bureau of
Standards tested the wear on shoes
in 1937.
Bots in Brief - Jan 17_Bots in Brief Mar15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:13 AM Page 31

bots
IN BRIEF
WALK WHAT WAY?
O ne of the many things that makes humanoid walking tricky is the fact
that when we walk, were off balance almost all of the time. For some
silly reason, our legs are positioned to the left and right when we walk
forward, which means were constantly rocking sideways while also leaning
in the direction were going. Most robots dont try to walk like this, and
the few that do tend to be very complex and difficult to manage.
At UCLA, Dennis Hongs Robotics and Mechanisms Laboratory
(RoMeLa) has come up with a robot design thats a novel new take on
bipedal walking. By doing away with anthropomorphic design and turning a
humanoid robot sideways, theyve been able to create a stable and agile
bipedal design thats simple and cheap at the same time.
Instead of mimicking human walking, Hong told us, we provide an
elegant solution by proposing a novel configuration utilizing mechanical
intelligence for speed, stability, and simplicity, enabling practical and
effective robot mobility for real life applications.
Apparently, once Hong and his students (including Sepehr Ghassemi,
Jeffrey Yu, and Joshua Hooks) came up with the concept for a sideways
walking robot, designing, building, and testing the robot only took two
weeks. The robot is called NABiRoS, which stands for Non-
Anthropomorphic Bipedal Robotic System, and its non-
anthropomorphicness actually makes it better at navigating some
otherwise tricky human environments.
Photo courtesy of RoMeLa.

WINGING IT
C hen Li was a researcher at Berkeleys Poly-PEDAL Lab and
Biomimetic Millisystems Lab, where he gave little legged
robots cockroach-inspired shells to help them push through
obstacles. Li now has his own lab at Johns Hopkins University:
the Terradynamics Lab which studies movement science at the
interface of biology, robotics, and physics. At IROS 2016, he
presented a paper demonstrating a new trick for legged robots
with shells: Ground-based dynamic self-righting, or flipping over
using wing covers like a real insect does.

Photo courtesy of Terradynamics Lab/JHU.

SERVO 01.2017 31
Koci - Animatronics - Jan 17_Steve Koci Animatronics #1 Parrot.qxd 12/6/2016 8:19 AM Page 32

DIY Animatronics
Power to the Robots By Steve Koci

The famous phrase, Scotty, we need more power! seems to pop into my head
whenever I am stretching the power envelope on a new creation. Since I dont have
anyone named Scotty (or any other name, for that matter) to come to my aid when
called, it falls to me to consider and resolve this issue early in the planning stages.
Although this is not one of the most exciting parts of the prop building process, it is
crucial that these topics be addressed in order to be sure your characters have the
power they need to perform at their best.

What are My Choices? will remain in a fixed location, then wall warts also
known as AC adapters become an easy and cost-effective
Circuit solution (Figure 1). These items come in regulated or
One possible source of power may be available directly unregulated versions, with the regulated models being the
from your circuit. Many microprocessors can source very supplies of choice.
small loads directly from their GPIO pins. However, most of Be sure to always check the voltage output of your wall
our applications will require more power than is available warts with a digital multimeter before plugging them into
using this option. This is where it is necessary to add an your valuable electronics. Just because it states on the label
additional external power source. Lets look at some other that it is a certain voltage does not necessarily mean it is
methods to get that extra power we need. true. I have seen unregulated wall warts measure out
significantly higher when unloaded than the stated voltage.
Wall Warts While some components may be more tolerant of higher
When a character is in close proximity to AC power and voltages, your sensitive electronics may have more stringent
requirements. This is one of those situations where a quick
check can save you a lot of time and frustration later. While
unregulated supplies are generally less expensive than the
regulated models, it is worth
the price to stick with the
regulated versions.
There are also some
regulated power supplies that
come with multiple voltage
regulators at different voltages.
This allows a single wall wart
Figure 2. to satisfy the needs of your
One
power components if they require
supply different voltages. I use this
for two setup for my Frankenstein
jobs.
boards to supply the 5V and
12V it demands (Figure 2).
Many of our projects
require different voltages to
operate the various devices. Of
Figure 1. Plenty of course, it is possible to regulate
wall wart choices.
the voltage with regulators.
32 SERVO 01.2017
Koci - Animatronics - Jan 17_Steve Koci Animatronics #1 Parrot.qxd 12/6/2016 8:19 AM Page 33

DIY Animatronics
Post comments on this section and find any associated files and/or downloads at
www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/January2017_Animatronics_Power-for-Bots.

RESOURCES
RobotShop http://tinyurl.com/jnvpn9p
ServoCity http://tinyurl.com/zc4ehyp
Hitec http://tinyurl.com/jltbqxh
DIY Animatronics Forum
http://tinyurl.com/qjeehjs
My Website www.halstaff.com
My YouTube Channel
http://tinyurl.com/nma2doj

However, I prefer to use a power source with the

proper voltages required by my individual
Figure 3. My ATX adapter board.
components.
I salvage the wall warts from any device that has one
before disposing of it. I quickly check the voltage with a
meter and write in down on the side with a silver Sharpie
before storing them away for future use. This makes it easy
to find the necessary adapter when searching through a
box filled with them. It also means I do not need to track
down a pair of reading glasses beforehand!

Computer Power Supplies

These offer another viable alternative. Several hacks are
available online to convert your computer supply into
something we can utilize in our projects. There are also
many breakout boards available. I make my own (Figure 3),
but a nice kit is offered by RobotShop (see Resources).
Even if these will not fit into your project plans, they do
make a great benchtop power supply (Figure 4). I find it
very handy to have clean reliable power at hand when
working on circuits. This is a good way to reuse a power
supply from an otherwise useless and non-functioning Figure 4. Benchtop computer power supply.
computer. I have a box of these that friends have given me
before they disposed of old computers and they eventually this is really your only option.
find a home in one of my creations. Adding batteries to your project can, however,
significantly increase the cost. You will either need to
Batteries continually replace batteries or purchase rechargeable
If this will be a stand-alone project, then we
are forced to consider battery power (Figure 5).
Cost, capacity, convenience, and durability are all
important factors to consider when assessing
your power requirements. Lets take a quick look
at some of the advantages and disadvantages of
using batteries.
The primary advantage to this is that you are
no longer tethered to a plug. You now have the
freedom to install your character wherever they
are needed. The remoteness of the placement is
no longer a factor!
The portability also allows you to make your Figure 5. Big or small,
character mobile. If you are constructing a robot, take your pick!

SERVO 01.2017 33
Koci - Animatronics - Jan 17_Steve Koci Animatronics #1 Parrot.qxd 12/6/2016 8:19 AM Page 34
DIY Animatronics
batteries along with the requisite charger to
keep them powered up. If your project uses
batteries, they will need to be monitored,
which takes some additional time and effort.
NiMH - These are the most widely
used batteries in the construction of robots.
They offer good value with a high energy
density and very little memory effect,
making them a very popular choice.
LiPo - It is easy to see why this design
is quickly gaining in popularity. They are
lightweight and have good capacity. They
also offer high discharge rates. The voltages
are a bit funky as they come in increments of 3.7 volts.
Li-Ion - The fact that these batteries have no
memory effect issues makes recharging a breeze. They have
a good power output rate and are lightweight, but are
expensive and heat sensitive. If they are completely
discharged, they are toast and will need to be replaced. Li-
ion batteries do pose a higher fire danger than other
battery types, so some added care should be taken when
using them.
NiCd - NiCds are declining in popularity as they have
a significant drawback. Improper use and charging can
cause a major memory effect. Continual recharging reduces
the capacity of the batteries. They should be fully
discharged prior to recharging in order to get the most out
of them.
Alkaline - We have all had experience using these in
a flashlight, toy, or other device. They are low cost but non-
rechargeable, so you are required to constantly buy
Figure 6. All-in-
one 12V battery.
34 SERVO 01.2017
Figure 7. Pick the size you need.
replacements. The convenience of being readily available
virtually everywhere is a plus.
Lead Acid - These are inexpensive considering their
high capacity, but they are big and heavy. You need to be
sure to keep them charged, and they lack the high
discharge rates of other battery choices. Motorcycle
batteries are a good option to consider if you are interested
in giving them a try.
I have also utilized a 12V 6,000 mAh li-ion battery that
includes a wall plug charger in some of my projects (Figure
6). It comes in very handy, and is a versatile all-in-one
solution to fit many of my power needs (see Resources).
Once you decide on a battery type, you then need to
consider what capacity you need. There are many choices
available, so consider your choice carefully. I am of the
belief that more is better here, so I choose the largest
capacity possible while still considering my space and
weight requirements.
Putting a Charge into Your
Batteries
It does come with its own challenges. Keeping batteries
charged and ready when you need them is an ongoing
concern. This is where a quality battery charger can be
worth its weight in gold. Well, maybe not gold, but you get
the idea!
As my battery supported projects have gotten more
complex, I have had to continually increase my reliance on a
greater number of batteries in ever-increasing capacities.
This need for more power has also demanded that I
upgrade my charging capabilities. I have had several
different models as my needs have changed. Both of my
previous chargers are models from Hitec and have served
me admirably (Figure 7). However, I once again found
myself in the market for an upgraded model.
The New Hitec X4 AC Pro Charger
I was fortunate enough to get my hands on one of the
new Hitec X4 Pro battery chargers (see Resources), so this
Koci - Animatronics - Jan 17_Steve Koci Animatronics #1 Parrot.qxd 12/6/2016 8:19 AM Page 35

DIY Animatronics
is the perfect opportunity to do an initial
review. I have just started to explore all this
unit has to offer and am extremely
impressed at what I am discovering so far
(Figure 8).
This charger is packed with features! It
offers the ability to charge up to four
batteries of different chemistries on any of
the charging ports. Each channel operates
independently of the others, allowing you to
mix and match battery types. It will
accommodate NiMH, NiCd, LiPo, Li-Ion,
LiHV, and Pb batteries. All four channels
have balance inputs and can accommodate
Figure 8. The new Hitec X4
temperature sensors which you can Pro battery charger.
purchase separately. It also includes a USB
charging port which is another thing I will put to use as
Jarvis (see the September 2016 issue of SERVO)
incorporates a couple of components that have this
charging requirement.
It packs plenty of power-charging ability with a total
of 200 watts on AC and 300 watts when using DC.
Having the capability to use a DC power source to run the
charger can be especially useful when away from the
availability of a convenient wall plug.
I am very impressed on how well designed and built
the charger is. Little details such as the use of all four Figure 9. A simple wiring solution.
sides of the charger for the various cable connections
shows how well thought-out the design is. This allows you the most inconvenient times, which is something we want
to spread your batteries out when charging which is to do our best to avoid. Remember that battery charging
especially useful if you are using all four ports. takes time, so plan accordingly!
The wireless feature is especially handy as the X4 AC
Pro can be controlled by your smartphone. Setup of the Other Considerations
app could not have been easier and was completed in a
couple of minutes. I think this will be something I take full When troubleshooting a malfunctioning prop, my first
advantage of! You can also use the free software to test is of the power supply. It is more often than not the
operate and monitor the charger from your computer. culprit! Replacing or recharging dead batteries or switching
The charger can store up to 10 separate charging out an inoperable power supply are easy fixes and are
profiles for each channel. The ability to access this at any frequently all that is required to get your character up and
time can be a valuable time-saver. The box also includes running again. Be prepared and have spares on hand!
two balance boards along with the various cables necessary There are a variety of different cable connectors that
to get started charging your batteries. are available for attaching your power supply to your circuit.
The use of quality components shows the commitment I prefer to use ones that can simply be plugged in which
to provide a well constructed product that will hold up to allows for an easy tool-less change-out if I need to quickly
some serious use. Considering all the features provided by replace a faulty power supply. If a circuit comes with only a
this charger, I feel the price of $199 is extremely screw-in header, I attach an adapter (Figure 9) which
reasonable. This unit should satisfy the charging needs and allows for a simple connection.
budget of the DIY animatronic builder very well. The Noise in your circuits from your power source can
chargers should be on the shelves by the time you read this, create havoc on your otherwise well planned design. This
so check it out and consider adding one to your can sometimes be resolved by using separate supplies for
workbench. each component. I find that isolating my servo or motor
The ongoing chore of having to recharge and power supply is especially helpful in reducing the feedback
continually swap out multiple batteries is a never-ending to the rest of my circuit.
process. Creating a deliberate charging routine will go a Beware of the danger of improperly storing 9V
long way to satisfying the continuous demands of your batteries. Since both the positive and negative contacts are
batteries. Components always seem to run out of juice at side by side on the top of the battery, it is easy for a metal
SERVO 01.2017 35
Koci - Animatronics - Jan 17_Steve Koci Animatronics #1 Parrot.qxd 12/6/2016 8:19 AM Page 36

DIY Animatronics
object to bridge them from making the
and start a fire. Store Figure 10. A safe way to store wrong choice when
them in the original 9V batteries. choosing a power
packaging or a specially source. Carefully
designed container consider your options
(Figure 10) until you and choose the
are ready to install method best suited to
them. Avoid storing that particular design.
them loosely where they Experiment with a
can come in contact method new to you
with other batteries or and resist the urge to
any metal objects. only use a single type
Taping the posts can of power supply for all
provide some added your needs. Using the
protection if you are old and known method
required to transport them. may limit your ability to expand your designs in new and
Please dispose of your batteries in an environmentally- exciting ways. The more options you have available in your
friendly manner when they reach the end of their useful toolbox, the greater your creations can be!
life. They contain toxic materials and need to be recycled If you have any questions or have ideas on this subject,
properly. Check with your local municipality for any available please share it with the rest of the community on the
opportunities in your area. forum. You can find it at http://tinyurl.com/hu6pxtz.

My Tank is on Empty Until next month, May the Passion to Build Be with
You! SV
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36 SERVO 01.2017
Prochnow - Symbiont Sensors - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 8:21 AM Page 37
Symbiont Sensors
Add Sensors to your Bot NO Battery,
NO Wires, NO Switches Needed;
Oh, and You Get Bluetooth, Too
W
e all know the drill and the misery of
trying to add sensors to a motorized project.
Motors need big current supplies, while
sensors generally speaking need modest
current supplies. Voltage regulators, buck regulators, wires,
and switches serve as unwanted but necessary guests
inside the robots circuitry.
There are alternatives to this common scenario,
By Dave Prochnow
however. Use two power supplies: one for the motors, and
another supply for the data collection system. While this is
a workable alternative, now youve got the added burden
of two battery packs that need separate and distinct
charging and maintenance routines.
Youd think with the recent advances in energy
harvesting technology, solar power efficiency, and super-
capacitor charge retention that someone wouldve put all of
SERVO 01.2017 37
Prochnow - Symbiont Sensors - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 8:21 AM Page 38
Post comments on this article at www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/January2017_Symbiont-Sensors.
Figure 1. Cypress has cracked the code for creating battery-
less sensor networks.
these technologies together, and created a drop-in-place
sensor package that could be easily inserted into any
project. Well, that someone is Cypress Semiconductor
(cypress.com) and theyve done it! They have a newly
released solar-powered sensor solution that enables you to
add a pint-sized, low cost, battery-free sensor package
anywhere on virtually any robot (see Figure 1).
Officially known as the Cypress solar-powered
Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacon or Solar BLE Sensor,
you can see by the name that Cypress added an
unbelievable extra to this sensor. Yes, this is a Bluetooth-
enabled sensor package.
Figure 2 shows a couple of assembled sensor
packages, along with the sensor PCB (printed circuit board)
and enclosure pieces. Not only that, its solar powered with
an energy harvesting circuit used for charging a capacitor
array, giving you unlimited operation while it is within range
of an adequate illumination source.
Specifically, the solar BLE sensor uses a couple of clever
Cypress devices: an Energy Harvesting Power Management
IC (PMIC) S6AE103A, and an EZ-BLE Programmable Radio-
on-Chip (PRoC) module CYBLE-022001-00 for achieving an
38 SERVO 01.2017
Figure 2. The solar BLE sensor by Cypress.
impressive set of specifications. Namely: a 3.6V solar cell;
0.2F super-capacitor; 10-pin GPIO connector (be
forewarned, however, this connector is very difficult to
access without the Cypress debug board); BLE chip
antenna; programmable via the Cypress debug board; and
an integrated temperature and humidity sensor IC (see
Figure 3 and Figure 4).
Incredibly, all of this goodness is housed on a wafer-
thin disc PCB that is about one inch in diameter as shown
in Figure 5. And remember, this solar BLE sensor is totally
self-contained just install and forget. In situations where
the presence of ambient light might not be sufficient, you
can solder an optional CR2032 cell battery to the PCB.
Im No Node, Im a Network
Studying the size of the solar BLE sensor, its hard to
believe that it is at the center of its own wireless sensor
network (WSN). You can access this portion of the BLE
module through an optional debug board as shown in
Figure 6 and Figure 7. This board is packaged with one
solar BLE sensor in a reference design kit (RDK).
Prochnow - Symbiont Sensors - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 8:21 AM Page 39
Figure 3. This solar cell supplies all of the power needed for
running the solar BLE sensor.
Armed with this kit (CYALKIT-E02),
you can verify the WSN function, as well
as configure serial parameters on a solar
BLE sensor (e.g., read/write the
transmitter power strength).
Furthermore, you can program the
sensors firmware with the debug board,
too.
So, having a debug board can be
pretty handy if you plan on integrating
the solar BLE sensor WSN into your
projects.
Reading and writing the serial
configuration parameters with the
debug board relies on a PC based
terminal program, such as the Cypress-
recommended Tera Term VT. In this
context, the solar BLE sensor PCB is
connected to the debug board via the
10-pin GPIO connector; a toggle switch
is set on the debug board to EZ-BLE; and
the board is inserted into an available
USB port.
When youre ready to start the
configuration process, a reset button is Figure 5. The solar BLE sensor is
pressed on the debug board and your about the size of a US quarter.
desired parameters are transmitted from
the PC to the solar BLE sensor with Tera Term VT. The WSN
does not transmit data during this configuration process.
After the parameters have been set, eject the debug
board, remove the solar BLE sensor from the debug board,
slide the toggle switch to PRoC BLE, and reinsert the debug
board into the PC. You can now verify the changed
Figure 4. The BLE radio is the green PCB and the super-
capacitor is the silver disc.
parameters through the WSN PC
program.
There is still another special chipset
on the debug board which is known as
KitProg. KitProg is used for
programming and debugging the EZ-BLE
module on the solar BLE sensor. KitProg
uses a programmable system-on-chip
(PSoC) 5LP device for burning hex files
into either the debug boards PSoC BLE
or the solar BLE sensors EZ-BLE module.
Let There Be Light
In addition to the onboard
temp/humidity sensor, you could argue
that the solar BLE sensor has another
stealth sensor built into it: an ambient
light sensor. Why? Well, according to
Cypress, variations in light intensity
cause the BLE radio to transmit data at
specific advertisement time intervals.
These light levels and time intervals are:
100-200 lux (roughly equivalent to
a street lamp) with an interval of 50
seconds
200-400 lux (subdued interior lighting) with an
interval of 30-50 seconds
400-500 lux (office lighting) advertising at a 15-30
second interval
> 1,000 lux (cloudy day and brighter) transmitting
data at 3-15 second intervals
SERVO 01.2017 39
Prochnow - Symbiont Sensors - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 8:21 AM Page 40
Figure 6. The main toggle switch has six silver legs along the right-hand edge on the
debug board.
Figure 7. The underside of the debug board.
Figure 8. A solar BLE sensor attached to the debug board via the 10-pin GPIO
connector. This configuration will charge the super-capacitor when plugged into a USB
port.
So, measure the time interval and you can get a rough
idea of the ambient light level that is powering the sensor.
This mode of operation is called demo mode (labeled
DM on the sensor enclosure). There is also timer mode
(TM). These modes are selected via a switch on the solar
BLE sensor PCB. Basically, the difference between these
modes include:
In demo mode, the solar BLE sensor transmits data at
the previously mentioned light level governed time intervals.
Also, demo mode does not charge the onboard super-
40 SERVO 01.2017
capacitor.
In timer mode, it transmits
data at five minute intervals in
variable light levels. If the super-
capacitor is not fully charged, it will
be charged during this mode of
operation.
In timer mode, data is
transmitted for approximately 30
hours even in total darkness
after the super-capacitor is fully
charged.
The super-capacitor can also be
charged via the 10-pin GPIO
connector on the solar BLE sensor.
Figure 8 shows the sensor PCB
plugged into this connector. The
sensor is plugged into the debug
board and then the board is
connected to a USB charger. In this
configuration, the super-capacitor
will be fully charged in about 10
minutes. Alternatively, you can also
use the USB port on your computer
for charging the super-capacitor.
Of Course, Theres
an App for It
Granted, you dont want to be
tethered to your PC while receiving
telemetry from your symbiont
sensor-equipped bot. Luckily,
Cypress is a couple of steps ahead
of you and your wandering robot.
There is both an Android and iOS
app for receiving and logging data
from the solar BLE sensor.
Once youve downloaded and
installed the requisite app for your
mobile device, just flick the
Bluetooth toggle in your Settings,
and launch the app. If youre using
the iOS version of Cypress BLE Beacon, you will have to
additionally enable the Location toggle inside Settings ->
Privacy.
Up to 10 solar BLE sensors can be read at the same
time. Likewise, up to 10 sensors can be logged at the same
time. These logs are saved in a CSV format file consisting of
up to a maximum size of 50 MB. This size limit is comprised
of up to five log files, with each file limited to 100,000
entries. The logs are added to the device in a rollover file
system fashion where the oldest file is replaced by the
newest file. Therefore, run tests of your data stream before
Prochnow - Symbiont Sensors - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 8:22 AM Page 41

you release your symbiont sensor system into the wild, or

you could lose the data that youre trying to capture.
Buy Two Kits
There are two relevant solar BLE sensor kits from
Cypress. The CYALKIT-E02 Solar-Powered BLE Sensor
Beacon Reference Design Kit (RDK) contains one solar BLE
sensor and one debug board. This kit costs $45. The other
kit is the CYALKIT-E03 Solar-Powered BLE Sensor Beacon 5-
Pack which comes with you guessed it five solar BLE
sensors. This kit costs $99. You can read more about each
kit at cypress.com/CYALKIT-E02 and
cypress.com/CYALKIT-E03.
Thats a Wrap
By using these solar BLE sensors inside your next (or
existing) robot project, you will be able to just add and
forget without all of the muss and fuss that is typically
associated with incorporating a sensor package into a
motorized bot. No batteries, no wires, no problem; a drop-
in package that pays for itself with simplicity and
convenience. SV
The Five Second Project
So, youve got a solar BLE sensor. Lets make a quick
project with it. One of the more popular network projects
is a remote weather station. Heres how long it takes to
build a fully functional data-logging remote weather
station: about five seconds. Basically, all you really have to
do is ensure that the solar BLE sensor is operating in
demo mode and youre good to go. Just find a location
with adequate sunshine (try to avoid direct sunlight, itll
skew your data and could melt the sensors enclosure) that
is sheltered from precipitation, and your new weather
station project will start broadcasting meaningful results
within a couple of minutes.
The photo here shows an impromptu weather station
built on top of a watering can sitting under a covered
deck. You can also install the Cypress app on every family
members smartphone so that weather conditions can be
checked without wasting
cellular data.
You could even take
this project one step
further by uploading your
weather logs to a cloud
service for the whole
family to share. Likewise,
you can email this
projects data to anyone
in your contacts directly
from within the app.

SERVO 01.2017 41
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Post comments on this

section and find any
associated files and/or
downloads at the specific
article link for each feature.

The Art of the Bot by Kevin M. Berry

his month, Combat Zone debuts two bots stood out for their creative Bot: Overhaul

T a new feature. To us gearheads,

we know the art in a well
machined shaft, a greasy bearing, or
paint schemes. As a guy who just
spray paints his bots one primary color
(Which ones mine? The red one, you
Team: Equals Zero
Artwork done by: Cynthia Lu

the delicate curve of a perfectly
tensioned #30 roller chain glistening
with oil in the glare of a bare 60 watt
bulb.
To fans and builders who still
have some shred of non-metallic
awareness, there is another form of
art in our sport: the decorations we
slather, draw, or sometimes carefully
craft on our precious machines. At
this years BattleBots tournament,
idiot!), the composition on these two
bots are truly works of art.
I asked the artists to comment on
their creations, as we present the
gallery of shiny objects for your
viewing pleasure.
The Editor
As described by the team:
Our team knew going into Season
2 that we wanted a mascot for
Overhaul. There already exists a big
fanbase revolving around the
anthropomorphism of inanimate
objects, so we thought, why not

Featured
This Month:
42 The Art of the Bot
by Kevin M. Berry

44 Builder Tip:
Going to Events
by Matt Spurk

45 EVENT REPORT:
NERCs Battle on the
Parkway: 10 Years of
Fighting in Philly
by Nate Franklin

42 SERVO 01.2017
Combat Zone - Jan 17_Combat Zone - Aug 15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:36 AM Page 43

www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/January2017_Bot-Art.

create a kickass, scythe-wielding,

cat-ear-headphones-wearing female
for our robot?
We took elements of both the
bot (like the curved grabbing arm)
and our team captain, Charles (cat
ears, fondness of Vocaloid Miku),
and meshed them together to
create 'Haru-chan.'
This female representation of
Overhaul also donned an outfit that
would fit our team dress code of
teal and black, and sported the
actual set of Axent Wear cat ear
headphones that our team wore on
TV. Haru-chan, of course, had to
dress like the team to be on the
team.
I sketched out the character on
paper first, then scanned it in to
finish inking and coloring it digitally.
The image was then printed out on
an adhesive vinyl sheet and applied like a decal on the back of the robot.
There are plans of making Haru-chan a mech suit for Season 3 if it's announced.

Bot: Witch Doctor and Shaman memorable. We designed it to

Team: Busted Nuts
Artwork done by: Andrea Suarez
and Michael Gellatly
As described by the team:
We wanted the robot to be
be an effective BattleBot, but
also look playful and relatable.
Most of the paint job was done with Doctor was painted by Michael
spray paint and brushed-on details. All Gellatly a local artist who is a
of the artwork is done by hand. sponsor for the team. SV
I painted Shaman, and Witch

SERVO 01.2017 43
Combat Zone - Jan 17_Combat Zone - Aug 15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:36 AM Page 44

www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/January2017_Event-List.

Builder Tip: Going to Events

by Matt Spurk

oing to events is always

G one of the best

experiences available to
builders. You get to pit your bots Primary Items
BRING IT List

Multimeter
against others, hang out with
Robots
friends, and see all the cool
Heat Shrink
creations very creative people
Controllers

Tap and Die Set
have built. I learn new skills or
Battery Charger(s)

Zip Ties
tricks every single time.
Controller Batteries

Dremel Tool
One of the bad things about
going to events is showing up

Controller Charger

Files
and forgetting that key part or
LiPo Charging Bags

Hammers
tool you really need. This can Spare Parts
Scissors
really put a damper on an
otherwise amazing experience.
Receivers
Snap Ring Pliers
Most builders are more than
Wheels
Pliers
happy to loan out tools or parts,
Batteries
Jigsaw
but I prefer having everything I

Drive/Weapon Motors
Angle Grinder
need to quickly get my machine
back in order without hunting
Speed Controllers
Heat Gun/Lighter
for it.
Belts
Random Stuff
In order to keep track of all
the tools and parts I take to Tools
Camera
events, I have put together a
Soldering Iron
Trash Can
little spreadsheet with all the
Solder
Chairs
items I commonly use. As Im


Solder Bulb Power Strip
building the bots, Ill often find
Im using a tool that wasnt on
Helping Hands
Extension Cord
my original list, so it gets added.
Drill/Driver
Spare plastic or metal to make a wedge
I also started taking my list to
Drill Bits (Standard and Metric)
Pencil/Sharpie
competitions, so if I realize I
needed a certain tool it can be

Drill Charger
Stuff to Bring Next Time
added for future events. It may
Wrenches / Crescent


not help me this time, but
Wire Strippers


repeating the same mistake is
Allen Wrenches
significantly more frustrating.

It also speeds up the

Scale


process of getting everything
Screwdrivers


ready. Just go through the list
Hardware (Nuts, Bolts, etc.)


and check it off once its packed.
Tapes (Duct, Electrical, Double-stick)
Hopefully this list will help

all the builders out there (new or

Glues (Hot, Super, Epoxy, etc.)


old) in those frantic moments
Safety Glasses

This List
packing just before the event.
SV
CE Robots 8-12-2016

44 SERVO 01.2017
Combat Zone - Jan 17_Combat Zone - Aug 15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:36 AM Page 45
www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/January2017_NERC-Battle-on-the-Parkway.
EVENT REPORT:
NERCs Battle on the Parkway:
10 Years of Fighting in Philly
ast October marked the 10th
L year of the Northeast Robotics
Clubs event at the Franklin
Institute in Philadelphia, PA. An
unprecedented combined total of 80
bots signed up for this event almost
twice the amount as last year. Also
present was Jerry Clarkin from Team
Hammertime, with his BattleBots
entry, SubZero on display.
Due to the massive increase in
numbers, changes were made to the
schedule in order to accommodate all
of the bots. First, every bracket would
run modified double elimination
(winner-take-all final). Second, all
Beetleweight fights were reduced to
two minutes. Third, there would be no
postponements. If a bot wasnt ready
to fight in time, there would be an
automatic forfeit. Competitors were
cooperative with the changes, and
were able to get their bots ready to
fight on time.
The Antweight division featured
some heavy-hitting spinners such as
DDT, Physique Black, and The Cuban,
along with wedges like Slim Pickens,
Cornerstone, and FireArrow. One of
the Ants this author found interesting
was Ubersaw: a
miniature version of the
iconic BattleBot,
Nightmare. It tore
through a 3D-printed
drum spinner with ease,
but unfortunately
emulated Nightmares
greatest weakness: being
unable to self-right.
Physique Black made
quite an impression,
taking out robot after
robot through the
winners bracket. DDT did SubZero on display.
the same, but fell short of glory after
it ate its own pulley, giving lifter
Ferocious Mk 4 a spot in the final.
The final consisted of Physique
Black delivering hit after hit, with
Ferocious Mk 4 fighting on. However,
it was not enough, and the drum
spinner claimed first place.
The Beetleweights were filled with
many deadly spinners and fast
wedges. Silent Spring, Mondo Bizarro,
BEST KOREA, and a new and
improved Weta returned to the event,
along with new spinners like Bagel
Bite, Recoil, and Event Horizon.
The new spinners put on a great
show, but suffered from new bot
bugs that will hopefully be fixed in the
future. Reigning champion, Speed
Wedge 3 had a rough day, winning
two fights but losing to Trilobite and
Weta (driven by Jeremy Butler, a very
experienced drumbot driver).
Silent Spring went on a rampage
in the winners bracket, while Weta
and Trilobite proved to be formidable
foes. The impressive new Weta was
stopped in the losers bracket by
Chuck, a vicious vertical spinner
whose driver won the Best Rookie
Physique Black.
by Nate Franklin
Driver award.
Trilobite lost to Silent Spring in
the winners bracket final, after nearly
losing its wedge thanks to a damaged
frame rail. In its next match, Trilobite
went up against the undercutter
Scorpius, and managed to win the
fight despite nearly losing in the same
manner. Without any more spare
frame rails, Trilobites wedge was
supported with duct tape, zip ties,
and hope. Silent Spring had no
problem taking the final.
In the Hobbyweight division,
horizontal spinner Butcher proved to
be a force to be reckoned with. Team
Conn Bots carved a path of
destruction, reaching the final with
ease. In the losers bracket, drum
spinner Odin worked its way through
despite suffering issues with its
weapon. However, it was stopped in
its tracks by the wedge of Freshies,
who made it to the final. After taking
several hits from Butcher, it stopped
moving, and Butcher took first place.
Two words can only describe the
Featherweight tournament: Big Ripto.
With heavy-hitters Triggo and Glasgow
Kiss absent this year, Kyle Singers
The Cuban.
SERVO 01.2017 45
Combat Zone - Jan 17_Combat Zone - Aug 15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:36 AM Page 46
monstrous vertical spinner was out for
blood. Its first victim was flipper
Imperial Entanglements, who was
dispatched with ease.
Meanwhile, a scaled down
version of everyones BattleBots
dream fight took place. Charles Guan
brought the latest version of his 30
lber Uberclocker, but rebuilt for the
Featherweight class and named "I
Can't Believe it's Not Overhaul," while
Jamison Go brought a miniature
SawBlaze, MegatRON.
FireArrow.
Ferocious
Mk 4.
Weta and Trilobite.
Event
Horizon.
46 SERVO 01.2017
The two fought an intense battle,
with MegatRON coming out on top.
MegatRON went up against Big Ripto,
who took a chunk out of its saw
blade and tore its wedge off, hitting
the ceiling. I Cant Believe its Not
Overhaul fought its way through the
losers bracket, beating vertical
spinner Duck Yeah, wedge Melvin,
and MegatRON. However, it was Big
Ripto who took home the win.
The Sportsman class featured
many impressive bots. Alex Horne of
DDT.
Silent
Spring.
Freshies.
Wedge Industries brought True Grit, a
bot inspired by Yeti from ABCs
BattleBots with a sanding drum. There
were also hammers like Iron Golem
and Jaeger (the spiritual successor to
Blacksmith on ABCs BattleBots), but
lifters Translationally Inconsistent
(which featured mecanum drive,
allowing the bot to move side to side
like a crab) and Heracross dominated.
However, the real star of the
Sportsman class was CLOMP, a bot
inspired by Mega Tento from
Ubersaw.
Chuck and
Bagel Bite.
Recoil launches
Scorpius. Best Korea.
Butcher.
Combat Zone - Jan 17_Combat Zone - Aug 15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:36 AM Page 47

BattleBots. Built by Centre County 4-H reducing it to scrap. Thankfully, the the former taking the win.
Robotics, it used a plastic bucket to team brought a spare bucket. In their Once again, the Northeast
smother its opponents, and won the fight against True Grit, they drove on Robotics Club put on a great event in
hearts of the audience and builders. top of the lifter/sander hybrid, and the Franklin Institute. Thanks to all
In its fight against Jaeger, the managed to yank out its power link who helped run the event, and to the
powerful hammer dealt blow after with its wheel. In the end, it came builders who put on a good show.
blow, puncturing the bucket and down to Dorno and Heracross, with SV
1st 2nd 3rd
Antweight Physique Black Ferocious Mk 4 DDT
Beetleweight Silent Spring Trilobite Scorpius
Hobbyweight Butcher Freshies Odin
Featherweight Big Ripto I Cant Believe MegatRON
Its Not Overhaul
Sportsman Dorno Heracross Translationally Inconsistent

I Can't Believe It's Not

Overhaul.

Duck Yeah.
Odin attacks 911 with its drum. Big Ripto.

MegatRON MegatRON
(before). (after).

Melvin.
Clomp.
True Grit takes on Lil Bale Kicker.

Translationally Heracross easily

Inconsistent. lifts Iron Golem.

Jaeger.

SERVO 01.2017 47
Cicolani - Nomad 2 - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 12:37 AM Page 48

NOMAD
This is an update to my March 2015
The Evolution of an
Autonomous Robot

review of the Nomad chassis kit from

ServoCity. The project is on-going, and
I've learned a lot along the way. As
usual, I got myself in way over my
head. Fortunately, through persistence
and a little help from time to time,
I've made some real progress. I really
have enjoyed working with this kit
and modifying it with other parts
from the Actobotics line. At the end of my initial review, I declared it a
very robust chassis that would be great for use in Magellan competitions.

he original plan was to use an old Android phone was an Intel Edison with the Arduino compatible breakout

T as the main processor, interfaced with an Arduino

to collect sensor data and communicate with the
motor controller. In the end, I decided not to use
the phone. I had started to read about the Robot Operating
System (ROS): a middleware package for controlling robots.
board. I had heard some great things about the Edison
board; it was pretty fast, ran on Linux, and it had that
Arduino compatible breakout board. It was a perfect
candidate for this project. Or, so I thought.
My goal was to get ROS installed on the Edison board
What enticed me about ROS was the fact that it is open and load a simple program that would allow me to control
source, used by researchers and companies around the Nomad with a wireless game controller. I had developed
world, and a lot if not all of the functionality I wanted the program for another platform I put together as a
to use was already written. test/learning system called BARB (Big Autonomous Robotic
In fact, it was already written by people a lot smarter Base). BARB was a 24 diameter circular robot built on a
and with a lot more experience Power Wheels drive train. It
than I have. Whereas there are uses a laptop as its controller
builds of ROS for Android, at which allowed me to develop
the time they were rather the test program that I wanted
unstable and seeing as the to port to Nomad.
learning curve was already To accommodate the
pretty steep, I decided to find a addition of the Edison, I had to
more suitable platform for what reconfigure Nomad. The battery
I was now calling the Nomad came out of the box to make
Project. room for the electronics. With
the battery out, I could lay the
Intel Edison Roboclaw motor controller flat
as opposed to mounted on the
Fast forward a few months side. I created a system of plates
when a friend from The Robot for mounting the electronics
Group in Austin, TX was using acrylic cut on the laser
divesting himself of parts hed cutter at ATX Hackerspace and
been collecting. Among them When last we saw Nomad, it looked like this. offsets. This allows me to
48 SERVO 01.2017
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By Jeff Cicolani Post comments on this article at www.servomagazine.com/index.php

/magazine/article/January2017_Nomad-Evolution.

remove the electronics as one unit. I often refer to this as

the stack. I replaced the 12V SLA brick with an 11.4V 3s
LiPo battery pack that I could mount in the aluminum
channel from the kit.
The Edison runs on a version of Linux called Yocto,
which I had never heard of before. ROS, however, is built to
operate with Ubuntu and other Debian derivatives. There
was not an install path for Yocto Linux. However, there was
some success using UbiLinux which is, supposedly, a light
version of Ubuntu. So, I installed UbiLinux on the Edison
and then ROS applying the same build instructions used for
the Raspberry Pi. The installation was successful and I had
ROS running.
However, when I went to install the test program, I
could not get the gamepad to work. It turns out the
joystick drivers are not in UbiLinux. On top of that, the Nomad with the Intel Edison board and sensor shield.
package needed to install the drivers was not part of
UbiLinux. With no community support for that application received the parts for the conversion.
and after spending two weeks looking for answers that The idea behind the two Raspberry Pis was to again
simply didnt exist, I abandoned the Edison board. split the processing. Vision processing is intensive, as is
navigation. With two boards, I could dedicate one to
Raspberry Pi processing the input from the Kinect and the other to
navigation, or as I learned during this process, SLAM
What did have a strong and growing community was (Simultaneous Localization And Mapping).
the Raspberry Pi. I happened to have a couple of model B+s ROS installed nicely and I was able to get the test
on hand. I knew I could get the test code to run on the Pi program running without a hitch. At that point, I started
since I had just done it on a project for some film makers in adding the sensors. Using a package for ROS called
San Antonio. ROSSerial, I was able to read the PING))) sensors through
To simplify the I/O with the sensors, etc., I decided to the Arduino. These were configured to act as a bumper to
also include an Arduino Mega. There were several reasons avoid any obstacles the Kinect may have missed. The Kinect
for this, not the least of which was the separation of signal itself, however, proved a bigger challenge. I could simply
processing from the main program. I would be able to not get the drivers to work. Others had great success with
manage the sensors on the Arduino and just send the this, but at the time I was not one of them.
consolidated information as a serial stream to the Pis. With
this, the stack took on a new form with the Roboclaw on Enter Nvidia
the bottom, followed by two Pis, and the Arduino with a
sensor shield on top. It was also at this point I decided to By now, I was a year into the project. I was trying to
add an Xbox Kinect for vision. get the Kinect working right up to the next big show for
At some point, I was further inspired by Actobotics The Robot Group: South by Southwest (SXSW). For those
Mantis platform. In particular, I was enamored by the of you who arent familiar with SXSW, it is a large festival in
independent suspension which, of course, Nomad had to Austin, broken into three parts: interactive, film, and music.
have. So, I spoke to the good folks at ServoCity and soon

Roboclaw at the bottom of the "stack. Nvidia Jetson TX1 unboxing.

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Interactive is all about new technologies. As part of
Interactive, there is a show called Create which is free and
open to the public. The Robot Group had a sizable display
there that year, and I really wanted to be able to show off
Nomad with working sensors and collecting vision
information from the Kinect. Alas, it was not to be.
However, directly across from our booth was one for
Nvidia: the makers of video cards. Nvidia has an embedded
system called the Jetson and they had just come out with
their newest version: the TX1. The Jetson TX1 runs their
latest Tegra processor which consists of a 64-bit quad core
ARM processor and 256 Cuda GPU cores. This setup allows
for massive parallel processing. In short, this little board is a
video processing powerhouse.
In their booth, they were demonstrating how their
Jetson TX1 could be incorporated into a robot with a stereo
camera system to perform SLAM activities. To take it a step
further thanks to the Cuda cores they were able to
build a neural network on the robot so it would learn as it
went. My amateur hobby robotics mind was blown. This
was one of those, stop talking and take my money
moments. The engineer that was there gave me his contact
information should I have any questions and directed me to
Cutting the new box on the laser.
Nomads new box, fresh off the laser cutter.
50 SERVO 01.2017
their embedded developer page.
Two weeks later, my Jetson TX1 Evaluation Kit arrived
in the mail. A week after that, the Zed stereo camera
system from StereoLabs was on my porch. The evaluation
kit is significantly larger than the Raspberry Pi, which meant
yet another reconfiguring of the chassis. This time, I had to
build a larger box in which to house the Jetson and
associated electronics. While I was at it, I added dedicated
space for the power switch, an external Ethernet port,
power jack, HDMI port, and two cooling fans. For the Zed
camera, I also ordered a nice pan/tilt assembly from
ServoCity.
At this point, I have to say how thankful I am to have
found the local hacker space here in Austin. This place has
been an amazing resource for building Nomad and so many
other projects. Between the laser cutters, 3D printers, and
all of the other tools available here, there is very little that
cant be done. Were even adding a CNC plasma cutter. So,
once the design is finalized, I might even cut a new chassis
altogether out of aluminum. And its not just the tools. The
people and talent is fantastic.
Without some of the expertise from the ATX
Hackerspace, I dont know that Nomad would have made it
anywhere near as far as it has. If you havent already
availed yourself of your local maker or hacker space, do so.
You will be astounded at what you can get done.
Prepping the Jetson
With the majority of the physical build done (because,
lets face it, youre never really 100% done with any part of
a project like this), it was time to get the OS and software
started. Nvidia provides a pre-assembled package of OS,
drivers, and software called Jetpack. This package is
optimized by the engineers and developers for this board.
The installation for someone new to this process is not
necessarily a straightforward one. There were some
obstacles I had to work around that werent obvious.
Hopefully, my experiences will help you avoid some of the
same hurdles. These issues started right at the beginning ...
Initial Hardware Problems
Right at the beginning, I was having challenges in just
seeing what was happening. When I received my TX1, it
wasnt blank. There was an initial OS installed. I didnt play
around with it enough to see if a version of Jetpack was
already Flashed. I wanted to get it updated quickly to
make sure it had all of the proper drivers. So, I tried to
connect the board to a spare monitor I had lying about.
The monitor did not have an HDMI input which is needed
for connecting to the Jetson. Using an HDMI to DVI
adapter, I connected the monitor to the TX1 with no
results.
It turns out the HDMI out from the Jetson is not
compatible with converters at least not natively. So, next
I tried connecting it to a television with an HDMI input.
Cicolani - Nomad 2 - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 12:37 AM Page 51
This time, I was able to get video, but it was
cropped around all the edges significantly. I was
unable to see the first five or six characters of the
text that was streaming during bootup.
The issues with the converter and the
television led to my first unexpected expense: a
new monitor with HDMI input. Fortunately, Frys
had one on sale. It was a little larger than I was
hoping for, but it was less than $100, so I went
ahead and bought it. While I was there, I went
ahead and picked up a USB3 hub knowing I
would need it for use with the Zed camera later.
With the new monitor, I was able to see the
output properly.
While on the topic of hardware issues, there
is also the matter of the keyboard/mouse. This is
probably not related to the actual install since it
was not an issue with the re-Flash (more on that
later). The Logitech wireless keyboard/touchpad
did not initially work with the board. I had to use a wired
mouse and keyboard through the aforementioned USB hub.
So, something to keep in mind.
Installing Jetpack
Jetpack is not installed directly onto the Jetson board.
It is actually installed through another host machine onto
the TX1. To install Jetpack, you will need to do so from a
full independent installation of Ubuntu 14.04. And by
independent I mean you cant install it from a VM (virtual
machine). It has to be an actual machine. I spent several
hours trying to get it to run within a VM, including
installing Virtualbox on my Windows 10 machine but, in the
end, it was nothing but frustration.
So, next I turned to my laptop running Ubuntu 12.04.
There I had many of the same frustrations. I just could not
get the installer to run. I put a fresh install of Ubuntu 14.04
onto the machine and had the same issue. It turns out the
problem was me and my very poor understanding of Linux.
In order to run the Jetpack installer, you have to precede
the filename with a dot-slash ( ./ ) in the execute line.
I am not going to go over the whole installation
process here since it is well covered on several websites.
The instructions I used are available at the URL listed below.
However, there are some things you will need to know
going into it:
You will need a developer account to download the
package. These are free. Nvidia just wants to know who is
accessing their files.
The Jetpack is not installed directly on the Jetson
board. You will instead be installing the Jetpack on a host
Ubuntu Linux 14.04 host system. In my case, I was using a
laptop which I have set aside specifically for my robotics
experiments and development.
As stated above, you cannot install Jetpack from a
VM. For you Windows users, its a bit of a pain, but if
Installing the Jetson Jetpack.
youre going to be playing around in this more advanced
robotics space, youre going to have to learn Linux anyway.
Bite the bullet, get a cheap refurbished laptop, and install
Ubuntu on it.
Be sure you are connecting both the host system and
the Jetson board via Ethernet cable to the same
router/network. Jetson installation will fail if you try to use
Wi-Fi.
Make sure the version of Jetpack is compatible with
your chosen hardware. Youre going to find at least at
the time of this writing the newest bleeding-edge version
may not have the driver and software support you need. I
ended up having to roll back from JetPack 2.2 for L4T to
JetPack 2.1 for L4T because 64-bit support just wasnt
where it needed to be. The latest version may have fixed
this, but at the time it was an issue.
During the setup, I ran into an issue where the host
system could not find the Jetson on the network. Jetpack
installation is a multi-stage process. Once it has Ubuntu
installed, it will restart the board and attempt to connect to
it via Ethernet. For some reason, on my first pass, the host
failed to capture the IP for the Jetson. If this happens to
you, reset the Jetson and boot it into the GUI. The user is
ubuntu and the password is ubuntu by default. Once
in, connect to your router as normal, then use:
~$: sudo ifconfig
to find your IP address. Back on the host machine, run the
installation again. It will skip everything that was done and
take you to the point it tried to connect to the Jetson.
When the system fails to find the IP address, select to
manually set it. This will bring up a new dialog box where
you enter the targets IP, user, and password. It may take a
couple minutes to connect, so let it do what its going to
do. Once it finds it, the installation will continue.
Now, with all my warnings and life lessons out of the
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way, follow directions at http://docs.nvidia.com/jetpack- nomad_control.py, and nomad_drive.py. The first is the
l4t/index.html#developertools/mobile/jetpack/l4t/2.2.1 custom driver script for the Roboclaw from the sample
/jetpack_l4t_install.htm. Python program provided by ION Motion Control: the
makers of the Roboclaw motor controller. The second file
Installing ROS (nomad_control.py) subscribes to the JoyCommand
message of the Joy node and publishes the axes signals as
The next step in the process for Nomad is the a Twist message which is the standard movement
installation of ROS. This installation is probably the most message used in ROS.
straightforward of any of them simply because youre Lastly, nomad_drive.py is the node that interacts with
installing onto a full version of Ubuntu. Because the version the motor controller. It leverages the Roboclaw driver to
of Ubuntu in this selected version of Jetpack is 14.04, I send movement commands as well as read pertinent
needed to install ROS Indigo. Like any other ROS install, information provided by the driver, such as battery voltages,
make sure you match the version of ROS to your version of operating temperature, and any errors generated by the
Linux. Each version is optimized to the most recent stable motor controller.
version of Ubuntu at the time it was released. Mismatching The fourth module is the standard joystick package. To
the versions will cause countless issues that can otherwise get the joystick package installed for ROS, I followed the
be avoided. instructions at http://wiki.ros.org/joy/Tutorials/
The Jetson platforms use ARM processors; therefore, ConfiguringALinuxJoystick.
youll need to install the appropriate version of ROS for To get Nomad moving, I have to start up each of these
ARM. The official instructions for doing so can be found on nodes. Generally, you would put each node call into an ROS
the official ROS.org wiki at http://wiki.ros.org launch file and simply use roslaunch to start all of them at
/indigo/Installation/UbuntuARM. Again, Im not going the same time. However, at the time of this writing, I have
to list out all of the instructions here. been experiencing some issues with nomad_drive.py
Finally, I was in a position to load the test program I starting up properly. While I diagnose the issue, I am
wrote so long ago for BARB and the earlier iteration of starting each of the nodes separately. Each node has to be
Nomad. The nice thing about getting familiar with and started in its own terminal window on the Jetson board,
using ROS is how little code it actually takes to make starting with the core processes:
something happen. All of this source code is available on
GitHub at: ~$: roscore
~$: rosrun joy joy_node
https://github.com/jcicolani/Nomad/blob/master/ ~$: rosrun nomad nomad_control.py
src/nomad/nomad_control.py ~$: rosrun nomad nomad_drive.py
https://github.com/jcicolani/Nomad/blob/master/
src/nomad/nomad_drive.py The night I got Nomad configured, loaded, and
https://github.com/jcicolani/Nomad/blob/master/ running was our Robot Group meeting at ATX Hackerspace.
src/nomad/roboclaw.py I cannot express how good it felt to have Nomad driving
around the classroom and shop there. Two years of build,
These are the pieces of custom code and the modified rebuild, and rebuild again, and Nomad was alive and
sample file from ION Motion Control that I'm using as a moving.
driver.
There are four modules needed to get Nomad driving, Current State
three of which are in the Git repository: roboclaw.py,
Of course, like any project, once you have it working is
when you start to find other issues. Right from the
Resources ROS for Ubuntu on beginning, there were three issues that had to be
Nomad's blog: ARM processesors: addressed. The first was a physical issue; the wheels I was
http://nomadrobot.info using were those from the original Nomad kit. These
http://wiki.ros.org/indigo/
Nomad's source code Installation/UbuntuARM werent intended to support the 16 lb Nomad now
on GitHub: weighed. The other two were electrical: There was too
https://github.com/jcicolani ATX Hackerspace: much pressure on the USB connector to the Roboclaw, and
/Nomad I had an intermittent power problem going to the Jetson
http://atxhs.org
Nvidia Jetpack board. Both of these issues resulted in the motor controller
installation guide: ION Motion Control: losing signal with the main board.
http://docs.nvidia.com/ www.ionmc.com Without changing the profile of Nomad, I essentially
jetpack-l4t/index.html#
developertools/mobile/jet have two solutions to the wheel problem. The first is to
pack/l4t/2.2.1/jetpack_l4t_ ServoCity: replace them with air filled rather than the standard foam
install.htm www.servocity.com filled tires. The other is to simply remove the foam insert
52 SERVO 01.2017
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and fill tires with expanding
construction foam. Obviously, I went
with the more eloquent and
complicated air filled solution. I ordered
bead lock hubs and air fill valves used in
volleyballs.
The USB connection was an easy
fix. I simply replaced the cable I was
using with one that has a smaller plug
end. The plug is no longer pressing
against the side wall of the box and the Nomad systems
pressure is released. The electrical block diagram.
problem is still plaguing me, however.
My initial thought was the barrel
plug assembly was interfering with other components and
was being knocked loose. The solution for this was simply
moving things around a little bit. The offending component
was the main power switch attached to one of the rear
panels. Fortunately, I designed the panels to be flipped. So,
the power switch is now on the other side of the box and
there is no more interference with the barrel jack.
In the end, I have a pretty substantial hardware stack.
At the root of everything is the Jetson TX1 board. Directly
attached to that is the HDMI port, USB2 OTG cable, USB3
hub, and Ethernet, wireless, and Bluetooth connectivity. I
may also add an SATA SSD for extra storage, though I could
do the same thing with an SD card. The USB3 hub is
connected to the Roboclaw, Zed camera system, and the
Logitech wireless keyboard and mouse. The USB2 OTG
cable terminates in the dongle for the Logitech wireless
gamepad. I discovered in a past project you cannot power
your Arduino through an external source while connected
to USB. So, the Arduino is connected to the Jetson board
via the I/O pins on the Jetson.
Power is supplied to Nomad using four 11.4V LiPo
battery packs. These are broken into two banks: one for the
motors and the other for all of the electronics. A 5V DC
regulator is supplying extra power to the USB3 hub, and a
second one supplies 6V to the Arduinos sensor shield. Both
circuits can be powered by an external power supply when
Nomad is on the bench.
Next Steps
One of the issues that needs to be addressed is the
power control. Allowing Nomad to go careening off out of
control when theres an interruption in communication
between the main board and the motor controller is
unacceptable.
In order to address this, I am building a power control
and watchdog system using an Arduino Uno and a couple
relay boards. The main switch will become a power selector,
allowing me to choose to power Nomad by the onboard
battery packs or through an external power supply. A
second smaller switch will control the power to the Arduino
Uno board. The Uno when powered up will
systematically turn on each of the systems in Nomad the
last of which will be the Roboclaw.
Once power is applied to the main board, the Arduino
Mega will be powered up and it will begin sending a signal
to the Uno via connected pins. The pins will need to share a
ground and will have a protective resistor on the jumper
between them for protection. Once the Uno begins
receiving this signal, it will turn on the motor controller. As
long as the Uno receives the signal, the motor controller
will remain powered. If serial connection is lost between
the Mega and the main board, the signal will be stopped
and the motor controller shut down.
While the power control system is being built, other
development will also continue. Next, I will be attaching the
sensors to make sure I can capture signals from them.
Then, I am anxious to get the Zed stereo camera powered
and working. I am excited to pull image and point cloud
data, and start working with navigation.
To assist in all of this, I am building a base station for
Nomad. The base station consists of a laptop outfitted with
a wireless hub. The wireless hub runs on five volts and less
than one amp, so it can be powered by the laptops USB
port. The plan is to bind Nomad to the wireless router and
then share the Internet connection from the laptop to the
hub. In that way, Nomad and the base station will always
be connected to the same network and when Im working
off-site, I only have to connect the laptop to local Wi-Fi. It
will also allow me to use remote desktop access on Nomad
to work without having to set up a separate monitor,
keyboard, and mouse.
The base station includes a box to elevate Nomad off
the table while on the bench. This will allow me to test the
entire system without worrying about the robot driving off
the table. A 12V power supply is built into the bench box
that can be used to power Nomad on the bench without
using the batteries. All of this is contained in custom boxes
for transport, protection, and to provide a platform on
which to work. There is a separate toolbox. The boxes are
stackable on a custom cart to allow for easy transportation.
Im planning on entering Nomad into the
RoboMagellen competition at the next RoboGames. Its a
tight deadline at this point, but an achievable goal. So, with
a little luck and a lot of work, the next update will include a
performance report from RoboGames! SV
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Roll Your Own

Turtlebot By Alan N. Federman (Dr. Bot)

Several years ago, I wrote an article for SERVO showing how you could convert an
old Roomba vacuum cleaner and a Microsoft Kinect into a robot training platform
capable of teaching yourself ROS: the Robot Operating System from Willow Garage.
Willow Garage has now closed, and Clearpath Robotics can sell you a complete
brand new Turtlebot for about $2,100. Recently, OSRF and Robotis have announced
a less expensive Turtlebot, but this is still a bit out of the range for most serious
amateurs.

W hat if you could easily build the equivalent of a

Turtlebot for under $300?
Im going to show you how simple it is to convert a
brushes, the dust bin, and used a strip of metal to disable
the bin detector switch.

Neato robotic vacuum cleaner into a fully functional training Step 2: Preparing the Pi and
platform in less than a day. Very little hardware skill or
special tools are needed. Everything is available COTS attaching to the Botvac.
(commercial off-the-shelf), and the software is all open Artfully arrange the Pi, battery pack, and optional
source. Lets get started! camera on a 6 by 6 flat piece of wood or plastic. Attach
Heres what you need to get, if you dont already have with double-sided tape. On the bottom of the assembly,
them: attach a piece of Velcro or similar quick release fastener.
Attach the matching Velcro to the top of the Botvacs
A laptop or Wi-Fi connected desktop running Unbuntu. LIDAR unit. Lastly, plug in the USB cables. You might want
This should be at least 14.04 and running ROS Indigo, to charge your batteries. It would be a shame to have all
but it would be better to upgrade to the same versions the software loaded and then have to wait to test it.
if running cross platform. ROS versions are usually
matched to Ubuntu releases. Step 3: Loading the software onto
A Neato Botvac or equivalent (I have seen used XV-12s
for under $200, and new basic models for under
the Pi.
$300). At the time of this writing, an official version of Ubuntu
A Raspberry Pi 3 (camera is optional but highly 16.04 was not available for the Pi 3. I used the Ubuntu
recommended) ~$50. Mate (pronounced ma tay) version. Instructions for
6 gig SD card for Pi ~$10.
Rechargeable 5V power pack (the kind for recharging
cell phones is fine) ~$20.
USB cables for battery pack to Pi (micro) and Pi to
Botvac (can be mini or micro, depending).
Small scraps of aluminum or tin from a can.
Small scraps of flat plywood or acrylic.
Velcro, double-sided tape, or other easy-to-remove
adhesives.

Step 1: Modifying the Botvac.

Depending on your model, you may choose to ignore
any hardware modifications entirely. Then, if you mess up,
you can just use it to clean your house! I removed the XV-12 dustbin removed.

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Post comments on this article at www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/January2017_Build-Own-Turtlebot.

loading Mate are available at https://ubuntu-

mate.org/download. Follow the instructions for 16.04
Raspberry Pi 2/3.
You can use an HDMI TV and attached keyboard to
initially set up the Pi, using the graphical environment. It
also helps to have a direct Ethernet connection when doing
the initial setup because you need to load a lot of software
initially. Using a desktop, its pretty easy to get Wi-Fi
working.
I suggest creating an 8 gig image on a 16 gig SD card.
After the initial software is on and you can bring up a
graphical desktop, follow the intro screen and click on
Raspberry Pi info it will enable you to expand the image
to 16 gig. It also will allow you to configure your Wi-Fi. I
suggest you still use the Ethernet connection, but at this
point you can open a terminal, type sudo graphical disable,
and then use SSH over Wi-Fi to complete the installation. XV-12 name plate.
Once Ubuntu is working, continue loading ROS onto
the PI. You may have to maintain your Ubuntu distributions; setup.bash. It also helps to add the following line if the Pi is
the following commands are useful: hosting the robot:
sudo apt-get update export ROS_MASTER_URI=http://$HOSTNAME.local:11311
sudo apt-get upgrade (must run both in sequence)
Sometimes to clear dpkg errors: where $HOSTNAME is the name you have in the
/etc/hostname file.
sudo dpkg configure -a Your /etc/hosts file should look like this:
)
127.0.0.1 localhost
127.0.1.1 your hostname
Summary:
sudo sh -c echo deb http://packages.ros.org/
ros/ubuntu $(lsb_release -sc) main >
/etc/apt/sources.list.d/ros-latest.list

sudo apt-key adv keyserver hkp://ha.pool.sks-

keyservers.net:80 recv-key 0xB01FA116

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install ros-kinetic-desktop-full

(if full is not available, just get ros-kinetic-desktop)

sudo rosdep init
rosdep update
echo source /opt/ros/kinetic/setup.bash >>
~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc
sudo apt-get install python-rosinstall

ROS Catkin Workspace installation:

mkdir ~p ~/catkin_ws/src
cd ~/catkin_ws/src
catkin_init_workspace
cd ..
catkin_make

Next, edit .bashrc to change the source

/opt/ros/kinetic/setup.bash to ~/catkin_ws/devel/ XV-12 brush removed.

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ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
ff02::1 ip6-allnodes
ff02::2 ip6-allrouters

This will support ROS networking.

You also may wish to install chrony to synchronize
the time different nodes are running at. This is because
the Pi doesnt have a real time clock, and if your Wi-Fi is not
connected to the Internet, the Pi will have the wrong time.
Next, I suggest you load the following ROS packages
into your catkin_ws/src workspace: ROS by Example Part 1
(RBX1) from Patrick Goebel; https://github.com/pirobot/
rbx1 (this should go on both your laptop and the Pi); and
the SV-ROS Botvac nodes (courtesy of mostly Mr. Ralph
Gnauck) at https://github.com/SV-ROS/intro_to_ros.
Follow the instructions in the README files to install
Raspberry Pi 3 mounted. and test. For example:
# The following lines are desirable for IPv6 cd ~/catkin_ws/src
capable hosts
::1 ip6-localhost ip6-loopback git clone https://github.com/SV-ROS/intro_to_ros
fe00::0 ip6-localnet

Listing 1. </include>

/catkin_ws/src/intro_to_ros/bv80bot/bv80bot_node <!-- velocity commands multiplexer -->

/launch/include/bv80bot_njoy.launch <node pkg="nodelet" type="nodelet"
name="cmd_vel_mux" args="load
<launch> yocs_cmd_vel_mux/CmdVelMuxNodelet
<!-- Change this to use a different joystick mobile_base_nodelet_manager">
controller --> <param name="yaml_cfg_file" value="$(find
<!-- Set the default value for the bv80bot_node)/param/mux.yaml"/>
'teleop_controler' arg below to one of the <remap from="cmd_vel_mux/output"
folowing values to select the controller you are to="/robot_cmd_vel"/>
using to teleop the robot: --> <remap from="cmd_vel_mux/input/navi"
to="/cmd_vel"/>
no joystick launch from pi, joystick or <remap from="cmd_vel_mux/input/teleop"
keyboard on remote to="$(arg output_cmd_vel_topic)" />
</node>
ps3
xbox360
keyboard <!-- create transform for laser (should be
logitech moved to the URDF) -->
<node name="laser_to_base" pkg="tf2_ros"
<arg name="teleop_controller" type="static_transform_publisher" args="-0.090
default="xbox360" />
--> 0.0 0.037 0 0 0 1 base_link base_laser_link" />

<arg name="input_cmd_vel_topic" <!-- launch the main base driver node -->
default="/raw_cmd_vel" /> <node name="neato" pkg="neato_node"
<arg name="feedback_cmd_vel_topic" type="neato.py" output="screen">
default="robot_cmd_vel" /> <param name="port" value="/dev/ttyACM0" />
<arg name="output_cmd_vel_topic" <remap from="cmd_vel" to="robot_cmd_vel" />
default="smoothed_cmd_vel" /> <remap from="/base_scan" to="/scan" />
</node>

<!-- publish teh URDF -->

<param name="robot_description"
<!-- smooths inputs from command="$(find xacro)/xacro.py $(find
cmd_vel_mux/input/teleop_raw to neato_node)/urdf/neato.urdf.xacro" />
cmd_vel_mux/input/teleop -->
<include file="$(find
bv80bot_node)/launch/include/velocity_smoother. <!-- publish the robot state transforms -->
launch"> <node name="robot_state_publisher"
<arg name="input_cmd_vel_topic" pkg="robot_state_publisher"
value="$(arg input_cmd_vel_topic)" /> type="robot_state_publisher" output="screen" >
<arg name="feedback_cmd_vel_topic" <param name="use_gui" value="False"/>
value="$(arg feedback_cmd_vel_topic)" /> </node>
<arg name="output_cmd_vel_topic"
value="$(arg output_cmd_vel_topic)" /> </launch>

56 SERVO 01.2017
Federman - Roll Own Turtlebot - Jan 17_Blank Rough SV.qxd 12/6/2016 12:43 AM Page 57

(this also should go on both)

Listing 2.
cd .. Terminal output from launching startup nodes.
catkin_make roslaunch bv80bot_node bv80bot_njoy.launch &

rostopic list
Testing /button
/cmd_vel
On the laptop, type: /cmd_vel_mux/active
/cmd_vel_mux/parameter_descriptions
/cmd_vel_mux/parameter_updates
roscd teleop /joint_states
/mobile_base_nodelet_manager/bond
If nothing is found, type: /odom
/raw_cmd_vel
/robot_cmd_vel
sudo apt-get install ros-kinetic-teleop-twist- /rosout
keyboard /rosout_agg
/scan
On the Botvac, turn on the Pi, and sign on via a /sensor
terminal window from the laptop. /smoothed_cmd_vel
I like to launch a custom base only node on the Pi: /teleop_velocity_smoother/parameter_descriptions
/teleop_velocity_smoother/parameter_updates
/tf
roslaunch bv80bot_node bv80bot_njoy.launch /tf_static
(refer to the code listings)
You should hear the Neato LIDAR unit start to spin. the subtleties of autonomous navigation. Because of the
On the laptop, open up another terminal window and Neatos XV-11 LIDAR unit, you can simultaneously
set up the ROS_IP and ROS_MASTER_URI environment accomplish localization and obstacle avoidance.
variables via the export command. Support for webcams and the Raspberry Pi camera are
Test to see if you are getting topics (rostopic list) and available through ROS nodes. I have gotten teleop via a
scans (rostopic echo /scan). Bluetooth joystick to work through the laptop, but not
Finally, launch teleop: directly on the Pi.
Please note that though the Pi has four USB slots, there
rosrun teleop_twist_keyboard is seldom enough power to run more than the Botvac
teleop_twist_keyboard.py
interface and a Wi-Fi dongle. A typical USB webcam will
You should now be able to drive your robot. draw too much current and crash the Pi.
If you open RVIZ in another window, you should see With a Wi-Fi connected phone and some ingenuity, you
the LIDAR returns. should be able to issue voice commands. This way, you can
call up your home robot from the office and ask it to find
the cat.
What Next? The Botvac is a little underpowered for bringing you a
snack from the kitchen, but when the next more powerful
With just this simple robot, you can begin to learn how platform is available, youll know just how to program it.
to accomplish advanced robotics tasks and begin to learn SV

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SERVO 01.2017 59
Carroll - Then & Now - Jan 17_Then & Now - Sep15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:45 AM Page 60

g{x Now
a n d
by Tom Carroll
TWCarroll@aol.com

The People Behind the

Evolution of Robotics
I have written about the evolution of robotics several times in this column. There has been
some amazing growth in the field of robotics in these few years. Exciting news articles and
videos about the advances in robotics are on TV and other media almost daily. I've also tried to
cover the history of past advances in the science of robotics, but history and evolution
describe two different facets of the growth and implementation of robotics. The history covers
what has occurred in robotics whereas evolution covers why it occurred the way that it did and
who were the key individuals responsible for the steps to the changes.

ooking back in time, these two
L studies are quiet often
intermeshed, but I find the
evolutionary studies a bit more
interesting. I wont start with the
earliest industrial robots or even
Hondas amazing Asimo. I just want to
cover the backgrounds of the
individuals who drove the latest
growth activity in robotics with newly-
formed companies.
Robot evolution is far more than a
succession of companies developing a
series of newer robots. It is people
with dreams who form the companies,
using insight and intuition to recognize
and hire talented innovators.
Education and experience are
important, but it the rare ability to
innovate that is most important. These
individuals then go forth and bring
their dreams to fruition.
In the first part of this article, Ill
discuss some of these unique
individuals who drove the evolutionary
advances in robotics. Most started
with advanced degrees in computer
science, but ended up as key players in
robotics. Id like to present several
robot startup companies by these
people and their spinoffs that were
composed of some of the brightest
entrepreneurs in recent robot
development history.
It is quite interesting to visualize
just how these people interact and
interface through similar interests to
form common bonds that evolve into
amazing startup companies. Ill start
with one very familiar company as an
example and continue with a short
history of a series of Silicon Valley
startups that began with that
company, Willow Garage. This robotics
company has a most unique history
and evolutionary path in its
background.
Scott Hassans Willow
Garage Launches a
Series of Startups
Scott Hassan was the founder of
the list-archiving service email
company called eGroups in 1997.
Hassan later sold it to Yahoo in 2000
for $432 million in stock. He previously
was the key software architect and co-
developer of Google, Alexa Internet,
and the Stanford Digital Library while
working at Stanford University. Hassan
met fellow post-grad students and
Google founders, Larry Page and
Sergey Brin. He ended up
programming much of the original
search engine that eventually became
the number one location for many
Internet users to find information.
Hassan had long been interested
in open source software and has been
a force behind introducing ROS (Robot
Operating System) to robot
developers. ROS was first created at
Stanford Universitys AI laboratory,
SAIL, under the name of switchyard.
He used his own funds to start Willow
Garage in late 2006: a privately-funded
research company aimed at advancing
the state of robotic technology in
autonomous devices, with the goal of
using ROS in their robots.
The Willow Garage evolution
along with Hassan offers a great tale
of how unique and driven
entrepreneurs with minds focused on
the future accomplish amazing things.
The evolution of a certain technology
does not always start with a specific
need to accomplish a task. Quite
often, it begins with an individual who
has a long range vision and that
dream need not be aimed at a specific
goal.
Hassan hired Steve Cousins as
President and CEO of Willow Garage
(refer to Figure 1). As I have read in
several publications, Hassan had
instructed Cousins to fill the building
that he just bought on Willow Road in
Menlo Park, CA with interesting
stuff. It is noteworthy that Hassan
Figure 1. Scott Hassan and Steve Cousins
the force behind Willow Garage.

60 SERVO 01.2017
Carroll - Then & Now - Jan 17_Then & Now - Sep15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:45 AM Page 61

Advances in robots and robotics over the years.

Post comments on this article at www.servomagazine.com/index.php/magazine/article/

January2017_ThenandNow_People-Behind-Robot-Evolution.

used to work for Cousins. I briefly Figure 3.

had the chance to meet Hassan PR2 is a
complex
when Cousins introduced us on one and
of my trips to WG. I could certainly well-
crafted
see why the both of them have research
become so successful. robot.
The first products of Willow
Garage were the $400K PR2 robot
and the Kinect sensor-based Figure 2. Eleven PR2 robots and the researchers
TurtleBot robot all based on ROS. from their new homes.
Fifty PR2s were built and 11 were
given away at no cost to major
robotics research labs. The 11
university recipients of the donated
PR2 robots are shown in Figure 2
with their new robots.
A test platform PR2 is shown in
Figure 3. It is easy to see why this
expertly-crafted and machined robot
cost $400K. Of course, if your
company was on a budget, you
could buy a one arm PR2 SE for a Figure 4. Willow Garages PR2 and Texai
mere $285K, and the cheaper robot telepresence robot at RoboGames.
had a nice updated sensor suite.
Figure 6. Tully
PR2s 7-DOF arm wrapped around Foote and
me in Figure 4 at Willow Garages Melonee Wise
with a Figure 5. Willow Garage platform bot.
booth at RoboGames illustrates the TurtleBot.
dexterity of the arms. What is more (Photo by
Jimmy Sastra.) Figure 7. Willow
important than arm dexterity is Garages Texai
WGs emphasis on ROS, telepresence
robots.
telepresence, and the amazing PR2,
as seen in the posters and the two
robots on display. processor for
the Microsoft
Willow Garage Kinects data
and the iRobot
Evolves into Many their development of a much Create base
Startups simpler robot: Even at Willow was a
In February 2014, Hassan shocked Garage, we went from a PR2 with netbook,
the robotics world by announcing the two 7-DOF arms designed for a shown folded
closure of Willow Garage. News much broader set of tasks to on a lower
reports were not very clear on the basically move around human platform. Wise
decision, but it is thought that Hassan environments and perform human (intern
felt that WG had served its purpose to tasks, down to a one-armed robot program manager and later Manager
develop open source robotic software called Platform Bot (shown in Figure of Robot Development) was the co-
that would meld seamlessly with a 5). The concept was later spun off as developer of the robot and spent half
variety of robotic platforms. After all, Unbounded Robotics, headed by a day instructing me in ROS, as well as
he had invested over $20 million of his Melonee Wise, WGs second showing me how the robot utilized the
own money that resulted in eight employee. I will write about her Kinects images for navigation.
successful spinoffs and an entirely new company later. Another project at WG involved
force in the robotics field. The TurtleBot shown in Figure 6 building telepresence robots (shown in
In a later interview for Robotics was developed as an educational tool Figure 7) that the WG team called
Business Review, Cousins spoke of using the ROS language. The Texai; the technology was later used in
SERVO 01.2017 61
Carroll - Then & Now - Jan 17_Then & Now - Sep15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:45 AM Page 62
Figure 8.
Suitable
Technologies
Beam 'smart
presence
system.'
a Willow Garage spinoff: Suitable
Technologies. The spinoffs product
the Beam robot shown in Figure 8
is the conference intermediary device
in the remote interview below.
The Beam from Scott
Hassans Suitable
Technologies
At the dissolution of Willow
Garage as a parent company, Hassan
took his concept of a simple stand-
alone robot from the prototype Texai
robots for the Beam smart presence
system described earlier. A simple
control system allows reliability and
better performance a goal that
Hassan realized after designing,
building, and using the complex and
software-laden PR2s.
On the Suitable Technologies site,
Hassan words are mirrored under Our
Story: Beam began as a solution to
our own frustrations with remote
work. Despite the variety of existing
technologies like email, chat, and
videoconferencing, we found that our
remote team members felt isolated,
things got lost in translation, and
calling multiple meetings for daily
work was disruptive. Then, it hit us:
What if our distributed team could just
be together?
Collaboration would be so much
easier, and our team would be much
more efficient and culturally cohesive.
We thought, surely if we felt this pain,
others were feeling it, too. Inspired,
62 SERVO 01.2017
we imagined what effortless smart
presence would look like, and set to
work creating it. The Texai concept
became a successful product.
Mark Mann
Interviews Scott
Hassan via
Telepresence
In May 2016, Mark Mann
interviewed Hassan via Suitable
Technologies Beam smart presence
system, as reported on the site
Vice.com. Mann was interviewing
Hassan via a Beam robot that was in
Hassans office and under control the
control of Mann. Hassan told Mann
how he was amazed at what Willow
Garages previous robot, the
autonomous PR2 was able to
accomplish.
Mann stated: I beamed into
Hassans office in Palo Alto, where
Suitable Technologies, Inc., is based. I
found him there waiting for me,
gazing intently into the camera of the
Beam I was manipulating. Hassan is
extremely alert and attentive, and
comes across as an over-caffeinated
genius: generous with his ideas, but
also impatient that you keep up. He
rarely does interviews, though hes
one of the most important figures in
modern robotics.
During the interview, Hassan
emphasized: Impact first and return
on capital second. The first new
employees were student interns who
were told to blaze new paths in the
field of robotics. These students grew
to about 60 in number before Hassan
decided to close Willow Garage and
allow his employees to go out and
start their own companies. It was not
a going out of business closing, just a
change in direction in the evolution of
his robotics endeavors.
Hassan said, Creating a robot
that accurately and quickly responds to
voice instructions and performs simple
tasks is still extremely difficult. He
illustrated this by asking me to nudge
a wastebasket under a chair with my
Beam, which I was able to do by
driving into it. It would take hundreds
and hundreds of PhDs in computer
science, electrical engineering, and
mechanical engineering to build a
system that does that.
Do Robots Need
Ultimate Autonomy?
Despite all those
accomplishments, Hassan ultimately
became disillusioned with autonomous
robots; he felt they are too expensive
to build. Although AI can now beat
humans at Go and perform other
impressive feats, these robots are still
not as smart as real people.
Computers are fabulous, but theyre
nothing compared to the human
brain, he told Mann. There are
billions of people on the planet, so
why not do it with people as the
intelligence, instead of an artificial
system?
These thoughts set him on the
path to develop robots that are human
controlled a sensible evolutionary
step from his advanced PR2. The
closing of WG was a sensible action
towards his goals.
A Personal Robot
Could Operate with
Minimal Autonomy
Hassans beliefs are also a similar
train of thought that has directed my
ideas of controlling a personal
assistant robot to allow millions of
seniors to live independently. Instead
of a sensor-loaded, fully autonomous
robot with complex manipulative,
visual, and speech recognition
capabilities, I have proposed a mobile
robot with a pair of simple arms that
can assist a senior from a floor after a
fall. These arms could also assist them
onto and off of a bed, chair, and/or a
toilet. These are just a few of the
capabilities that I learned about after
visiting seniors at an elder care facility
a while back.
Hassan has said that Here is a
funny word, referring to a request to
a robot to come here. I feel that the
word can easily be translated into:
Carroll - Then & Now - Jan 17_Then & Now - Sep15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:45 AM Page 63
Figure 10.
Relay delivers
a towel to a
hotel guest.
Figure 9. Steve Cousins and
the Relay from Savioke.
That is my command to go to the
location of the spoken words come
here; stop and wait for further
instructions. It is also the preparation
command to perform a task for a
human being at their request. The
command steps of moving are then a
series of coordinated individual spoken
words to allow an elderly person to be
lifted or lowered in a safe manner.
This might sound like a simple
robot design project, but the FDA
Code of Federal Regulations under
part 890, Physical Medicine Devices
has many sections to protect users and
patients from potential injury by such
a machine. FDA approval and
certification can be a lengthy process.
It is easier to build a robot that has
many movements than it is to design
the same robot so that it cannot injure
a user in any way. Im not sure if
Asimovs Three Laws of Robotics can
be applied at this early stage of
development as advanced AI would
have to be implemented for a robot to
not only recognize a human but to
understand what would cause harm to
a human.
Cousins was curious about uses of
the PR2 with elderly and disabled
persons, and asked me to give a
presentation on my concept of a
personal assistant robot for the elderly
to him and some of his staff at Willow
Garage five years ago, as he had been
interested in similar applications for his
company.
This type of robot has been a holy
grail for designers to create, but a
stumbling block for safety concerns due
Figure 11. UBR-1 from Melonee Wise's Unbounded Robotics.
to the robots physical interaction with
humans.
Cousins Starts Savioke
Cousins took a different approach
and developed a robot called Relay,
shown in Figure 9. He set the
company that he formed, Savioke
(pronounced savvy oak) on the path
to design and produce a robot that
does one thing and does it very well: a
robot to serve guests in hotels. Now,
Im not talking about a waiter or
personal servant in a guests room,
but a delivery robot, much the same
as a bellboy.
Figure 10 shows the robot
delivering a towel to a guest. Yes, this
robot has more autonomy than a
remotely-guided telepresence robot
like the Beam, as it has multiple
sensors to utilize SLAM or similar
navigational techniques to find its way
around a hotel with multiple floors.
Melonee Wise Starts
Two Different Robot
Companies
When I first met Melonee at WG,
it was obvious that this inventive
woman would either soon be the
Chief Technical Officer of some huge
robotics company or the founder of a
new and soon-to-be-large robot
company. She had all the attributes of
success: education (a PhD in
Mechanical Engineering), robotics
knowledge, and computer and
electrical expertise to develop a world-
class robot.
After leaving WG, she co-founded
Unbounded Robotics and developed
the UBR-1 shown in Figure 11.
Considering all of its capabilities as a
research platform, the price of $35K to
$50K was a bargain. I felt that this
robot took all of the best qualities of
the very expensive PR2 without the
extreme cost. For certain legal
spinoff wording agreements with
Willow Garage and Unbounded that
were confusing, she had to close her
company. Soon after, she began Fetch
Robotics
An article in the MIT Technology
Review about 35 Innovators Under
35 best describes her: Melonee Wise
imagines that all homes will have
autonomous robots something like
The Jetsons Rosie, the robot maid,
minus the apron and Brooklyn accent.
Just one problem: Wise, chief
executive of the year-old startup Fetch
Robotics, thinks it wont happen in her
lifetime because the challenges in
hardware and software are too big.
Im probably one of the most
pessimistic roboticists youll ever
meet, she admits.
Fetch Robotics is going after one
promising area: warehouses and e-
commerce fulfillment centers, which
are plagued with high turnover, injuries,
employee theft, and a chronic shortage
of workers who require sleep and time
off during a days shift. Her first
product, Fetch (shown in Figure 12) is
one of the most sensibly designed
robots Ive seen. The main feature of
the robot is the back-drivable 7-DOF
SERVO 01.2017 63
Carroll - Then & Now - Jan 17_Then & Now - Sep15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:45 AM Page 64
Figure 12.
Melonee Wise
and Fetch.
Figure 14. Helen Greiner and
the iRobot PackBot.
Figure 13. The two Fetch Robotics robots; Fetch
and Freight work together.
arm that is capable of lifting over 13
pounds. The 250 pound Fetch can
adjust its height from 37 to 410.
It has a SICK obstacle avoidance
laser scanner with a 25 meter range
and a PrimeSense 3D sensor in its
head that can pan and tilt. There is a
bunch of mounting points available for
additional sensors also. Fetchs base
includes a charging dock. The vision
system cannot recognize actual
objects but can perceive spaces and
object sizes to grasp, Wise says. Wise
has also produced a companion robot
to the Fetch called Freight. Figure 13
shows how the two different robots
work in collaboration with each other.
Freights purpose is to follow and work
beside Fetch and its articulated arm to
receive and carry items fetched from
shelves.
iRobot Formed from
MIT Threesome
Id like to look at another
64 SERVO 01.2017
company iRobot
formed by three
associates who
met at MIT: two as
students and the
other as their
professor. Professor
Rodney Brooks was
born and raised in
Adelaide, Australia.
He immigrated to
the US and
received his PhD in
Computer Science
in 1981 from
Stanford University.
He was professor of Robotics at
MIT and was the director of the
Computer Science and Artificial
Intelligence Laboratory at MIT.
One of Brooks students,
Colin Angle, has a BS in
Electrical Engineering and an MS
in Computer Science both
from MIT. Angle has stayed with
iRobot and is the CEO and
Chairman of the Board. The
other student, Helen Greiner
was born in London, UK and her
family came to the US when she
was five years old. Inspired by the
robots in the film, Star Wars, she went
on to MIT and received an MS in both
Computer Science and Electrical
Engineering. Both Greiner and Angle
had signed up for the PhD program at
MIT, but didnt start it due to their
desire to begin iRobot with Professor
Brooks.
Greiner and Brooks
Leave iRobot, Form
Own Companies
Greiner was a strong
force behind the designs of
all iRobots products, but
especially the military robots
such as the PackBot shown
with her in Figure 14. The 24
pound robot can cost as low
as a little bit over $100K or
as much as $200K, so you
wont find them in your local
hobby shop. With over 6,000
sold around the world, they Figure 15. CyPhy Works PARC drone for the military.
have found great acceptance with
small and large police departments as
well as the military.
Greiner left iRobot in 2008 and
founded CyPhy Works that year a
company devoted to the development
of small multi-rotor drones for the
consumer and military markets. Her
unique tethered design allows for
unlimited flying time, reliable drone
control, secure communications, and
high quality video feedback. The
Persistent Aerial Reconnaissance and
Communications (PARC) drone shown
in Figure 15 allows constant multi-day
surveillance in military battlefield
conditions.
Rod Brooks Forms
Rethink Robotics
Rodney Brooks also left iRobot in
2008 to form Heartland Robotics to
focus on industrial and workplace
robots with the aim of boosting US
competitiveness. In mid 2012, he
changed the name to Rethink
Robotics.
As the home page on their site
states: When Rethink Robotics
founder, Rodney Brooks was producing
the Roomba vacuum at iRobot in the
2000s, he saw first-hand how
challenging and inefficient the off-
shore manufacturing process could be.
By the end of that decade, he founded
Rethink Robotics, with the intent of
providing an entirely new type of
automation to manufacturers. One
that was safe to work next to without
cages; easily and manually trainable by
non-engineers; flexible enough to
move quickly from job to job without
an integrator; and affordable for
Carroll - Then & Now - Jan 17_Then & Now - Sep15.qxd 12/6/2016 8:45 AM Page 65
companies of all sizes.
That vision was realized with
the introduction of Baxter in 2012.
For the first time, manufacturers had
a cost-effective and easily adoptable
alternative to off-shoring. And the
market had a new category of
automation called collaborative
robotics.
The $25K to $40K Baxter is three
feet tall and extends to 510 to 63
with its adjustable pedestal. It weighs
165 pounds (306 pounds with the
pedestal). It was designed for simple
and dull jobs on a production line or
the loading, sorting, and handling of
materials. It was designed with small to
mid-sized companies in mind.
Baxter and Brooks are shown in
Figure 16. The robot is what the
industry calls a collaborative robot a
recent category for the industrial robot
industry as mentioned. So many
industrial robots of the past were
dangerous in their operations around
humans that protective screens
surrounding the robot and its
operations were a must. Sensors were
installed that quickly disabled the robot
if a human entered the work space.
A collaborative robot not only
does not have the quick movements
and power of a large industrial robot,
its compliant joints can allow its back
drivable arms to be struck and moved
without solid resistance. Baxters
happy face and roving eyes do a lot to
make the operator feel at ease.
Simplicity of programming and use has
given Brooks robot a home in many
small businesses.
Computer Science
Education is a Key to
Robot Evolution
There are many robotics
companies that have paved the way
for the evolution of robots. I just
Advertiser Index
Actuonix Motion Devices ........................27
All Electronics Corp. .................................14
BotKits ........................................................19
EarthLCD ....................................................14
and microcontrollers as one giant
step in the evolution of modern
automotons. There were some
amazing robots constructed as early
as the 1770s, such as the Writer
shown in Figure 17 built by Pierre
Jaquet-Droz with over 6,000
handmade components.
Programming the automatons
mechanical computer was done by
Figure 16. Rodney Brooks and Baxter. careful filing of many brass cams and
gears, and re-programming was
accomplished by replacing these
components with new carefully-filed
cams. Even the early Unimation
industrial robots of the 60s used
rotating magnetic drums for program
memory. Weve come a long way
since then.
Final Thoughts
No matter what robot we might
stare at with absolute amazement, it is
Figure 17. The Writer by Pierre Jaquet-Droz. not the robot itself that is amazing. It
is the many people who have trod the
wanted to highlight the two parent long path in the development of the
companies that many of you are most technology behind the robots
likely familiar with and the ambitious creation. Most of the people
entrepreneurs behind them. I do find responsible for that technology had no
it so unique that almost all of these idea that they were contributing to the
people have advanced computer creation of a robot.
science degrees. Melonee Wise has a Curiosity on Mars, Elon Musks
PhD in Mechanical Engineering, but I Tesla self-driving cars, Larry Page and
found her to be just as competent in Sergey Brins self-driving cars, IBMs
advanced coding and programming of Watson supercomputer, and many
ROS, as well as client libraries of C++, others of todays amazing
Python, LISP, and Ubuntu Linux. Helen technological feats took the minds and
Greiner also has a degree in Electrical efforts of many thousands of people
Engineering, and both of these working for individual goals. Others
women were key co-designers of most took the results of those goals and
of the robot products in their created absolute magic.
companies. Scott Hassans Willow Garage
spun off eight startups and
Robot Evolution: From foundations such as Industrial
Gears and Cams to Perception and Redwood Robotics
both of which were snatched up by
Microprocessors Google. SV
I look at the use of computers
ExpressPCB ................................................27 Routakit ......................................................15
Hitec .............................................................2 SDP/SI ........................................................14
Maxbotix ................................................3, 57 ServoCity .............................................57, 67
PanaVise .....................................................41 ShopBot Tools ...........................................36
Pico Technology ........................................66 The Robot MarketPlace ............................41
Pololu ..........................................Back Cover Tormach .....................................................21
SERVO 01.2017 65
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 The new starting point for robotics

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