20M2 Mobile Robot

Jamster

Senior Member
That touch control is awesome, and looks quite simple. Nice.

Can you provide schematics and code to help others?

Jamster
 

erco

Senior Member
Thanks for your interest. Code & schematics are in progress, this bot will be in ROBOT magazine and there will be a web page of code & construction info. Buttoning it up now.
 

techElder

Well-known member
erco, do you see a situation where one task is PAUSED or delayed in some way and the other tasks get a lot more "attention" from the underlying multitasking?
 

erco

Senior Member
I'm sure that will be necessary at some point to prioritize the tasks. My interest in multitasking is primarily wheel watching; counting wheel encoder pulses for dead reckoning & navigation. I'm still learning which functions crash the system to a halt. Just last night I found that PLAY and even SOUND suspend all other functions. Disappointing! I'm finding that the silly little LED scanner is quite useful to provide visual feedback when the system is bogged down, you can see the LEDs stumbling.

I hope to get this robot doing lots of things: wall following, even maze running; line following, light seeking, beacon tracking, etc. I have a few neat tricks using IROUT planned. This old dog will do whatever's necessary to get the job done. If it takes pausing or suspending tasks, so be it! :)
 

erco

Senior Member
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techElder

Well-known member
So, the only way to view the code you've used is to subscribe to ROBOT magazine? So far, all of your videos are just an advertising campaign for ROBOT magazine. Just sayin' ...

Usually the User Projects area is for showing off your code and skills.
 

erco

Senior Member
Since it's a series of magazine articles promoting PicAxe, it's only fair that ROBOT magazine (who commits to the series and saves space in each issue) gets "first dibs" on the material. I post here to get some feedback and gauge general interest in specifics to help steer where my articles go. All the code and most of the construction material ends up available for free on their website.

I'm simply promoting PicAxe in the US. Wasn't my intent to upset anyone. I'll stop posting here completely if that's preferred.
 

eclectic

Moderator
Since it's a series of magazine articles promoting PicAxe, it's only fair that ROBOT magazine (who commits to the series and saves space in each issue) gets "first dibs" on the material. I post here to get some feedback and gauge general interest in specifics to help steer where my articles go. All the code and most of the construction material ends up available for free on their website.

I'm simply promoting PicAxe in the US. Wasn't my intent to upset anyone. I'll stop posting here completely if that's preferred.
Is this the sort of thing?

http://find.botmag.com/051206
 

erco

Senior Member
Yes, that's the online content for part 2 of my series. Just today they started uploading the content on this mobile robot from part 3 at http://find.botmag.com/091206

They have the code, but haven't added that yet. Should be soon.
 

erco

Senior Member
Test using the bot's touchpad sensors to send data to an SP0-512 RoboVoice Chip. Sale on chip is officially over, but mention erco & Picaxe in an email to Ken and he'll give you the old sale price ($16) for a limited time. http://www.speechchips.com/shop/item.aspx?itemid=22

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB_xIlnZ_SU


Code:
#picaxe 20m2
#no_data
setfreq m16	' 16 Mhz  servo commands only work at 4 and 16 mhz
		' 8 or 16 MHz required for 9600 baud serial data


dirsb=%11010111
outpinsb=3		' initialize center LED on

input b.5	'speaking line from 512
output b.4	'send 9600 baud true 8N1 data to sp0-512

GOSUB waitspeak
high 4:pause 10'		manual 2 p.209 says set pin high before sending true data
SEROUT 4,T9600_16,(13,13)   'initialize
qq:
touch16 [%11101000],c.1,w1':sertxd("w1=",#w1,13,10)
touch16 [%11101000],c.2,w2':sertxd("w2=",#w2,13,10)
touch16 [%11101000],c.3,w3':sertxd("w3=",#w3,13,10)
if w1>1200 then
'sertxd("one",13,10) 
SEROUT 4,T9600_16,("[V6] [S3] [E3]1",13,13)
GOSUB waitspeak
endif
if w2>1200 then
'sertxd("two",13,10) 
SEROUT 4,T9600_16,("[V6] [S3] [D3]2",13,13)
GOSUB waitspeak
endif
if w3>1200 then
'sertxd("three",13,10) 
SEROUT 4,T9600_16,("[V6] [S3] [C3]3",13,13)
GOSUB waitspeak
endif
goto qq

waitspeak:
PAUSE 50
test:IF pinb.5=1 THEN test
PAUSE 50
RETURN
 
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jinx

Senior Member
hi,
your text to speak is a project by itself, have you got a write up about it already? if you have pls add a link. am seeing this method gaining pace in the little robot world but why not use a speakjet voice play back,driod sound effects,serial ready seems to get overlooked.
jinx
 

BCJKiwi

Senior Member
@ Erco

Would you please advise what format your attachments/pictures/code/whatever are posted in as I have not yet been able to see anything you have ever posted on the Forum except the text.

Thanks
 

erco

Senior Member
Using a SHARP IR analog distance sensor as a digital proximity sensor. Triggers at about 3.5 inches, not adjustable, based on PicAxes's high/low transition voltage of ~1.3V. In theory, you could read the digital status of 8 of these sensors on port B with a quick, simple look at PINSB to see if any proximity sensors were triggered.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_OF8XK53LY

 
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BCJKiwi

Senior Member
See you have had no response from anyone else with the same problem that I am experiencing.

Would you be able to advise what format the images are in as I would like tosort out what my system is not doing that everyone elses is.

Thanks
 

BCJKiwi

Senior Member
@ Erco
I can view the linked youtube vid from yr post #28
However all the posts 1,2,6,9,16,17,21,24,26 simply show the text and a large white rectangle.
erco post 26.jpg
 

erco

Senior Member
First test using twin TSOP4038 IR receivers to track to a simple LM556 beacon (blue LED on door). Seperately, it uses a Sharp IR distance measuring module as a digital proximity switch. When it gets within 4" of the door it does an about face and drives away for 6 seconds, then repeats the locate & track cycle. Not bad for a first test, I have many variables to adjust.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BKikozfdds

 

BCJKiwi

Senior Member
No. the white box won't yield anything but where you post a link it works fine. (e.g. posts 28, 33)

If I right click and then click on 'select all'
then paste it into say notepad it shows;
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<meta name="robots" content="noindex,nofollow">

So maybe the robots' noindex,nofollow is somehow being respected by IE9 ?? - but of course it should not be affecting this activity.

Have just tested it in Chrome and they display OK.

So it is either IE9, or some configuration in IE9/PC

Thanks
 
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erco

Senior Member
Good to know, thanks for the update. I'll post links along with embedded videos from now on.

I also added links to previous posts.
 

erco

Senior Member
Three beacon tracking demo. A weak IR signal is better than a strong one to avoid reflections & ghosts. Detection range is over 20 feet from robot to beacon. Ultrasimple beacons can be individually coded so robot can distinguish between at least 4 different beacons. Front LEDs show active steering direction towards beacons.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rHuFFe6HRc

 

erco

Senior Member
Sensor mounting details. Photos and code listing will be online soon at ROBOT magazine's website. Will share when that goes online. Beacon schematic attached.

 

Attachments

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jinx

Senior Member
hi erco,
thats a neat idea about the swivel ir sensor,am planning a simailar ir beacons but ceiling/wall mount so the bot knows which part of the room in.
jinx
 

IronJungle

Senior Member
erco:

Can you explain briefly the general method that you use for the beam tracking.

I think you are using two IR detectors to "look" at the beam, but it seems like they would both read the same value. (Obviously I am wrong about this...)
 

erco

Senior Member
@IJ: The IR receivers each count pulses received from the IR signal in 7 milliseconds, yielding counts ranging from ~6-14, depending on the beacon's modulation frequency. In use, the count received from any beacon is 6-7, or 8-9, etc. The 1-count fluctuation is rounding error, since the count interval isn't necessarily sync'ed with the beacon output. So both receivers will count within 1 of each other when they both see any beacon, or the count is zero if a receiver can't see the beacon. There is an IR-opaque baffle (black cardboard) between them as well as around them, as shown in the last video. Both sensors "see the beacon" and receive the signal (yielding the same count) only when the beacon is straight ahead of the robot, so it drives straight ahead. If only the left sensor sees it, the robot turns left, and when only the right sensor sees it, the robot turns right. In the video, you can see the LEDs up front changing to show which sensor sees the beacon.
 
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