Graymark’s Scooter Model 601A

Here’s an inexpensive kit from Graymark to help you learn motor theory, transistor switching and R/C time constant circuits. Comes with an excellent instruction book of lessons, schematics and troubleshooting guide. Scooter changes direction when you clap your hands or when it hits an object. See KrisTech’s independent First-Person, First-Robot Review — $16.95

Scrambler Model 606A

Graymark’s Scrambler is a 6-legged robot kit with an infrared eye which helps him avoid objects in its path. Its well-written instruction book discusses infrared beams, operational amplifiers, photo detectors and more. — $35.95

Includes all hardware, housing, software, Hitec HS-300 servos and a Mini SSC servo controller kit. Serial port controlled, programmable 5 axis arm. Compatible with PC, microcontroller or BASIC Stamp. $250

Complete brains and brawn. . Powerful Motorola MC68HC11 microcontroller.
Fully autonomous, programmable, light or darkness seeking. All parts, including infrared emitter/detectors Cds photocells, microphone and buzzer are included.

Interactive C software is included (PC or MAC) with manual and tutorial (expert support is available online). Requires some soldering (the delicate parts on the circuit board are pre-soldered).

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The NEW Mondo-tronics’ Robot Store catalog is now available! It includes 32 pages of robot kits from Owi, Tamiya, A K Peters, Scott Edwards and many others, plus parts, books, videos, Muscle Wires(R) motorless motion and
more! Visit www.robotstore.com to see everything & to request your FREE
catalog today.

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Bob and his wife Nita scoured the mechanics pit, looking for any RC robot to fight. Bob has utmost confidence in Thumper’s ability to beat an equal-weight RC. Nita is confident of Bob: “He’s a genius.” They search the pit, but the RCs are all recharging batteries, repairing damage, or scheduled for bouts. No one can fight him. Bob REALLY wants to fight Dan Danknick’s Alexander, a finely crafted metal machine with a swiveling arrow-tipped puncher on its back and an articulated buzz saw up front. But he’s scheduled to move into finals. (More on Alexander below.) Then Jim Smenkowski’s Hercules picks up the gauntlet. At 99 vs 169 pounds, this is by no means an even match. But Bob wants a fight.

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The Robot Wars community justifiably thinks that autonomous robots are slow. Not so. You see, previous autonomous entries used notebook computer brains. Camp Peavy’s Gladiator Rodney used a 386SX with DOS 6.22, programmed in GW-BASIC; same as he did to win the autonomous face-off in 96. But this year he’s wielding an electric chain saw and a 1000 watt DC to AC inverter to run the 750 watt Sears chain saw. The circuitry is simply bread-boarded, like anyone can do by reading a Forest Mim’s Engineer’s Notebook from Radio Shack. Batteries can keep Rodney going for twenty minutes. It all adds up to 85 pounds.

Camp demo’ed its seek and kill functions for me before the bout. It worked great. Rodney’s two IR sensors found an infrared beacon, turned toward it, moved crisply forward, and turned on the chain saw, lowering it to slice through an imaginary opponent. I thought, Rodney could be the world’s first autonomous chain-saw murderer!

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Pretty Hate Machine’s offensive saws stalled while chewing on Ziggy’s metal armor. Being standard (hand-pull) gas-powered weed eater motors, they could not be restarted during the match. Jon Ridder’s Ziggy was fortunate not to have turned off.

TIP: Other bots also lost controls in the ring. If your bot doesn’t restart its own functions, then put those features onto RC control. (Personally, I’d like more bots to use proprioception. That is, where the robot senses what’s happening to itself.)

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Before Generation X makes its mark on Earth, it will make its presence felt on the Moon. Entrepreneurs at LunaCorp (Arlington, VA), NASA-funded scientists, and researchers at the Robotics Institute at Carnegie-Mellon University (Pittsburgh) are working toward a 1999 return to Tranquillity Base. The mission will require landing two rovers packed with sensors at the Apollo 11 landing site where Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin first walked on the moon. Significantly, the rovers will be operated only some of the time by scientists; the most important operators will be customers, you and me, at the Lunar Expedition Pavilion of a major entertainment theme park. 

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