solarboticsltd

[solarboticsltd]

Not every product we design is destined to make it to the consumer. Sometimes a great idea gets taken to completion before we realize that one factor or another dooms it to an existence in our failed project bin.

One such project that now lives a watery grave is the Sharkbot. Akin to our much loved Herbie the Mousebot, the Sharkbot was a light seeking, semi-intelligent robot with a unique and quirky movement mechanic. Instead of driving along with a regular DC motor, the Sharkbot used a servo motor to “wiggle” the front wheel set back and forth, propelling it forward, not unlike a shark or fish would wiggle their tail to do the same. But up front, using... wheels. Trust us, it's cool. Watch video:

We fell in love with the idea way back in 2007 after buying a wiggle/swing car (a.k.a. "Plasma car") for the kids, but ended up having the staff run laps around the office on it instead. What a cool idea... We prototyped a robot chassis using a simple DC gearmotor driven by a BEAM light-responsive "Bicore" oscillator. With one motor we were able to get propulsion, direction, and even reversing with minimal mechanics and electronics. Plus, it looked fabulous. We had to try to make this into a seriously fun robot.

After several prototypes, we got to a stage where it needed some love to get past the 80% mark. Unfortunately, other projects took priority, and it languished until just earlier this year. We updated the mechanics to use a servo and microcontroller, sourced better light sensors, and gave it a truly sleek PCB design that pushed the abilities of our PCB house (they wanted to keep one as a showpiece). However, this is when the Sharkbot became beached.

While new PCB design companies have been bringing down the cost of PCB fabrication, the raw cost of FR4, the main ingredient in a printed circuit boards, is still considerable. With the Sharkbot using a 7 x 4.5" PCB, it wasn't cost effective for what the kit did. Replacing some of the body materials with less-expensive alternatives brought up new fabrication challenges. Mechanical constraints of battery and servo sizes make it near impossible to reduce the size. As beautiful as it is, it just didn't offer enough value in what it did to justify the price. In other words, it lacked bang for the buck.

The project isn't a total loss, as we did learn some wicked cool PCB fabrication techniques we're bringing into other designs, and we learned how to identify shortcomings in a project much earlier in the design phase. Unfortunately, until we can come up with a less expensive to build Sharkbot, it's going to remain a shelfbot.

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Our resident code monkey Gilroy's here to share his latest project, a custom ergonomic keyboard in the first part of a long overdue Project Monday post

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SumSHARKovore on Flickr.

SumoSHARKovore! (Lasers are fun...)

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Arduino DUE in stock

After a long wait, we're happy to present these 5 Arduino DUE boards for sale! These 4 interesting boards offer ARM power in an Arduino package. So if you want any of these 3 DUE boards, I suggest you come on by soon, so you can pick up one of these 2 DUE boards...

https://solarbotics.com/product/50456/

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NOT tech-oriented, but WOW - huge iceburg breakup caught on tape. Like "Manhatten breaking apart". Jaw-dropper.http://bit.ly/VzG01P

Now, what did I say about writing whilst writing... Hrm... Bad documentation-writer, BAD!

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Writing tips for kit docs

Don't use 10"uf" caps. Use 10µF! (alt+numpad 0181)

And 10deg is easier as 10° (alt+numpad 0176)

Another tip: Don't write about writing tips when you're supposed to be ...writing... (sigh)

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PCB Designing PCBs to the dulcent tones of Chris Gammel & Co.

Damn you @TheAmpHour! Great show wi Ian but it's distracted me from my PCB work! Too many side-visits to the DangerousPrototypes website!

In other news, I think I can pull off a pretty decent Dave Jone's impersonation...

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...because flashing your neighbours would just be wrong. Especially in our (my) case...

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Add a SB-Firefly, to a 3-watt LED kit and BLINK YOUR NEIGHBOURS

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Aaron (from Oomlout) found our Useless Box in a HK Subway freebie magazine!

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Openbeam and Hubees on Flickr.

We're using Openbeam for many funky projects lately. This one is a robot, with unusual wheels called Hub-ees (more detail coming)

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Double Rainbow Sneak Peak on Flickr.

What do you call an Arduino-based RGB controller that manages 2 strips at a time? "Double Rainbow", of course... Via Flickr: We had a fun time coming up with a name for this project! Need a convenient way to drive RGB strip lights? The Ardweeny "Double Rainbow" backpack does it, with a 11A capable FET drivers per channel. Our RGB striplights (www.solarbotics.com/product/60520/) draw 3.25A per meter at 12VDC (producting FULL white), so you can easily drive 3 meters (10') per side. Even logner lengths are possible, if you don't plan on running full-bright white mode! We have a 5A-rated switch on the PCB, but have break-outs for beefy screw-terminals if you need to use the full 11A capacity of this backpack. This project is a derivative of something we did for the costumes used at the Calgary Stampede earlier this summer.

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Everytime we turn around, our IT guy Gilroy has added to his collection of displays!

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Only a slightly delayed tuesday Tumblr post from the lab :D Today we feature all the hard work our R&D Tech Jeremie puts into designing & building our product Demos.

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Dave at The Hackery (@thehackery) hooked us up with some awesome Symbol handheld scanners while we were visiting :D If your looking for vintage computers or parts, check them out!

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A wall mount kit for the venerable Arduino/Freeduino SAFE we're currently testing. The hole patterning allows it to be mountable at 90 degree intervals for whatever you need for your project.

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Brian (@XBrav) stopped by Friday with his Raspberry Pi to help Jeremie test the fit of his new SAFE design. A few more tweaks, and it may just find its way into our catalog..

(And yes, that's a VESA spec mounting plate)