element14 Community
element14 Community
    Register Log In
  • Site
  • Search
  • Log In Register
  • About Us
  • Community Hub
    Community Hub
    • What's New on element14
    • Feedback and Support
    • Benefits of Membership
    • Personal Blogs
    • Members Area
    • Achievement Levels
  • Learn
    Learn
    • Ask an Expert
    • eBooks
    • element14 presents
    • Learning Center
    • Tech Spotlight
    • STEM Academy
    • Webinars, Training and Events
    • Learning Groups
  • Technologies
    Technologies
    • 3D Printing
    • FPGA
    • Industrial Automation
    • Internet of Things
    • Power & Energy
    • Sensors
    • Technology Groups
  • Challenges & Projects
    Challenges & Projects
    • Design Challenges
    • element14 presents Projects
    • Project14
    • Arduino Projects
    • Raspberry Pi Projects
    • Project Groups
  • Products
    Products
    • Arduino
    • Avnet Boards Community
    • Dev Tools
    • Manufacturers
    • Multicomp Pro
    • Product Groups
    • Raspberry Pi
    • RoadTests & Reviews
  • Store
    Store
    • Visit Your Store
    • Choose another store...
      • Europe
      •  Austria (German)
      •  Belgium (Dutch, French)
      •  Bulgaria (Bulgarian)
      •  Czech Republic (Czech)
      •  Denmark (Danish)
      •  Estonia (Estonian)
      •  Finland (Finnish)
      •  France (French)
      •  Germany (German)
      •  Hungary (Hungarian)
      •  Ireland
      •  Israel
      •  Italy (Italian)
      •  Latvia (Latvian)
      •  
      •  Lithuania (Lithuanian)
      •  Netherlands (Dutch)
      •  Norway (Norwegian)
      •  Poland (Polish)
      •  Portugal (Portuguese)
      •  Romania (Romanian)
      •  Russia (Russian)
      •  Slovakia (Slovak)
      •  Slovenia (Slovenian)
      •  Spain (Spanish)
      •  Sweden (Swedish)
      •  Switzerland(German, French)
      •  Turkey (Turkish)
      •  United Kingdom
      • Asia Pacific
      •  Australia
      •  China
      •  Hong Kong
      •  India
      •  Korea (Korean)
      •  Malaysia
      •  New Zealand
      •  Philippines
      •  Singapore
      •  Taiwan
      •  Thailand (Thai)
      • Americas
      •  Brazil (Portuguese)
      •  Canada
      •  Mexico (Spanish)
      •  United States
      Can't find the country/region you're looking for? Visit our export site or find a local distributor.
  • Translate
  • Profile
  • Settings
A Question of Scale
  • Challenges & Projects
  • Project14
  • A Question of Scale
  • More
  • Cancel
A Question of Scale
Blog Tiny24hourMoBot #3 : 13 hours have passed
  • Blog
  • Forum
  • Documents
  • Events
  • Polls
  • Files
  • Members
  • Mentions
  • Sub-Groups
  • Tags
  • More
  • Cancel
  • New
Join A Question of Scale to participate - click to join for free!
  • Share
  • More
  • Cancel
Group Actions
  • Group RSS
  • More
  • Cancel
Engagement
  • Author Author: dubbie
  • Date Created: 7 Feb 2019 11:26 PM Date Created
  • Views 2197 views
  • Likes 12 likes
  • Comments 9 comments
  • mobile robots
  • tiny24hourmobot
  • hc-sr04
  • robotics projects
  • questionofscalech
  • arduino
Related
Recommended

Tiny24hourMoBot #3 : 13 hours have passed

dubbie
dubbie
7 Feb 2019
image

A Question of Scale

Enter Your Electronics & Design Project for a Chance to Win a Cartridge-Sized NES Portable or a $100 Shopping Cart!

Back to The Project14 homepage image

Project14 Home
Monthly Themes
Monthly Theme Poll

 

It is now over half way through the 24 hours for my Tiny Mobile Robot and I have a sort of working prototype.

 

image

 

I 3D printed a cylinder slightly wider than the widest part of the two motors which also had a mounting bar at the bottom. I very carefully used self-tapping screws to fix the motor unit to the mounting bar. It is stable but could easily break if knocked - so hopefully I will not knock it. I have programmed the Arduino Nano to simply move both wheels together so that the whole mobile robot moves backwards and forwards in a straight line as I need repeatability while I stuff everything inside the cylinder. As it is a mobile robot it needed to have some sort of sensor and as I had a HC-SR04 ultrasonic distance sensor I decided to use that. The HC-SR04 is a simple to use sensor as all you need to do is to add power, a trigger signal of at least 10 microseconds length and then measure the length in time of the echo pulse detected. Dividing the length of the detected echo by 58 converts time into distance in centimetres. At the moment it is not making use of the data from the sensor but it is all working, see below:

 

You don't have permission to edit metadata of this video.
Edit media
x
image
Upload Preview
image

 

There is a great deal of wheel slip as the batteries are quite heavy and it really needs elastic bands for tyres, but unfortunately I do not have any. I will see about using AAA instead of AA batteries later and see about fitting everything into the cylinder. I have also 3D printed a top for the cylinder so that I should be able to mount the ultrasonic rangefinder to that. I don't think it is going to look as good as I had hoped, nor is it going to be as tiny as I originally planned. Maybe I should call it the not quite so tiny mobile robot.

 

Well, it is late now so I'm going to bed soon. There is still time for a couple of hours work tomorrow morning before my 24 hours is up.

 

Dubbie

  • Sign in to reply

Top Comments

  • fmilburn
    fmilburn over 6 years ago +6
    Pretty sure you won't be able to stop working on this after 24 hours :-)
  • jw0752
    jw0752 over 6 years ago +6
    Often when working on a project for an extended period of time I will stop and find a point at which I can put it aside. I usually can't put it aside mentally even if I physically walk away from it. While…
  • dubbie
    dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to fmilburn +4
    Frank, You are probably right. I have already been thinking that maybe it could be a 25 hour (or 26 hours, or maybe ……). Having already (almost) made one I have already been thinking about making it smaller…
  • dubbie
    dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to jw0752

    John,

     

    I agree, I'm a bit fan of the 'I'm thinking about it' approach. It was while I was in bed last night that I thought of a smallish method of connecting all the wires together. I may well have thought of it when I started again this morning but it did mean I was ready to go straight away in the remaining time.

     

    Dubbie

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up +2 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
  • dubbie
    dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to nobble

    Elliot,

     

    Yes I do like the smaller robots, more manageable at home. I do sort of enjoy the difficulties that trying to go small introduce as well, which are really not that related to functionality. The effort involved in design and construction seems to increase exponentially once a certain smallness is reached. I was surprised by how large my body shell had to be made just because the wheels had to be so large due to the distance from the motor axle to the edge of the motor body. It would probably be a lot easier if the motors could have a gearbox that brought out the wheel axle at 90 degrees to the motor axis.

     

    Dubbie

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up +3 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
  • dubbie
    dubbie over 6 years ago in reply to genebren

    Gene,

     

    I did think about O rings, a lot, but mainly in frustration as I don't have any. I think they might be something I might need to buy. I would then have to work out how to design the wheels in TinkerCAD to make the grove for them to fit into. I'm not sure how difficult that might be.

     

    Dubbie

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up +2 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
  • fmilburn
    fmilburn over 6 years ago in reply to dubbie

    It is too good a project to stop at 24 hours :-)  I have been interested in mini robot swarms for some time and look forward to seeing what you come up with.

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up +4 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
  • jw0752
    jw0752 over 6 years ago

    Often when working on a project for an extended period of time I will stop and find a point at which I can put it aside. I usually can't put it aside mentally even if I physically walk away from it. While I am away I continue to analyse and go over ideas and problems in my head. When I return to actually working on the project I almost always have an improved approach and the break has been a beneficial thing. It looks like you have a really nice project well on its way to completion.

     

    John

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up +6 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
>
element14 Community

element14 is the first online community specifically for engineers. Connect with your peers and get expert answers to your questions.

  • Members
  • Learn
  • Technologies
  • Challenges & Projects
  • Products
  • Store
  • About Us
  • Feedback & Support
  • FAQs
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy Policy
  • Legal and Copyright Notices
  • Sitemap
  • Cookies

An Avnet Company © 2025 Premier Farnell Limited. All Rights Reserved.

Premier Farnell Ltd, registered in England and Wales (no 00876412), registered office: Farnell House, Forge Lane, Leeds LS12 2NE.

ICP 备案号 10220084.

Follow element14

  • X
  • Facebook
  • linkedin
  • YouTube