Getting Started In Robotics?

macarthy asks: "I'd like to get started in robotics. Coming from a programming background, I don't know much about electronics or engineering but I'm eager to learn. Where can I get the parts, tutorials and help to get started??"

Robot Wars!!!

[grammar nazi]

Start watching Robot Wars on PBS and then you are on you way to becoming a robotics guru (just remember to put heat shielding around everything)!

Lego

[jeroenb]

I know it sounds strange, but Lego Mindstorms [legomindstorms.com] is actually pretty cool. O'Reilly has a good book [oreilly.com] for it and they also list lots of online resources here [oreilly.com].

Where to start?

[FreeJack1]

You need to decide which aspect of robotics you want to get into.

If you just want to toy around and experiment with kits and such, you can probably find good kits and parts at your local electronics dealer (I.E. Fry's Electronics, Edwards Scientific, etc.), but if you're considering a career in robotics, you have more options.

There are industrial robots, such as the welding type on vehicle assembly lines; Engineering positions for these normally require a Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience in Industrial or Mechanical Engineering.

There are robots used in equipment such as semiconductor manufacturing which are quite a bit smaller than their industrial cousins, but require an enormous amount of precision. You may find a position working on these with just an Associate's degree in electrical engineering, but with no previous experience, it may be a while before you can actually program and maintain these on your own.

You can also work with experimental robotics which are normally found in University research departments such as MIT and Stanford, but these people are usually there working on a grant or conducting research for a specific goal or Company.

There are other types of robotics but hopefully this gives you a general idea of what's available. Your programming experience will help quite a bit and you could find a position just teaching robots but if you want to actually get into building and maintaining robots, you'll need to get a good understanding of electronics, pneumatics, and general mechanical theory.

Hope this helps.

General advice

[Alik]

I got started in the robot lab of a small liberal arts college. They didn't have a whole lot in the way of facilities; a few of their bots were expensive research jobs from Pioneer, but mostly it was a matter of students screwing parts together. Said parts mainly came from the more expensive catalog kits; in my last days they finally acquired a 3D printer. (Of course, you have to have some mechE background and CAD experience to use a 3D printer.)

If you want to do this academically, the easiest thing is to search your school, find out who has robots, and go work with those people. Be prepared for an enormous amount of frustration; academic robotics research is mainly the study of an infinite number of Things That Don't Work.

If what you want is home robotics, the Mindstorms kit may be an option. However, you may have been looking for a cheaper solution. Lego is still about the best solution (IMHO) for the body of a home hobbyist's robot, because it's fairly cheap and very easy to redesign as needed. Buy a big box of Lego Technic and order spare connectors as your cat eats them or they get lost in the couch. There are many alternatives to Mindstorms for controllers; many people swear by the BASIC stamp, for example. This is a case where you're going to have to search the web and catalogs to find some parts within your price range. The more soldering and splicing and assembly you're willing to do, the better the price you can get.

Note that for "advanced" stuff you will also need a workbench which lets you drill and cut and shape parts with reasonable accuracy. You're also likely to need some electronics supplies --- a soldering iron and a standard set of resistors at the very least. The initial outlays here could also eat into your budget.

Your situation sounds like that of a coder who'd like to play with robots but really doesn't have much in the way of dedicated workspace, tools, or know-how. Given your claimed lack of electronics skills, you probably want to avoid kits until you're more comfortable. In your situation, I'd start with Mindstorms: you get plenty of tutorial advice and can even start working with a friendly little GUI at first. You might pick up the O'Reilly book on Mindstorms to help you out. That setup should give you a flavor for what robot-building is really like and should cost you $200 maximum. It'll take a while to exhaust all the capacities of a mildly hacked Mindstorms set (the most you'll need is extra Lego or sensors), and by then you'll be beyond the realm of Ask Slashdot.

Re:Avoid Lego's mindstorm

[A Big Gnu Thrush]

This is so wrong.

Mindstorms (at least the advanced set) will let you build fully-functional robots. In the long run, it may be a "dead end" in the sense that you're at least somewhat limited by what Lego provides, but look into what other people are doing with it. I think you'll find this will give you a good start.

After you have a feel for the macro engineering challenges, you can roll your own from brillo pads TI90 calculators if you still want to. No sense taking the MacGuyver route when there are viable alternatives that will get you farther down the road faster.

YES YES YES

[FascDot Killed My Pr]

I've wanted to get into robotics for quite a while and made numerous attempts to learn electronics (even the basics). Many failures later I can only conclude that I am not an EE type.

Then I got the Mindstorms--AWESOME. Now instead of having to be a mechanical, electrical AND software engineer, I can be a half-assed mechanical engineer, and a mostly-competent software engineer and get 10 times the results.

Of course, if your situation is different (i.e. you are good at EE but bad at programming) this advice doesn't apply to you...
--

"Me too"

[FascDot Killed My Pr]

Except don't get the OReilly book. I paged through it at the store and it looked like it was doing a breadth-first search on the tools rather than a depth-first on any particular tool. Since I run Linux, I use nqc--so I bought that book by the NQC creator. [amazon.com]


--

Robot Catalog

[spell_caster]

For everything ROBOT, try http://www.robotstore.com/
This site has books, suplies, videos, .....
Good Luck!

Come visit Project-Borg

[nuntius]

<plug> Hi, over at Project Borg [www.projec...gtargetnew], we've just started working on an open source bipedal robot.

By open source, we mean that the design will be free, although the parts will not. ;-)

Anyway, anyone interested in robotics is welcome to come visit us. By doing this as a group project, everyone can work on their own specialty... Programmers on the control or user interface, electricians on the electronics, machine workers on the hardware, ...
</plug>

There are also a lot of other sites on the Web. Recommended starting points:

• general search for robotics
• comp.robotics.misc (exact path?)
• [e-mail]
• places like Mondo-Tronics [www.robots...mtargetnew]
• feel free to ask me or any of these groups more specific questions

Hope that helps,
Nuntius

Re:"Me too"

[Alik]

I don't have the book because I probably wouldn't bother to buy a full Mindstorms kit, but what makes you say that a breadth-first search is necessarily bad? I can see how it's not much help for the Mindstorms guru who wants to know more, but for someone who's just starting out, a broad review (with specific examples) seems like a good thing.

Re:"Me too"

[FascDot Killed My Pr]

It was a breadth-first search over all the tools. For instance, there were several chapters on using the programming tool that comes with the kit. Problem is, I couldn't use the tool and wouldn't even if I could. So those chapters were largely waste for me. There was only one chapter on NQC.
--

Find others, network

[Matt_Bennett]

The most important thing to do is do something! Try to hook up with other experimenters in your area- find out where the skills you have now can help someone else. From there you can expand your own knowledge, and start to work on your own. Your best work is going to be done in collaboration with others. Having others to work with can keep you on track, and help you avoid getting bogged down.

You can see all sorts of so-so robot projects out on the net (mine included), when there is only one mind working on it, corners get cut around that person's weaknesses. Sure, you want something you can call all your own, but a part of something is infinitely better than a nothing all your own.

If you can't find others to help? Start small, develop subsections of a larger whole, and then put up a web-page about them- that way you can start developing a group of your own- think of your work as a seed. Use one of the greatest strengths of the Internet- community building.

But let me re-iterate: DO SOMETHING!

If you want to build a robot...

[risotto]

Hum. Maybe I can be of some advice. I completed a bachelor's degree in robotics engineering some years ago and had a lot of fun doing it (it was a sort of cross between electronics, software and mechanical engineering). However, I saw more robotics jobs in Bangkok than I did here in Montréal, so I never really worked in that field, always sort of wound up in software engineering instead.

Robotics can be a very complex subject. Basically, it depends whether you want to build a robot or program one. At the very least, building a robot requires knowledge of control systems and inverse kinematics, for which you will need relatively advanced mathematics skills. OTOH, programming robots if fun and easy (I used to love Legos as a kid and when I saw that robot gizmo thing they've got, I sent them my resume)!

If ever you're serious about building a robot, read this book's introduction : Craig, John J., "Introduction to Robotics : Mechanics and Control", sec. ed., Addison-Wesley, 1989, 452 p. That'll get you started with inverse kinematics. If you're interested about controlling a motor, it's position and speed (which of course you'll need to move the robot arms), take a look at : Bucek, Victor J., "Control Systems : Continuous and Discrete", Prentice Hall, 1989, 304 p.

But watch out, these books can be pretty harsh. One thing you can also do is to go to the nearest engineering faculty and pick up whatever robotics course documentation you can find : that's usually an easier pill to swallow.

For now, if I were you, I'd go with the Lego thing. The documentation probably introduces all those robotics concepts in an easier manner and from there you can decide if you wanna go further.

Good luck!

Jean-Philippe

Get involved in FIRST!

[GenCuster]

FIRST [usfirst.org] is a project started by Dean Kamon (a super cool inventor.) Each year, teams of engineers, students and other interested parties get togethor for a intense six week period. They design, build, and test a robot. Last year they were 30" by 36" by 5'.

I was on a team [k12.mi.us] last year, it was great fun.

If you want to find a team go to these discussion boards. [chiefdelphi.com] They can point you to a close team.

FIRST is activly working to get kids interested in technology and needs all the help it can get.

BEAM robotics

[Hadlock]

I'm suprised nobody mentioned beam robots. The short short version is they are very simple robots capable of "thinking", or detecting light, shadows, and walls. One section of BEAM robotics is the solar section, which are basically robots about the size of coasters that derive their power from the sun. They're incredibly simple, and fairly cheap (60$), and will get you a general idea of what kind of work is involved in the planning, design modding, and actual soldering (which is a major bitch the first couple hours). Check out www.solarbotics.com for more on that.

I am not an Engineer...

[The-Bus]

...but from years of high robot "experience" (watching TV), I've come up with the following ways to have/build your own robot:

• If your neighbor is a mild-mannered man called Ted Lawson, and he has a daughter who speaks in a monotone voice, pigtails, and always wears a red print dress, ask to borrow his daughter. She is a robot named Vickie.
• You can build your own robot in your basement. You have to, however, live in a large Victorian house. Combine the following elements: a radio, television, lightbulbs, steel bucket, springs, a human brain, and gears. Some words of warning: Your robot may appear to not be functional. Just wait for a freak electrical storm to "wake" your robot up. If, when awake, the robot has red eyes, it means it is evil.
• Finally, visit your local woods. Strange, mechanical noises heard at night are surely signs that a robot has come from space/a government testing facility/the future and landed in the woods. In this case, it needs a friend. You fit the bill if you are a pre-adolescent boy. Be warned that no one in the schoolyard/your family will believe you because you've always had an active imagination. In the end, the military will be involved.

GoRobotics.net has a lot of info..

[GoRobotics]

If you want to get started in robotics. Then I suggest you vist GoRobotics.net [gorobotics.net]. We have projects, links, books, resources, tutorials, news, and more. If you have any questions just ask. I'd also recommend signing up for as many robotics related e-mail loops as possible. That's how I learned. -William