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I’ve thrown together a simple mockup of the layout for my new skateboard to check clearance and whatnot, It’ll be tight but should work a treat!

It’ll be dual motor, one front and one rear, and I’ll be mounting both behind the trucks so if I hit a curb they wont be destroyed.  It does have a kicktail but I’ll not be using it as a brake needless to say!  I will still be putting a protective cage around the rear motor to be safe though.

Almost got all the parts printed for my new printer, that’ll need doing before finishing this off and I’m continuing work on the Occupancy Sensor for the pub too.  If there are no more complications from that I’ll be sharing more info soon.

Got the workbench finished this eve, I will have plenty of room to work with now! I’ve been using a folding camping table as a desk since lockdown kicked in so this will be a massive improvement!

I added a back stop to stop things falling down and had to remove the keyboard holder as I couldn’t shut the door, very tight for space!

I’ve been working on a project to help with social distancing at my local pub which I’ll be finishing off on Friday, then the robotics can begin in earnest!

A few updates!  I’ve received the chassis for the NE-1 robot along with a Teensy to control it.  I’ve a bunch of cheap motor controllers I’m going to try with it shortly, with heatsinks on they should be more than up for the task.  The chassis is a bit bigger than expected, it’s about as wide as MacFeegle Prime, but it’s pretty solid.

MacFeegle Prime is heading back to war too!  PiWars 2021 has been announced, it’ll be run at home and I’ll need to build the course that it’ll be running too.  I’m not sure what this entails yet but looking forward to it for sure!  He’ll be completely redesigned too, I learned so much in building him the first time I can see the mess for what it is.  The benefit here is I’ll be able to get the aesthetic much closer to Johnny 5 too as well as simplifying the whole thing.  With the new batteries I have I should be able to halve the size of the pack and still have 2/3rds of the capacity of the current one.  That weight reduction also means I may be able to drop down to one pair of motors…  On and on the small changes go, all the way from tracks to the head as I’ve an idea that should make animatronic eyebrows possible too! 😀

My plan to rebuild my old 3d printer to make it actually work is going well too, I’m using my Prusa to print the parts to upgrade my old one at the minute and once I have it built I’ll use the new one to print parts for the Lack enclosures so I can soundproof and have them printing in a more stable environment.  Drafts are a killer for long prints, enclosing them will help a great deal.

I’ve wanted to build a new electric skateboard for ages, I’ve pretty much all the parts now and only waiting on nickel strips and the battery management system for it then I can crack on.  It’s based around a Mindless Skateboards SurfSkate which has a quirky truck geometry I’ll be designing and printing a custom enclosure for the battery and electronics, probably in transparent filament so I can see the innards, and as these will be big parts I’ll be using the newly rebuilt printer for the task.  It’ll have a 0.8mm nozzle rather than a 0.4mm nozzle the current one has which makes it massively quicker to print, a several hour print can be brought down to 30 minutes for example.

The latter is a bit off piste compared to the rest but what I’ll learn making a large battery pack for it will be incredibly useful for NE-Where when I build it next year. 

Finally, I’ve had my part time working request officially confirmed!  Still a few bits of paperwork to do but it’s kicking off officially next week so I’ll be back to having the Monday/Friday for robotics work.  I’m also working on building a new workshop with my girlfriend which is incredibly exciting!  Fingers crossed that’ll be done in a few months time, it’ll give me a lot more space to work in and a lot more space for bigger tools too.  A mini-lathe is very high up my list!

Pubs have reopened but the threat of covid hasn’t yet passed, social distancing is key but how do you know if the toilets are free without going in to the toilets? This is the problem I was given to solve by a friend who runs The Castle Tap in Reading.

The solution I’m building, and installing tomorrow, is a combination of motion sensors to detect when someone enters the main room, distance sensors to track it someone is sat on the throne or in front of the urinals, and a footswitch either end of the alley way to control a traffic light.

It’s gloriously over engineered but should work a treat! I’ll be writing up how to build and install it as well as a video demo and all the code needed to build one if anyone else has need.

This setup uses the same radio transceivers in planning on using in future robotics projects so excellent learnings for those!

My first day off reduced hours and I’ve that excited/anxious feeling I used to get when starting a new year at school!

With that in mind, an obligatory ‘uniform in front of the door’ in my Foxy Fitzroy ROS t-shirt!

… I spend it doing wood working!

First photo is a new desk, second the render of what I’m aiming for, the last is the current one that I hacked together when lockdown kicked in.

At some point I’ll have a CNC router and have a robot do this for me but I’m not there yet!

Welcome reader to the first post on my Patreon page!  I’ll be designing robotics of various types and not only sharing the results but all the files, code, and knowhow needed to build them yourself.  

I have a long post over on my blog detailing the projects that are already in the works, but the summary is I’ll have three robots, one shown above, and two controllers.

NE-1 will be based around an original Roomba, I will show you how to figure out which sensors and motors do what and allow you to take direct control at the hardware level.

NE-5 will be based on my award winning PiWars robot MacFeegle Prime, shown in the photo above.  This will be used for research in to teleoperation, navigation, perception, and tasking of a robot.  

NE-Where will be a much larger robot, designed around a Really Usefull Box to be able to carry large payloads over any surface, the specification for this one includes being able to carry me…

NE-Thing is a multipurpose controller, based around a Raspberry Pi, and will be used as the primary interface to all of my robots.  Longer term it’ll be extended to control drones and anything else besides.

NE-Body is a waldo controller, if you think of a puppeteering rig that is a twin of a robots arms you’ll have the right idea.  This will be used to research teleoperation.

All of these will be released under an open source licence, which one to be confirmed, and I’ll be creating a weekly video log showing what I’ve been working on to keep everyone up to date.

Most importantly, my content will always be free.  I’ll be using ROS (Robot Operating System) and other open source tools so it feels only right to give back to the community too.  I am still working on what tiers I’ll implement but they will include early access, live streams, and being listed as a supporter for my projects.

If you could support me with a pledge I’d greatly appreciate it, if not stick around anyhow and please share this wide.

Welcome aboard, let’s see where this ride takes us!

So as I mentioned in my previous post I’ll be putting any money raised here towards my projects and I thought I’d give two examples of what I have planned.

For my NE-1 robot, based around an old Roomba, it has all its sensors on board which I’ll be able to use but these are typically for near range detection.  To enable mapping and navigation I’m planning on adding a LIDAR scanner which will enable a real time view of a 360 degree sweep around the robot.  These have come down in price but are still around £100.

For the NE-Where robot I have the ODrive, batteries, and motors already but will need to buy parts to make a new frame, this time around out of aluminium extrusion.  The reason for this is it is very easy to work with and reconfigure as well as being very strong.  It’s more expensive than using steel, and I can weld, but for versatility it’s a great solution and one used in many research robots.  I’ve spec’d this up and it’ll cost around £200 or so for the frame and connectors.

I’m very conscious that I’m spending other peoples money and want to make sure I do it right, and be honest about it up front.

I’ll be solidifying my plans over the next few days and figuring out where to start.  I’m very close to finishing MacFeegle Prime but I’ve been saying that for months…  I think the best plan is to start with NE-1 and go back to basics, it’ll get me up to speed with all the basics of manual control.  Once the basics are done, and the NE-Thing controller with them, I can step up to NE-5 to tackle the complexities of stereo vision.

Ah, well, I think I have a plan!

Currently more than a little worse for wear but we can rebuild him, we have the technology!

Last time I worked on it was before I really knew how to use my 3d printer, possibly before I even had one, so much of it was attached by hot gluing Lego plates to the chassis and attaching things that way. It’s a good trick for prototyping for sure.