You might have noticed that I have been bothering everyone in #nesvideos with a lot of questions the last few months about C programming and whatnot.
I'd like to thank everyone in #nesvideos for their fantastic help with all the questions I've had. I think it's safe to say that this project wouldn't have gotten far without your help... I thought it might be interesting for you to see the results of all the things I asked about:
Sleipner, the robot we built and programmed from scratch.
Properties:
- Top speed: > 20 km/h
- Ground clearance: 25 cm
- Weight: 30 kg
- Width: < 70 cm (can run indoors)
- Operating time: ~1h
- Individually suspended wheels with variable damping (terrain driving capabilities)
- Low center of gravity
- Zero turning radius
Actuators:
- Three brushless DC motors
Sensors:
- Motor encoders (RPM)
- Rate-gyro (platform angle, angular velocity)
- Angle sensor (steer wheel angle)
- GPS
What I did mostly - the main operating program
- Threaded
- Runs via WLAN on ssh
- Manual and autonomous steering (waypoints)
- Logging of all variables
- Tuning parameters during running
- Kalman filter for estimating position
Thread and communications overview
Actual position as calculated by Kalman filter and by GPS. (GPS signals tends to distort close to forests and walls. Also it doesn't work indoors.)
Finally: Demonstration video (21 MB download) of Sleipner in action!
Hugs and kisses for everyone. :)