Junkbots

Taken from:  http://computingnorthampton.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/physical-computing-junkbots-with-brain.html Figure 1 A new stage for the Junkbots project ( http://junkbots.blogspot.co.uk/  ) starts this week. Up to this point the junk bot building has largely being about building a moving (or drawing) 'bot' moved by vibration - limited control, but fun. This week, A  Nuffield funded bursary studen t starts working on investigating whether LEGO NXT or Raspberry Pi based solutions can be incorporated with the bot to add some control of the movement (still by vibration). Idea One  Is to add a LEGO NXT brick, plus motors that are made to vibrate, to a junkbot similar to one shown in figure 1. The motor and broken propeller combination being replaced with the NXT brick and LEGO motor. A good potential feature is it a self-contained unit with power and control together, as well as being potentially fairly simple to set-up. Idea Two Is to do a similar approach as...

For the last few months at lot of the outreach work from the Junkbots project was focused on the exercises based around turning cans into drawing bots or junk clearing bots. Yesterday (21st June 2012) the robot programming side of the project was trialled with primary schools. The Northamptonshire based Nene Lakes Extended Services ran "Chemistry at Work Day" event hosted by Scott Bader, Wollaston  and the robot programming was also included as well. The programming idea, an off-shoot of the junkbots project, was for the students to programming an NXT Lego robot to dance using only four commands that allowed the robot to: go forward for so many centimetres go back for so many centimetres go turn right for so many degrees go turn left for so many degrees The structure of the activity was up to 5 minutes introduction to the activity up to 10 minutes as a group of usually up seven; design a dance routine of no more than four moves up to 10 minutes putting the ro...

A lego controlled junkbot has been produced, Hayley Stevenson has produced a walking model from straws and cotton. Together we combined this with two motors from LEGO NXT set and wrote some java code to get it to move. More details can be found at:  http://junkbots-hayleystevenson.blogspot.com/2011/08/day-18-my-last-day.html  including video of it working. LEGO arrangement The walking model This has new junkbot is very much in-line with the ideas behind the projects, combining engineering, waste and computing to produce something new.

 The second half (programming lego robots) on the junkbots project has been carried out at  Huxlow Science College  on 28th February 2011. At the start of the day most of the students had not previously programmed a robot or (knowingly) a computer. The first task was to get the robot to collect some rubbish and push it over a line and then move back to the another line. All groups programmed the robot to do this and some groups add a sweeper to the front of the robot to push several items at once across the line. The second task was to get the robot to collect the rubbish this time, but without adding any attachments to the front of the robot. Several groups successfully did this, by programming the robot to follow a path that collected the rubbish (drinks cans) and put them behind the line. The third and fourth tasks involved the use of a sensor: -To build the robot that did not move unless there was a can in front of the robot. -To build a robot that went aro...

Students at Thomas Becket Catholic School have been working with the University of Northampton's School of Science and Technology on the junkbots project. Kerrie Henton, Vice Principal at Thomas Becket Catholic School said 'We are committed to environmental sustainability at Thomas Becket and any opportunity we can give our students to engage in an exciting learning opportunity that is good for the community is something we couldn't turn down. The students and staff supporting the project have had an excellent time and the robots they produced from rubbish are just superb' A Student  (14) said 'It's been very good and great fun and it has made me realise aspects about the environment that I never realised before. We have even found ways to save the school money which I am sure the Head will be pleased about'.

The School of Science and Technology at the University of Northampton have been working with local schools to create robots made from junk. This is an initiative by the University to introduce environmental sustainability, engineering and computing to students and has been been funded by Northampton Enterprise Limited and east midlands development agency (emda ). This project sets out to engage pupils with a set of activities over four three-hour sessions that provides an insight into STEM subjects. The workshops will be structured in the following way: (a)Session 1: Introduction to waste management, its impact, recycling and reuse. An introduction to the idea of making robots from rubbish. (b)Two sessions involving guided exercises. · Session 2: Involves some problem-solving exercises (approx. ½ hour), then in groups investigate adding ‘junk’ with a new electrical components such as batteries and motors to use vibrations to move the robots. · Session 3: To appl...