A quick summary of how Renoster started and where it is going.
But first, my standard robotics disclaimer:
By day I am a mild mannered Delphi developer based in Sydney, when the sun sets I put on my evil genius lab coat and build robots out for world domination…. I have no formal engineering training in electronics or mechanics, what I know I got from Google and the few people out there willing to help with my projects.
While bored at work Dec 2007 I came across J-Bot, “An Autonomous Six Wheel Off-Road Robot with Differential All-Wheel Drive, All-Wheel Independent Suspension and Static/Dynamic Stability” built by David P Anderson. After some reading googling, etc. I came across Robogames, and more specifically the RoboMagellan event. This got me thinking… I have started a few robots in the past but never really finished any of them; mostly due to a lack of purpose I suspect; however committing to an event like this should ensure I complete the robot.
Thus Renoster was born (Rhinoceros in Afrikaans).
I have a 4WD1 rover kit from Lynxmotion with two 12vdc 30:1 200rpm gear head motors with encoders. This is all assembled and working well. The two motors are controlled by two Parallax HB25 motor controllers, which in turn is controlled by a Devantech SD21 servo controller. Currently Renoster has one Devantech SRF04 ultrasonic ranger panning on a Hitec ultra speed servo. It has an ATMega32 for low level control, proper PCB's are on order, and a ARTiGO A1000, also on order, which will handle the high level control.
For more information on how it all fits together see Renoster in the projects section.
