Feb 11, 2006
Attendance: 24
Class:
The 11:00 class was led by Jeff Dunker on power management. Topics included problems with looping ground connections, voltage changes within a system, and battery type characteristics. Jeff had researched and prepared over 90 pages of material, with lots of questions we only got through half; the remaining will be covered during the March class. Alex's H-Bridge class will be moved to June. Jeff's powerpoint presentation on power management will soon be made available in the newsletter/documents section of the web site.
Business:
The business meeting began at 12:40 covering the following topics:
1. Class schedule for the beginning of 2006:
Mar - Batteries/Power Mgmt part II (Jeff Dunker),
Apr - Hierarchical goal behavior (Jim Ubersetzig),
May - Soldering: Basics through Surface Mount (Tim Lewis),
Jun - H-Bridges (Alex Brown),
TBD - PC/Visual Basic control of a servo.
2. Martin La Rocque will have his son file for the club to obtain a non-profit 501c designation. Funds were authorized for the fil ing fee.
3. Unfortunately Shane's Feburary "Robot of the Month" was unable to make the meeting in time; the club is still looking forward to seeing "Robbie".
Planned future "Robot's of the Month" are:
Mar - Jeff Dunker,
Apr - Scott Mummert,
May - Gary Smith.
4. Also unfortunately, Walter Martinez has work conflicts that will prevent him from serving as Vice President for the remainder of the year and has resigned. Jim Ubersetzig volunteered to serve and was elected as Vice President.
5. A reminder that the 4th Saturday of the month is still the share and chat meeting for the club.
6. Scott Mummert volunteered to take in some of the clubs books for the library. Tim Lewis was going to try to get a hold of Henry Arnold who also has library materials. The plan is to inventory the material and publish the material on the web site so people can contact the holder and schedule the pickup.
7. Upcoming contests for 2006:
March - Mini Sumo (Jeff Smith)
May - Hall Navigation (Alex Brown)
TBD - Follow On to Line Following (to be developed at the Mar meeting)
The business meeting concluded at 1:00
Show and Tell:
1. Between the class and business meeting, test battles took place among several mini-sumo's. John Davis's bot unfolded and used a clever swinging hinge. Jeff Smith's was experiencing intermitant problems, and Jeff Dunker's is appearing to be a capable competitor.
2. Alex Brown updated us on the shoulder mount to an R2-D2 arm he is working on with an R2-D2 builders club that is planning on using the LEAF project inside. Last month Alex shared his problems with a commercial product to convert a large motor into a servo; this month he showed his own PIC 16F876A solution that was successful at moving a 5 pound weight at 3 feet - simulating an arm holding a 6 pack (this is a major success towards many of our robot goals!)
3. Jim Ubersetzig demonstrated his entry into the upcoming hallway navigation contest. Jim's idea is to track the ceiling lights as a way of navigating the hall. The robot adjusted it's position based on the lights then moved to the next one and re-adjusted. Good job Jim.
4. Tim Jones displayed his "Petco" robot, made enti rely out of parts purchased at Petco! Don't believe me? Look at the picture! Ferret tunnel tubes for arms, a feed box for the body, hampster ball for the head, and several feeding bowls for the joints. The hand is in process and looking very interesting; it includes servo's in the finger tips to move what it grasps.
5. Bruce Weimer discussed his successes with expanding LEAF's networking; previously he was able to tie LEAF wirelessly to his home desktop then to the internet so LEAF could be communicated with from his work office. He is currently networking multiple robotic projects together to communicate.
6. Tim Lewis displayed his model parot that he is working to remold and animate. Were very interested to see the results.
7. A pnuematic contruction kit was displayed (sorry I missed the name) that would have lots of potential for a small robot arm/gripper applications. The kit is from Fisher Scientific and was purchased at Fry's for approx $50.