I've been spending my wee few hours a week designing, tinkering and finally building my little robotics platform. I've had ideas brewing for a while but haven't had enough time outside of work to start hacking.
It all started when I first saw Rick Waldron's Johnny Five framework for Node.js.
Sensors are asynchronous, so, ya, a node.js robot framework makes sense.
A few months later I started sketching designs, reading up on
firmata and buying my arduino & Pi.
Don't expect regular posts anytime soon. However, this is a pet project that I hope to take pretty far and hopefully inspire some weekend hackers along the way.
Before the what & why, here's the basic BOM:
- 1 Arduino Uno R3 running firmata
- 1 original Raspberry Pi with Raspbian, Node.js & 4gb of storage
- 1 Magicians chassis
- 1 SN754410NE Quad Half H-Bridge to drive the motors
- 1 dual-output mobile battery back
- A custom mount for the Pi & some custom USB cabling for power
Why Raspberry Pi
The main controller is a Rpi. It turns 2 small motors by delegating instructions to an Arduino. Overkill? For now, yes. But by having a powerful machine at the helm, I can expand the robot's capabilities. That means bigger boards like the Mega with 54 I/O, multiple boards via a USB hub and interpreting a bazillion inputs or adding vision with OpenCV.Why Node.js
Short answer: Internet of things & I <3 Node. If you haven't heard of the
Internet of Things concept, it basically means physical things will be connected to the web. TVs, Thermostats and of course robots! The main interface for my robot is a web app and that app will continue to get more sophisticated. Due to latency concerns, I wanted to control it over websockets, so Node.js was a good choice there. Plus, the more JavaScript in Node.js I write, the happier I am :)
Hardware choices
Outside using a cheapo chassis to get started, you may wonder why I'm using a mobile battery pack. I had the idea because the Raspberry Pi needs 5v and connects via USB. That made running cables easier. The model I went with also has 2 ports, so I could power the Pi and drive the motors at the same time.
What's next
I've already alluded to more & bigger boards but I'll definitely need a bigger base. I'm currently eyeing the
Rover 5 from Dagu. It is a tracked chassis that has 4 independent motors with optical encoders. It can also be converted to an omni-wheel bot pretty easily. That also means more inputs & more inputs = Arduino Mega. Lastly, once I get the latest Raspberry Pi with more memory, I'll try out OpenCV for some basic blob detection.
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