Lego Spike Prime Weather Station with Raspberry Pi -- Episode 543

Great project.

( Now, can you make an input version that allows you to select the weather ?  )

One issue I find though is that these type of projects often tie-up what is often a very limited Lego resource. If you want to keep that weather station, you now have to go replenish your Lego box with the parts you have used, which I suspect could be quite expensive as motors were never the cheapest of Lego parts. Alternatively you view this as the prototype version and then you recreate it with a final build using cheaper components along with 3D printing and then return the Lego parts from the prototype version back to Lego stock for the next project.

With this build, you have hidden most of the Lego look behind the printed cover sheet. Perhaps for true 'LegoLand' style you could use some of the flat shiny tiles (yup the ones that are a nightmare to remove) mosaic stile with stick-on numbers where required.

Yes, I think this fits the prototyping model really well, quick to build up a working model and test the theory and code before buying specific hardware.

As a bonus, I do lots of school sessions as a stem ambassador, and taking this in to the schools has sparked alot of attention from the children.

If only I could use it as a weather input, that would be bliss!

"...I do lots of school sessions as a stem ambassador..."

That sounds like a pretty cool role.

Did you see shabaz's recent comment when asked about the potential of his current project for use in teaching scenarios ?

/products/raspberry-pi/raspberrypi_projects/b/blog/posts/xr-1000-pico-based-robotic-motion-subsystem?CommentId=b8269e42-1107-42fd-a248-e580c635d788

Nice project! Very cool using the motors to make an electronic display. I'd not heard of Lego Spike before.

I wonder how similar the UART communication is between the Raspberry Pi build HAT, and the motor control board I worked on.. probably I have a less flexible API that only operates one motor at a time (using commands like 'm2 100 cw' sent over UART, to indicate that motor 2 should turn 100 units clockwise, except for motors assigned into pairs, in which case both are controlled simultaneously using commands like 'fwd 100' etc. I figured it's good enough for some basic projects, but more advanced ones would need code changes there.

From Katie's video I could see that from the Pi side, there is a Python library to abstract away the UART commands, whereas currently my project doesn't have that, and the connected board (e.g. the keypad project) would use Python code like this to move a pair of motors forward:

uart.write(("fwd 1000\n\r")

or, a bit cleaner using a simple function::

command_send_uart(command.index("fwd"), "1000")

Also, I've pre-assigned two connectors to be a pair of motors, and the other two connectors to be controlled as separate motors, since at the time I figured that may meet 80% of needs (a weather station would be in the 20% however! : ) although that's easy to modify, it currently entails modifying the code on the motor control board.

The lego integration with the Pi Build HAT is nice, I can see it being attractive to schools as a result, I guess my motor control board is needs a bit more work to integrate with Lego/Fischertechnik, although it could be possible.. maybe with 3D printed adapters for the motors I used. I'm no good with 3D CAD and don't have a 3D printer however!

FYI Fischertechnik are continuing to embrace Arduino, R-Pi, micro:bit platforms as alternatives to their own controllers via various 3rd party adapters and controllers

https://www.fischertechnik.de/en/teaching/arduino-microbit-u-co

A new range of kits as well, some which now include mechanum wheels.

FYI Fischertechnik are continuing to embrace Arduino, R-Pi, micro:bit platforms as alternatives to their own controllers via various 3rd party adapters and controllers

https://www.fischertechnik.de/en/teaching/arduino-microbit-u-co

A new range of kits as well, some which now include mechanum wheels.