raspberry pi robot

Question

hi thier my name is jack i am enbarking on my 1st robotics project and acctually my first

raspberry pi project, How ever i am stuck.

My idea for my robot would be a Maplin Robotic arm (Google it) controlled by usb on the pi over the

interwebs *1, and to have a tracked veichle driving the whole thing.

My plan

Have an onboard wireless router hooked to the pi via ethernet, a robotic arm linked to the pi

via usb, and finaly a motor controler for the pi to control the 2 catapillar tracks.

the router would act as a gate way to the pi and allow me to connect to the pi on the local network

the pi would be loaded with a website that allows me to control the whole robot over a mobile device/laptop

thus this all sound well and good but i have searched every where for this project and have not found a

simmilar one, so i am asking you guys as a community to help me,

A; create a website (with code to control the robot)

B; tell me how to do it

C; Can't think of one

Can you help?

Former Member · Answer

This is a really cool idea! First off, I would suggest that you make sure that the Maplin Robotic arm can be controlled by the PI, make sure it isn't a Windows only thing.

You will need to somehow control the tracks too, if this uses a USB interface, then that would have work with the PI as well, obviously. Alternatively, you could hook the PIs GPIO ports to two h-bridges and the h-bridges to the motors (If they are brushed dc motors) on the tracks. you can controll the GPIO output with python I'm pretty sure, I haven't tried it, but I have gotten input with C code.

You shouldn't use a wireless router, unless you change the firmware, they don't connect to other networks, just provide their own. you could however, use a USB WIFI stick for the PI, there are a lot of different types.

To control the PI, I would suggest that you SSH into it and control it like that, through scripts. If you insist on the website portion, then there are probably tutorials online for that.

One suggestion, is to look up parts individually, so look up whether or not the PI can communicate with the components, and how to communicate with them. and I would look up about controlling a raspberry pi from a website.

This is an interesting build idea, I would like to see it when it is done.