Palm Pilot Robot Kit 69
Pizon writes: "Ever wonder what else you can do with your Palm? Well, here is a good start. This clever little monkey used the 3Com Palm Pilot to build a fully autonomous robot out of standard, readily available parts (glue, tape, and a small amount of soldering). The robot can then drive itself around on flat surfaces, using optical range sensors to sense nearby obstacles and walls." Proof that not everything requires scads of hardware or the latest processor -- sometimes small is beautiful.
Hardware needed... (Score:2)
I support the EFF [eff.org] - do you?
Enough to drive a Hardware guy MAAAAD! (Score:3)
How much processing power do you need to process a few sensors and drive a couple wheels? $200 bucks worth of palm? Uhh... how about $4 bucks worth of microcontroller like a nice 16C64 from PIC Microship microcontroller [microchip.com]? Enough to make a hardware guy cry! Onboard RAM, ROM, EEPROM.... mmmmm..... timers and interrupt vectors.... 20mA drive current.... whoo-hooo! Just need a few H-Bridges and a couple infrared leds and detectors. You wanted to know what to do with those old 5 1/4" drives... its time to get out those irons and solder suckers!
I suppose this kit is nice for those software types that don't like to touch hardware, but what fun is that?
If you REAALY dont want to challenge yourself, and don't want to touch hardware, I would think a nice Lego mindstorms kit would be better suited and more flexable. Reconfigurable, and you can always buy more motors and sensors.
A freaking GUI for a robot? And thats a selling feature? Who needs a GUI anyways
Re:Hardly just 'tape & glue'. Full Parts List: (Score:2)
Total Cost, on top of the Pilot itself, about $270, $250 if you've already got the sync cable.
Re:mmm a new "beer bitch" (Score:1)
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They're - They are
Their - Belonging to them
Re:Enough to drive a Hardware guy MAAAAD! (Score:1)
change it from a Palm to an iPaq (Score:2)
So what i want to do is:
Control it with an iPaq running linux.
Install wireless networking into the iPaq.
Allow it to explore and learn it's enviroment, storing and retrieving info through wireless when it can't hold all it's data.
Make it 'curious' When it senses something has changed about the way things are laid out (based off it's exsisting 'floor plan'), make it want to explore.
Make it get 'hungry' and go automatically charge itself. (I know, have to add the hardware side support for that).
Give it tasks: sweep the floor. Where I work would be perfect for this, large smooth concrete floor with lots of obstacles.
When the floor was clean, do senseless acts like run a IA routine to find the quickest route between points (kinda a 'idle-time' task).
etc...
Ok, I know it can't do all that, but this is definately a jumping off point. It's the ultimate blend of hardware/software hacking.
A great learning tool, too... can you imagine the reaction if you brought one into a class room that would do something cool like map out the room and wirelessly report the results back to a laptop? Have it show the room being explored in real time on the screen.
This is gonna' be fun...
TI 35 driven robot (Score:1)
I don't get it... (Score:3)
From my calcs, this thing would cost over $250 - over the cost of a Palm!
Heck, the wheels and servos alone cost over $100!
Now, since this was all about a Palm robot, we can just say this is one part that is needed, and has other uses besides the robot, so let's not really factor it in...
So how to make a cheaper robot? Start by dropping the holonomic drive! A simple two wheel approach will work fine, and will also save you on a servo. That alone will drop your cost by over $60 (not $75, because you make up the $10-$15 by using two normal R/C aircraft landing gear wheels bolted onto the servos). Save another $6.00 on the acrylic by taping the parts to a few FREE AOL CD's (as well as possibly creating a winning entry in the previously posted UltimateChaos contest!). Save around $30 by hooking up some matched IR LED/Transistor pairs instead of the sensors (you may have to calibrate this yourself - plus you might need a few more parts - but not much more - get one of those sensor interface Forrest Mims books at RatShack while yer at it). You'll also save close to $14.00 if you already have the glue, tape, and heat shrink tubing available (any geek worth his salt BETTER have these things handy). Finally, save the $32.00 for the battery, and spend only about $10.00 of it for a used ni-cad pack for a cell phone at your neighborhood electronics junk yard (provided you live in a place that has one or two).
So, what do we have? I just told you how to save over $150 by a) dropping the holonomic drive, which only has value as being "the" thing to do in robotics today (seems like a fashion show!) b) using cheaper parts and stuff around you. Now, I say use that serial port thing, 'cause you probably couldn't do better on your own for less, and it is cheap and easy enough to use. However, know that they way they want you to build a table-top robot is a damn expensive way to go.
Oh, almost forgot - since the cheaper way to do it involves the tank-drive approach, and this is a table-top robot, you don't need casters. If you want (or need) something to rest the fore/aft portions of the robot on, use a couple felt pads.
I support the EFF [eff.org] - do you?
My Palm Robot (Score:1)
For those people complaining that the CMU robot has too much processing power I want to point out that both the CMU robot and our robot can be controlled by anything that communicates serially.
Anyway if you want the address of the site when I eventually finish it just email me. Thanks
BTW - Acroname (http://www.acroname.com) had a Palm demo using the Pontech Servo Controller at the Trinity Competition. I talked to the designer of it at the competition and we compared how we solved certain obstacles.
somone's a little touchy about their AIBO (Score:1)
That's exactly what I was thinking when I made that comment.
I know that moderation is a game. You can't take it seriously, and that's why I'm laughing -- why did someone even BOTHER to moderate that comment?
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Re:Use of PalmOS (Score:1)
LS
Infrared Rangefinders vs IR LED/Transistor (Score:1)
Save around $30 by hooking up some matched IR LED/Transistor pairs instead of the sensors
As the point of building the Palm Robot is to find a frivilous project to do with the palm (not to build a cheap robot), you wouldn't want to drop the sensors. An IR LED/Transistor pairs will tell you if there's an obstacle. But the sensor (using triangulation) will actually tell you the distance to the obstacle, which is way cooler.
Does anyone remember ... (Score:1)
IR LED/Transistor "distance" measuring (Score:2)
Measure the IR light level (which is all I bet these "sensors" actually do - but I might be wrong here) with the IR LED/Transistor pair at various distances to an object, and build a table of thresholds to know roughly how close the sensor is to an object (on your tabletop environment). It might even be possible to calculate this with ratios (probably have to factor in the square root of distance thing as well).
I also noted that the Palm could be left off the cost of the complete robot, because it was useful and could be used for other things in its own right.
I support the EFF [eff.org] - do you?
Re:My Palm Robot (Score:1)
I know what else I can do with my palm (Score:1)
Palm Hybrid (Score:1)
"Effects in the cupboards, effects in the dishes!" (Score:1)
"There's a Wizard of Speed and Time
Steppin' out by the Hollywood Sign!
To sing the joy and love he's found,
And bring it all to Movie Town..!"
I can just picture this thing being inspired by Mike Jittlov's movie [wizworld.com]...
Site has changed.. (Score:1)
mmm a new "beer bitch" (Score:1)
"Honey, get me another beer"..."go to hell"..."ok fine *click*" off goes the palm-on-wheels
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remove SPORK.
Re:Enough to drive a Hardware guy MAAAAD! (Score:1)
I'll bet 1/5 of the readers do have Mindstorms kits lying around...And the rest are getting them for xmas. FWIW, you can get serially addressable H-bridges and stepper drivers almost as easily as servo controllers. It's easy to go nuts with these once you have them.
Noone has these lying around, but those omnidirectional wheels are something new-ish in the fairly staid field of homebrew robotics, and would be fun to noodle with whether driven from a PIC or an Athlon. Good for mazes, I'm sure.
The same foam-tape-and-superglue chassis could apply, but with a Basic Stamp II [parallax.com] or (better and multitasking) BasicX-24 [basicx.com], you wouldn't tie up your Palm--you could even use the Palm's IR to interact with the beast.
CMU's bandwidth. (Score:1)
Well... (Score:1)
Maw! Git me another Bud! Thissun's empty!
Git it yerself, ya I cain't milk the cows, slop the hawgs an look after you at the same time!
Wayull gol dang! It's a good'un I made one'o these thangs from my Palm Pilot, Git me a beer, robot!
Zeewwhoop nooozziiiteeeemm bzoit!
Oh, yeah, yer off ta plow the north forty, shee-yoot. Gonna hafta buy another Palm Pilot and set o' roller blades from them li'l black hooded monks!
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Chief Frog Inspector
Re:I don't get it... (Score:2)
unfortunately the company that sells the wheels has a $100 minimum order! (well, actually a $25 extra service charge for orders under $100) anyone in the sf bay area want to pitch in with me on buying some wheels? i'm planning on building a modified version of this (possibly using an OOPic (www.oopic.com) as the processor instead of a Palm, mainly because i'm interesting in learning to program the oopic).
- isaac =)
Not so easy (Score:1)
Holonomic Drives... (Score:2)
I would admire the whole thing more if they told you how to build your own holonomic drive wheels from scratch (they don't seem like a very hard part to build - I bet you could make some out of drill saw rounds and a few wooden beads, with proper application of a Dremel).
I support the EFF [eff.org] - do you?
Ack (Score:1)
Now... (Score:1)
öööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööö
Re:Ack (Score:1)
I wonder (Score:1)
no slashdot effect? (Score:1)
Heel, Palm! (Score:3)
personal life (Score:3)
I really don't want to know about your personal life.
And robots too... man that's just getting weird.
So ummmm.... (Score:5)
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Nice hack... (Score:2)
Colin Winters
What I'll do with one of those (Score:2)
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Re: (Score:1)
Use of PalmOS (Score:3)
Of course, some of the memory can't be "erased" because of the way 3Com writes basic apps into a small PROM section. Why games like Hardball needed to be written to PROM was always beyond me...
it wasnt my fault (Score:1)
Re:Handspring Visor Module? (Score:2)
Black rubber-sheathed robotic tentacles attached to a Springboard module, flailing around -- now that would be suitably evil-looking...
Who doesn't want an autonomous, completely amoral robotic cephalopod in their shirt pocket, anyway? =)
hmmmmmmmm (Score:1)
INTERACTIVE [mikegallay.com]
Re:Use of PalmOS (Score:1)
Re:Palm VII (Score:1)
*gasp*, why didn't I think of that? I could program my Palm to steal some valuables from [insert a store name here].
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dd if=/dev/random of=~/.ssh/authorized_keys bs=1 count=1024
Rock on! (Score:1)
I agree (Score:1)
Re:mmm a new "beer bitch" (Score:1)
you could probably wire a free cuecat to it. use it to check the upc and then it'll know which beer it has. of course, dc might get confused if you scanned multiple brands of beer so there's another plus.
Build it, it's easy. (Score:1)
Really, I'm astounded at the simplicity of this project. It looks *extremely* easy to build, and I hope some enterprising capitalist puts together a parts kit for this thing and starts selling it.
It looks *super* easy.
a robotic palm? what a mindstorm it could be ... (Score:1)
What? I'm porting Linux to the RCX (Score:1)
Re:Handspring Visor Module? (Score:2)
links on building robotic tentacles
Keyword search for "nitinol". I don't think it would be too hard to build tentacles using nitinol wires as the "muscles", but it might be expensive, and it might consume too much power. If that's the case, then I would probably go for a multi-joint spine with a wire to each joint, and control all the wires with a camshaft in the body to give an authentic "wriggling".
BTW, I had no interest in PDAs until I saw the Handspring. Modules rule!!! The only drawback I've heard of is that the Handspring supposedly can't be upgraded, as it has no flash memory. Maybe they'll add flash or a socketed ROM in rev2. If they come out with a better camera module, the Handspring may make my Christmas wish-list.
Whacked things to do with a Palm Robot (Score:1)
World Domination (Score:1)
Cheap input device (Score:1)
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My robotics (Score:1)
People are doing too many things with their Palm. (Score:2)
Handspring Visor Module? (Score:2)
Re:Nice hack... (Score:1)
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Re:Enough to drive a Hardware guy MAAAAD! (Score:1)
But you couldn't disconnect your Mindstorm from the mobile platform, put it in your pocket, and have an orgonizer and whatever else people use Palms for. And I'm sure there's hardware that has to be made in this project: H-bridges to drive the motors and maybe some sensor interface circuitry.
Anyway, the point is to make something cool with stuff that you might have lying around.
Don't forget the goat*uckers (Score:1)
TRS-80 is too advanced. USE yor ZX81, or Chicklette key Pet or die.
maybe an Altair but that was before my time....
Emulator? (Score:3)
Aside from being fun for the mechanicaly inept, it might be a nifty testing ground for the robot software.
It would definitely be a good way to drain your Palm batteries.
Re:Use of PalmOS (Score:3)
Good, Fast, Cheap: Pick any two (you can't have all three).
They picked PalmOS because it was fast (zero development time) and cheap (hey, they'd already paid for it). You're suggesting making your own OS, because it would be more good, but developing it would take time, meaning that developing this would be less fast.
That robot... (Score:2)
Greg Reshko (Score:2)
Greg is, well, exceptional. In our chem class, the teacher called him the nucleus, cause he's got a big head. ( if you don't beleive me, check out http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~reshko/Calculus/ , he is the one on the far right with the nasa shirt. note: props to rosy, jeremy, ben and bronwyn on the left) He gave me homework in algebra two. (sorry rosy =]) In physics two, though, he didn't really help me at all (bastard) He is, however, probably one of the more likely candidates in our high school to become very rich and famous in the next few decades. In fact, we made a bet that whoever makes their first million first would take the other out to lunch. ( I'm more of a
I would like to add that as far as I can tell, greg still does not have a life. He is now a freshman at CMU and I think he still lives at home. So, if any hot girls out there wanna introduce that sexy russian to the ways of the world, please do.
justin wants lunch, greg =]
note: please moderate this up, I want to make greg laugh. He doesn't smile enough either =]
Re:no slashdot effect? (Score:1)
They're known to be somewhat big in the
whole computer science research realm.
I had a T1 right to my dorm room for my
4 years there. Yummy.
-Mike
Fuck moderators (Score:1)
Clones (Score:1)
Sticking a TI-92 on a mobile platform might be an overkill, but a TI-82 or an HP-48xx might make a nice robot brain.
Palm VII (Score:3)
Walmart Employee: "Security to hardware. We have a code 4427. I repeat, we have a small robot loose in the store."
All while geeks watch the live webcast from the bot.
This is a Microsoft/Nazi/Roman Catholic ploy (Score:1)
The provided software is not GNULIX friendly. Yes I know it will still compile with a "free" compiler from Metroworks, but still...
This is evil capitalist proprietary software. I ask you, is the PalmPilot "open souce?" Is the microcode for the robotic parts "open source?" Is there any guarantee that deep down inside the PalmPilot there is not code that will discharge all 5 monsterous volts of power at the user?
no, no, and NO! It reeks of a plot by the Pope himself (Bill Gates) to get you to purcahse Windows ME. So, Grigoriy Reshko, Illah Nourbakhsh, Matthew Mason, and Garth Zeglin, if you are reading this - come forth! Convince a drunken troll that you are not the spaen of Satan himself. I dare you!
Heed my warning, this is just the beginning.
"Proof that not everything requires scads of hardware or the latest processor -- sometimes small is beautiful."
Yes timothy, finally a voice of reason! Despite the wickedness of this example, I agree. I think, ney I decree, that all
With love,
Re:personal life (Score:3)