• This solution has found a problem

    James Newton04/05/2022 at 19:01 0 comments

    This idea is very much a solution in search of a problem, and now there is a problem that is worthy of being solved this way. A robot that is cheap as dirt, but as smart as the average SmartPhone, with all the phones sensors available to detect collisions and tipping (accelerometer) and direction (compass) and position (GPS) and recognize objects and avoid obstacles (camera, possibly with the laser line structured light trick and with cloud services or even vision in the browser via OpenCV.js) all while retaining the WiFi connection to the net for true teleoperation. More about that here:

    https://hackaday.io/project/184720-web-smart-phone-screen-blink-bot
    (be sure to read the detail section)

  • New code, support for shift registers

    James Newton02/02/2022 at 18:10 0 comments

    Updated versions of this code are also available, using better methods and also supporting shift registers.

    These are untested and I would very much like your feedback on them. If you see bugs, please let me know. The silence on this project has kept me from devoting any time to it, but please know that if you ask, I will respond and make corrections, etc...

    I'd really like to work on a design for a little board to interface between either a shift register or a microcontroller. My idea is that perhaps one board can be made to serve both functions. e.g. You populate part of the board for I2C, and you populate a different part for a shift register.

    The other option is to do two separate boards, in which case I would do the I2C to uC version first. It would be something like my RC Servo to uC adapter board:
    https://hackaday.io/project/181972-rc-servo-adapter
    but with locations to mount the electronics and 2 light sensors, either directly to the PCB or via wires. (note to self, remember to include strain relief holes. I always forget those).

    If a final circuit for a shift register is tested, then I'll try to include a 3rd sensor and use one edge to pinout for a shift register chip.

  • Another schematic

    James Newton02/02/2022 at 18:06 0 comments

    Juergen Pintaske from Facebook also made and tested a version of this. (video is facebook only sadly) Here is the schematic he used:

    he is very interested in a version with 3 channels for shift registers.

  • Got a circuit board to test with!

    James Newton02/19/2015 at 20:52 0 comments

    My friend Conrad soldered up a permanent version of the breadboarded circuit and gave it to me. Next is hooking it up to an Arduino and testing the transmission of data for accuracy and speed.