Friday, March 30, 2012

LEGO RCX Drawing Machine

Here is the second drawing that my LEGO RCX TURNTABLE Robot made.  I ran the robot for 15 minutes with 3 different pens for a total of 45 minutes.

Sunday, March 25, 2012

LEGO RCX TURNTABLE MACHINE

 LEGO RCX TURNTABLE ROBOT
 Rear Touch Sensor
Front Touch Sensor and Pen

LEGO RCX TURNTABLE ROBOT

 This Robot Is designed to draw in a circle as it drives forward.  It is a take off of my First LEGO Machine where it was controlled by one motor.  This Robot has 3 motors and 2 touch sensors.  It is controlled by a LEGO RCX 2.0 Programmable Brick.  2 of the motors control the drive of the tracks.  The tracks are controlled independently.  The third motor controls the pen.  The touch sensors are located in the front and rear of the Robot.  The Program for this Robot is designed to drive forward until the front touch sensor hits the frame of the drawing area.  This tells the Robot to back up strait for one second.  Then the "drivers" side track stops for two seconds while the passenger side tracks continues to drive backward.  After that both tracks drive backward until the rear touch censer is activated.  That causes the Robot to drive forward for one second then the passenger side track stops for 2.5 seconds.  After that both tracks start driving forward until the front sensor is activated and the whole process starts again.  The Robot keeps driving back and forth on the paper until someone stops the program or the battery dies.  I have run it non-stop for 15 minutes.  Below is a couple of videos of the robot running.
Top View of LEGO RCX TURNTABLE ROBOT
 LEGO RCX TURNTABLE Robot on drawing showing the exterior frame that is 36" by 36"
 Full Drawing with 4 colors, Blue for a total of 22 minutes, Red for a total of 16 minutes, Green for a total of 20 minutes, and Black for a total of 13 minutes
Close up of Drawing

(Above)  LEGO RCX ROBOT running for about 2 min.

The machine is created completely by me (Tim Morrison) without directions.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Quote

Inventor: A person who makes an ingenious arrangement of wheels, levers and springs, and believes it civilization.

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Wooden Machine 4


 Machine 4 (Without arms/paper holder)
  Machine 4 (Without arms/paper holder)
  Machine 4 (With arms/paper holder)
  Machine 4 (Without arms/paper holder)
  Machine 4 Top
  Machine 4Bottom
  Machine 4 Top
This Machine improved on Machine 3.  Instead of having a rubber band as the belt I took a bike chain off one of my old bikes.  I also took the gears off the pedals to use in my new machine.  This machine keep the chain in tension with the gear-shifter from the back of the bike.  This Machine uses all steel connections, bushings, and makeshift bearings.  The crank turns both the paper and the arms.  The problem with this machine is the smoothness of the cranking and the post that moves side to side and connects the top and bottom arms.  This is because of the distance between the two arms.  This machine ends up drawing an oval if the paper was stationary.  But because the paper turns it draws a rose like shape. 
Drawing From Machine 4
Paper Cutter
 For this machine I made a little machine that cuts paper in a circle with an knife.
The machine is created completely by me (Tim Morrison) without directions.