Last week I finished teaching the five-day “Hands-On Robotics for Teens” robotics course at Stanford University. As I thought would be the case, the planned robotic sumo event was the highlight of the week. The winning sumo-bot, “Kill-Dozer,” was a treaded vehicle with a slope that had TECHNIC teeth at the end. The design proved to be very effective, enabling it to win even a “king of the hill” round (i.e., pile all the sumo-bots onto the arena and see who lasts the longest).
The students, each of which had a computer with Internet access, also enjoyed creating robots from Dave Parker’s excellent nxtprograms.com website. We built the Catapult, Modular Test Vehicle, Machine Gun, Rattlesnake, and more. Below are some random pictures I took during the week. Besides enjoying the robots, I also enjoyed the nice weather there: a high of 70s during most of the week!
Still struggling to get an idea for a robot to compete in the MINDSTORMS Summer Olympics Building Challenge? Here’s a video of an NXT “Gymnastic Robot” that could inspire you. This robot can really move!
The following video was posted in February of 2008 and shows an NXT robot that can always solve the Rubik’s cube—within a minute or less! The robot’s creator is Daniele Benedettelli, who has experimented with a number of robot designs to solve the Rubik’s cube in the fastest possible way.
Kevin Clague has released version 4 of his popular LPub program, which is an “LDraw Building Instruction Publishing Tool.” You can download LPub 4 from his website; the program is now compatible with both Windows and Mac OS X. You can see a screen-shot below of the new LPub (the LDraw model shown is made by Allen Smith and included with Bricksmith). I used an earlier version of LPub to generate the building instructions for The Inventor’s Guide and am excited to see this latest version. Creating building instructions is a much easier task with tools like LPub!
The official MINDSTORMS website has posted yet another building challenge. This time, the contest has a “Summer Olympics” theme. The website mentions the following:
The 2008 Summer Olympic Games will be held from August 8 – 24, 2008 in Beijing, China! We are challenging all you to create a robot that can compete in one of the summer sports on the Olympic program.
There’s no limit on amount of LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT sensors, motors, HiTechnic sensors, or Bluetooth communication you can use on your MINDSTORMS NXT Summer Olympics Robot.
The website also has a long list of summer sports that you can use for inspiration of your Olympic robot, and the sports range from swimming to wrestling. (Note: Do NOT get your NXT wet! Water is its natural enemy.)
Movie Monday time! Stepping back to early 2007, here is a video from Brian Davis titled “LNE: LEGO Packbot.” Nothing can seem to stop this robot; one of my favorite parts is the scene with the robot “swimming” across packing peanuts. You can watch the movie below, and Brian has posted a number of pictures of the robot on Brickshelf.
The official MINDSTORMS website has announced the winners of the “NXT NXT” building challenge: a contest involving creations that use two NXTs. Check out the winners and get some inspiration for your next robot! Employing the power of two NXTs is a great way to demonstrate the potential of the NXT set.
Starting July 28th, I’ll be teaching a week-long robotics course for teenagers at Stanford University using LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT. The course, “Hands-On Robotics for Teens,” is one of many technology courses being offered this summer by DMA (Digital Media Academy), a nationally-recognized organization that runs summer computer camps at campuses across the nation. I’ve written a course description and put together a five-day course outline, and DMA has posted the information to their website.
The entire course will be “NXT-based.” We’ll be using the educational version of the NXT set and also the Education Resource Set. And what’s the highlight of the course? I think it will be the robotic sumo competition!
Previously, there was a “secret” NXT movie that could be accessed on the home page of the MINDSTORMS website by clicking an exclamation mark in a sentence. The hyper-linked exclamation mark seems to be gone now, and while the URL is still valid, the same movie and a few others featuring Alpha-Rex have appeared on the “movies” section of the MINDSTORMS website. Check these little movies out if you want to see an Alpha-Rex play ball, dance, and fight a fly (and win!).
More book news! I just reviewed Daniele Benedettelli’s book Creating Cool MINDSTORMS NXT Robots and posted the review on Amazon.com. In summary, though, great job, Daniele! Below are two pictures I took of robot’s from the book: NXT AT-ST and Omni-Biped.
I am the author of "The Unofficial LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Inventor's Guide" (No Starch Press, 2007) and "Competitive MINDSTORMS" (Apress, 2004). I enjoy reading, writing, MINDSTORMS robotics, and spending time with my family. Currently, I am pursuing a degree in Management Information Systems.
