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  • Author Author: dubbie
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My New Robot

dubbie

Just received my latest robot called Super Fighter, already assembled which is a change for me. I was attracted to this robot as it had a reasonable price, it looked good, it was supposed to walk (which it does - sort of), fire a 'laser', speak and most importantly, fires foam disks out the front.

 

 

It is quite an interesting design as most parts are independent of all others. The laser arm contains it's own motor and LED, the two legs have a motor in each foot, the head just contains LEDs and the infrared communications diodes and the foam disk mechanism fits into the chest. It would be relatively easy to add a motor to the second arm as this is not currently motorised, as well as adding sensors and what-knots to the head.

 

I have already disassembled it and it looks relatively easy to replace the existing controller board with an Arduino or similar. The supplied controller looks like it is some sort of custom single chip microprocessor and I doubt it could be reprogrammed. Most of the motors and LEDs seem to be driven directly from this custom PCB so if replaced it would be necessary to provide H bridge drivers or similar for three DC motors (two feet and one arm), plus transistors to drive the two motors used in the foam disk firing mechanism - these only rotate in one direction so do not need H bridge drivers.

 

There is some spare room inside the chest cavity for other sensors and radio communications. The current remote control system uses infrared. It might be necessary to remove the foam disk firing mechanism if more space were needed.

 

I wonder if I could use this for an entry into the Month of Robots competition?

 

Dubbie

  • in reply to fmilburn

    Frank,

     

    I was really talking about the modules themselves - I did not express myself very well. Anyway, I have now purchased both of these types (JQ650 and ISD1820). The JQ6500 allows multiple audio clips to be controlled while the ISD1820 allows the recording and play back of a single clip (as far as I can tell) on a single module. This is also cheaper and easier to use, so both types have advantages. The ISD chips that I used, many years ago now, had the ability to control which portion of the audio clip was played back so if you were careful you could achieve the equivalence of controlling several different short clips. I'm not that bother - I just want to be able to add audio to my robots, which I can change at a later date if I want.

     

    Thanks for the help, your suggestions have been very helpful.

     

    Dubbie

  • in reply to dubbie

      wrote:

     

    Frank,

     

    I have not heard of the JQ6500 so I will go and look this up. The problem I have been having is what keywords to use. I tried audio player and audio PCB but these just bring up MP3 players which are too expensive. I'll find something eventually. I hope.

     

    Dubbie

    Do you mean to record?  Audacity is widely used. The link I give above describes the utility to move the recorded MP3 onto the JQ65600 board. Audacity comes in most flavors, but the JQ6500 utility is only Windows I think. 

  • in reply to fmilburn

    Frank,

     

    I have used ISD chips before, although not this particular one. They work well but the one's I used took some getting going as they record the audio in so they needed a good audio input filter and so on. Plus in was a big chip. I do have a child's toy that contains something similar, where you record a message and then you can change the playback frequency to make it higher or lower pitched. This works but you can only have one message!

     

    Dubbie

  • in reply to fmilburn

    Frank,

     

    I have not heard of the JQ6500 so I will go and look this up. The problem I have been having is what keywords to use. I tried audio player and audio PCB but these just bring up MP3 players which are too expensive. I'll find something eventually. I hope.

     

    Dubbie

  • in reply to fmilburn

    OK, found the other inexpensive one I have used - ISD1820.  It has the advantage that you can record directly to it but less capacity and lower quality.  Probably not as good for what you are considering...