#robotics Logs
Jan 08 2013
#robotics Calendar
00:01 rue_house Ademan, the reset is just to re-sync it with the micro
00:01 home a web based rov
00:01 home hmm
00:01 rue_house the micro goes thru the servos one at a time, each pulse interval it just has to send one pulse t start the time for the next servo
00:01 home if only I could get my RPI working properly :/
00:01 home having battery/ voltage issues...
00:02 RyanS Broadmeadows... im kidding .. Greenvale it's not far from the airport
00:02 rue_house home, I'm strapping a microatx and a wrt54G to my robot
00:02 home I have a wrt54g with headers soldered in...
00:02 Ademan rue_house: ok that's more or less what I thought, but isn't it possible for servos to get "starved" of pulses in this scheme?
00:02 home would probably be a better options, since I am getting huge pings..atm
00:02 rue_house I didn't load openwrt yet
00:03 home but wrt54g is 12v
00:03 home I don't have 12v batteries lying around..
00:03 rue_house Ademan, no, if you calc it out, you can fit max pulse width for each servo and still have 50hz update
00:03 home limited to 5v-6v
00:03 rue_house my robot is running 36 or 48V
00:03 home yeah, thats why
00:03 home mine is small..
00:04 home and it can only go forward and backward :/
00:04 Ademan rue_house: awesome then :-)
00:04 rue_house http://eds.dyndns.org/~ircjunk/robots/buddy_II/assembly.html
00:05 rue_house see how I do that? I make the robot THEN make the plan, that way they match
00:05 Ademan lol
00:05 home lol
00:05 home adapter widgets
00:05 home is that what they are really called?
00:05 rue_house OH! THAT WHEEL ATTACHMENT _WAS_ SUPPOSED TO BE TEMP!!!!
00:07 rue_house dont think the experts know what they are doing, they are just good at making it up as they go along AFTER jumping in
00:08 rue_house Step 1: Jump in.
00:08 home meh
00:08 rue_house Step 2: Sort out the rest
00:08 home I need to prototype
00:08 home a shooter for shooting frisbees XD
00:08 home I wish I had a workshop ;/
00:09 Ademan I wish I could have my reprap in my apartment :-p
00:09 rue_house I'm sure the dinningroom table is clear as we speak
00:09 rue_house ooh I was supposed to work on my reprap
00:09 home I wish I had a REPRAP
00:09 home I need one :/
00:09 rue_house I promised myself bit every day
00:09 home but no time
00:09 home too busy with school :*(
00:10 Ademan home: grad school? undergrad you have no excuse :-p
00:10 home meh
00:10 home I am stupid
00:10 home so...
00:10 Ademan I dove in head first and came out ok, you're almost certainly smarter than I
00:11 Ademan I started in august and "finished" early december
00:11 Ademan I'm still tweaking the damn thing though
00:11 Ademan but I'm REALLY glad I decided to do it myself rather than buy a product, I learned a ton
00:11 rue_house Ademan, I think Triffid_Hunter can help you tweek
00:12 home haha
00:12 home my voltmeter is messed up
00:12 Ademan He's probably had enough of my questions for a year :-p
00:12 rue_house if he's like me, he dosn't mind helping, but may not have time to help for long
00:12 home I wish I had a workshop :/
00:13 Ademan But it's printing well enough for functional parts, they just have visible banding, and some blobbing issues with smaller features
00:13 Ademan home: local hackerspace?
00:13 home too far
00:13 home none at where I live
00:13 home could start one
00:13 home but who is paying
00:13 Ademan home: how far? my closest one is pretty far
00:13 home ..
00:13 rue_house I'm off to bed!
00:13 Ademan I bootstrapped my reprap there
00:13 Ademan gnight rue_house and thanks for the help
00:13 home oh god
00:13 home is 100km far?
00:14 Ademan home: I think so, that's like 60 miles right?
00:14 home maybe
00:14 home all I know
00:14 home is that it takes me about 40-120 mins to drive there
00:14 home its a nice palce
00:14 home they have a laser cutter, 3d printer..sigh
00:15 home I should probably bother them in their IRC
00:15 Ademan 120 minutes is a long drive
00:15 Ademan 40-60 is mine
00:16 home still far
00:16 home and a waste of time
00:18 rue_bed hmm
00:19 rue_bed I dont know if I should look at setting up my shop as a hackspace
00:19 rue_bed its kinda going that dir already tho
00:31 Ademan rue_bed: if you're anywhere near me, I think you should
00:31 Ademan nearer to me than my nearest hackerspace* :-p
00:32 Ademan Although my hackerspace has an open door policy that makes it effectively double as a homeless shelter, so projects have been stolen, and there are sometimes less savory homeless folk in there
00:33 orlok eugh :-\
09:15 Rif http://rifraf.dyndns.org does this work at all?
09:16 rue_house it always had...
09:17 rue_house oh odd, when did it break? and when was it dropped out of the topic?
09:17 Rif impossible
09:17 Rif i just made a server and recovered some old webpages
09:17 Rif so it works?
09:17 rue_house did you have another page somewhere?
09:17 Rif nope
09:17 Rif nothing on the net
09:18 rue_house it worked for ages...
09:18 Rif now i can show things again
09:18 rue_house its not working
09:18 Rif yeah at the last house months ago maybe
09:18 Rif lol, thanks
09:19 Rif the server is on my android tablet
09:19 rue_house hah
09:20 Rif is working in here, my be the wifi modem settings, did try and port forward
09:21 rue_house my tablet picks up a new ip every time it reboots
09:22 Rif rue can you try now please
09:23 rue_house slowly...
09:23 Rif you are slow or the page is?
09:23 rue_house going nowhere...
09:23 Rif k
09:23 rue_house it loaded a black background
09:24 rue_house dude, there is no content
09:24 rue_house it didnt' finish loading, but it a paw titlepage of some kind
09:25 Rif ok getting somewhere at least
09:25 rue_house <body>
09:25 rue_house <center>
09:25 rue_house <p></p>
09:25 rue_house <table cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0">
09:25 rue_house </table>
09:25 rue_house </center>
09:25 rue_house </body>
09:26 rue_house eeek! have to go!
09:31 GuShH tables? eeeeeew
09:31 ShH throws a hipster at rue_h
09:36 Rif GuShH does this work for you? http://rifraf.dyndns.org
09:37 GuShH Rif: yes
09:37 GuShH oh god it's 1990s again
09:37 Rif oh great, cheers
09:38 Rif yes its need a long time since updates
09:38 Rif been*
09:38 Rif but good to have a webserver of sorts again
09:39 GuShH :p
09:39 GuShH is that a speaker-table I see? http://rifraf.dyndns.org/robotics/motion/track4.jpg
09:40 ShH wonders how many people actually use speakers as ta
09:41 Rif hrm, the links won't work for me, need to edit it
09:43 Rif yeah some speakers with a pan tilt camera
09:44 GuShH http://what-if.xkcd.com/22/ hah
09:45 Rif you still have pennies?
09:57 GuShH yes...
09:58 GuShH is it all plastic in AU?
09:58 Rif plastic from $5 to $100, coins from 5c to $2
10:52 lefthook has anyone designed a robot that washes dishes?
10:54 andrewc maybe somebody did it with a pr/pr2?
10:56 lefthook what's pr/pr2?
10:57 andrewc pr = personal robot
10:57 andrewc http://www.willowgarage.com/pages/pr2/overview
10:57 lefthook oh
10:57 andrewc so pr was developed at stanford
10:57 andrewc pr2 is now at wg
10:58 lefthook it is pretty advanced
10:58 lefthook two static arms could do the dishes probably
10:58 andrewc ok i found this on google
10:58 andrewc http://techcrunch.com/2009/10/16/panasonics-dish-washing-robot/
11:02 lefthook http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3j11yW7zaA
11:02 lefthook I don't want a robot putting dishes into the washing machine
11:09 andrewc what are you envisioning?
11:11 Skwint I assume his ultimate goal is to replace maids, home help and similar, with robots, because let's face it we need more unemployment in the world!
11:14 lefthook eventually someone will do it commercially, I however want it for personal use and to learn
11:18 andrewc i don't see much possible improvement... is loading dishes that much of a chore?
11:19 lefthook what if you don't have the dish washer
11:20 andrewc so you are suggesting a robot that washes dishes
11:20 andrewc isn't that a dishwasher
11:20 andrewc what i'm saying is you either buy your dream robotic dishwasher or a conventional dishwasher right
11:21 andrewc how is the robotic dishwasher any easier to use
11:21 lefthook :D
11:22 lefthook don't you have to scrub the dishes if they are not put into the dishwasher immediately
11:23 andrewc sounds like you just want a better dishwasher...
11:24 lefthook but what is cheaper, two robotic arms or a dishwasher?
11:26 andrewc ok... dishwasher... what's your point?
11:52 Skwint dishwasher is more efficient on soap and water too
11:53 Skwint it's basically a box with a lawn sprinkler in it
12:09 GuShH Skwint: yet it consumes extra power
12:10 GuShH pumps, heaters, whatnot.
12:10 Skwint true!
12:10 GuShH and they cost more to maintain !
12:10 Skwint well, no, we have heaters for the water for manual washing up, and since it uses less water it's arguably less power on that count
12:10 GuShH I miss my dishwasher :(
21:08 TELunus zlog
21:27 rizlah Why do you log the channel?
21:27 rue_house rizlah, why do people ask the same questions again and again
21:27 rizlah Because the answer isn't anywhere easy to find.
21:28 rue_house its in the log tho
21:28 rue_house sometimes we make howto's out of the logs
21:28 rizlah Ah, ok
21:29 rue_house sometimes we use the logs to repeat to people what we just told them cause they got disconnected
21:29 rue_house sometimes we use the log to repeat to people what they didn't pay attention to us saying
21:30 rue_house sometimes we use the logs to find out what we missed while we were away
21:30 rizlah Here's a quick question: Is it better to buy a cheap (but OK quality) starter kit to play around with, or buy all things seperately. I looked around and components are cheap on ebay but in serious quantities
21:30 rue_house thats one of those questions
21:30 MjrTom Why do you log the channel?
21:30 MjrTom ;)
21:30 rue_house the answer is that you wont hang around long enough to find out
21:31 rizlah Who?
21:31 rue_house rizlah, doing ANYTHING is the best approach
21:31 rizlah Elaborate
21:31 rue_house the more you do, the more problems you solve
21:31 rue_house the more problems you solve the more solutions you have to solve problems
21:31 rue_house after a while, your project just seem to start to put themselfs togethor
21:32 rue_house it dosn't matter if you start with programming, elelctronics, or mechanics
21:32 rizlah Right. I've been reading a lot but haven't got round to purchasing anything because I really don't see a need to have 100s of each component (seems to be the smallest quantity), or something I don't need.
21:32 rizlah I do some software, but software is boring. Want to delve into hardware.
21:32 rue_house can you program C?
21:32 rizlah Yar
21:33 rizlah I've been idling here for about 3 years now
21:33 rue_house ok get an avr board or an arduino, you can program them in C
21:33 rue_house start with a flashing led
21:33 rizlah Was thinking an arduino Uno with breadboard + components
21:33 rue_house keep asking us for pointers
21:33 rue_house sounds good, go for it
21:33 rue_house what components?
21:33 rizlah I have a list i've compiled, hold on
21:34 rue_house I suggest 10 leds with resistors from ebay china for $1 and 22 days shipping
21:34 rue_house ok
21:34 Rif rizlah i can give you an idea of what to get now, got some webpages up
21:34 rizlah http://pastebin.com/GgACNivn
21:35 rizlah When it says something like 5x LED, <colours>, it means 5x of each colour
21:35 rue_house thats a good list rif
21:36 Rif woops tablet went flat, just gotta recharge webserver
21:36 rizlah The wire is easy, 10m each colour from ebay at very cheap prices
21:36 rue_house I was going to say
21:36 rue_house Rif, suggestion: 5V 1A cell phone chargers are regulated, gets rid of need for 7805
21:37 rue_house cheap and verry available
21:37 Rif cool
21:37 Rif yep
21:37 Rif but only 500ma
21:37 rue_house no, usually 1A
21:37 rizlah Wrong person :D
21:37 rue_house I have a huge collection of 9V 300mA adapters that I dont know what to do with yet
21:38 rizlah So you don't think I need the 78?05s?
21:38 rue_house I'm suggeting you can substitute for a 5V 1A cell charger
21:38 rue_house it CAN be handy to have a 12V power supply too, but not right off
21:39 rizlah I was thinking of getting a 3 - 12V variable supply
21:39 rue_house http://eds.dyndns.org/~ircjunk/projects/audioswitch/main.html
21:39 Rif http://rifraf.dyndns.org/tiptoes/avrkit.htm does that work now?
21:39 rue_house see that?
21:39 rue_house rizlah, good if you can afford it, and if its regulated
21:39 e_house whispers to Rif (parallel programmers are ou
21:40 Rif ok thanks, but its some ideas, am not trying to sell it
21:41 rue_house hmm I still need to make a vacuum former
21:41 Rif i just found 7 tiny pinhole punctures in me boat
21:41 Rif is gonna be nice fishing this trip
21:41 rue_house http://eds.dyndns.org/~ircjunk/projects/audioswitch/main.html <-- did you see the adapters i powered it with?
21:41 rizlah rue_house: Is there anything else I would need to add to that list?
21:41 rizlah Are the values A-OK?
21:42 rue_house yup
21:42 rizlah This is my main reservation, I don't want to buy anything unneeded/wrong
21:42 rue_house you can stay entertained for a while with that list
21:42 rue_house dont ahve ANY reservations, DO THINGS
21:42 rue_house its how you learn
21:42 rizlah Hold on, will show a few links to ebay
21:43 rizlah Is this any good? http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Official-Arduino-UNO-Rev3-ATMEGA328P-Board-Basic-Essentials-Starter-Kit-R3-/121032905747?pt=UK_Computing_Other_Computing_Networking&hash=item1c2e1f9413
21:44 rizlah Seems like starting with a working arduino + stuff would be best
21:44 rue_house do you have a heat gun?
21:44 rizlah No
21:44 rizlah I don't have many tools
21:44 rue_house do you have a screwdriver?
21:44 rizlah No, but I can buy one
21:45 rizlah I moved recently, don't have much stuff at hand
21:55 rue_house hmm
22:06 rue_house "he told me I scored perfect on the pilot test, but I didn't get a perfect score, so I asked, and he said that he had to dock me a general mark for going backwards the whole way. I didn't let on that I didn't know, explains why the seat was so awkward, what kinda goofy spacecraft puts the pilot at the back!?!?!"
22:07 rizlah hah
22:07 rue_house :)
22:07 rizlah Is the kit above any good?
22:08 rue_house its just missing a plug in adapter
22:08 rue_house 28
22:08 rue_house 16
22:08 rue_house $56, hmmm
22:09 rue_house 27.... its a bit pricey, but the postage is included, so its fair
22:10 rizlah Hmm
22:10 rizlah But Arduino Unos don't go cheaper than 22€ anywhere
22:10 rizlah I think the ones on ebay at 14€ must be scams
22:10 rue_house correct, and the breadboard is about 7
22:11 rue_house rest of the parts are worth about 5,
22:11 rue_house and the rest is reasonable for shipping
22:11 rizlah Alright, will buy that later today
22:21 Rif are there any new cool things i should buy?
22:22 rizlah 1KM of CAT5
22:22 Rif already have over 250m doing nothing
22:22 rizlah wot
22:23 rizlah Get ~5k of assorted cable ties.
22:23 Rif we recabled factory recently, plus have boxes of cables
22:24 Rif like something cool for robotics, the latest cool motors with encoders or dev board thats makes things easier
22:24 DagoRed rizlah: wrong btw
22:24 DagoRed on the cost of arduino's
22:24 rizlah Tell me about that.
22:24 DagoRed Look at deal extreme for the arduino nano.
22:24 rizlah Uno, not nano
22:25 DagoRed Why would you want something that doesn't fit on a bread board?
22:25 rizlah Why would the arduino need to fit on the board?
22:25 rizlah You can connect with hookup wires.
22:27 DagoRed It's simpler. Not to mention the smaller foot print is nice.
22:27 DagoRed Granted.... I mainly use arduino's for just having a nice board with boot loader and just use AVR studio.
22:27 rizlah Heh, nano doesn't do usb right?
22:28 DagoRed The nano does do usb.
22:28 rizlah oic
22:28 rizlah Heh, Uno has more stuff, easier to use as a beginner.
22:28 Rif DagoRed nice, just ordered a couple for $10 each
22:28 rizlah Rif: Of what?
22:29 Rif nano arduino
22:30 Rif http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/mini-USB-Nano-size-V3-ATmega328P-AU-Micro-controller-board-Arduino-compatible-/300830037624?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_15&hash=item460ade1678&_uhb=1#ht_1038wt_1167
22:30 DagoRed rizlah: the uno doesn't have more stuff.... it's the same damn thing. But in the end you can't put a price on happyness so if an Uno fits your needs then awesome :)
22:30 rizlah Oh right, my bad
23:34 rue_house http://www.ebay.ca/itm/New-LM2596HV-LM2596S-DC-DC-Step-Down-CC-CV-Adjustable-Power-Supply-Module-/180947008880?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a21483d70
23:34 rue_house they know their stuff, but are still rough on the language part :)
23:57 piney that specific one has a design flaw
23:59 piney the two pins for the on/off, i can't remember which it is, but they give you ground when you need + to trigger it, or they give you + when you need ground to trigger it