Subject:
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Re: New Syngress RIS 2.0 Book!
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.books, lugnet.robotics
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Date:
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Tue, 12 Nov 2002 00:40:25 GMT
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14611 times
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I did a little review of the "10 Cool Projects" book from Syngress for the
Dark Side Developers kit (DSDK) a little while ago. I suppose I should
supply another review for the newer book based on the RIS V2.0 kit. Here goes:
"10 COOL LEGO Mindstorms Robotics Invention System 2 Projects" is the second
in the 10 Cool Projects series of books from Syngress. It is essentially a
really thick constructopedia that contains 10 Amazing projects you can build
under an hour. I can't say how "amazing" the projects are, but most of them
can be built in under an hour.
The book was developed using LPUB from Kevin Clague. The same LDraw to
photo-realistic imaging software that was used on the DSDK book. The
instructions are very crisp gray scale images with some descriptive text
included. The construction images are easier to follow than those supplied
by LEGO. The added parts for each construction step are hilighted by
"ghosting out" pieces added in previous steps. K'nex uses this technique in
their instructions, and I think it really helps when building complicated
machines.
I had a beef with the DSDK book in that it was really just a fancy
constructopedia. I was hoping for more general purpose building
information. I'm happy to say that the second book contains a few perls,
but I still recommend buying the Ferrari book if you really want to learn
LEGO robot building. This is a project based book.
Projects:
The Bug - An embarassingly simple (it's mine) two wheeled differential drive
robot that has highly cambered wheels to increase stability. This robot is
on the upper right corner of the cover.
Funky Chicken Techno-Walker - A neat looking two legged walker of the
overlapping footprint variety. Any hardcore Mindstormer has built more than
a few of this type of robot, but newbies will find it increadibly cool.
This robot is on the lower left corner of the cover.
Missle Turret - A gun that shoots small LEGO bricks mounted on a rotating
turret. It has a hammer that you load against some rubber belts. Releasing
the hammer causes it to slam into the projectile, flinging it into space. I
had a few problems with this design. The geartrain used to cock the hammer
had a gear-skipping problem. To fix the problem I replaced the suggested
belts with more elastic rubber bands.
The next four projects are not so much finished projects as they are
starting points for your own projects.
MINDSTORMS F1 Racer - A car with a rear differential and front wheel
steering. Lacking any sensor feedback this is more of an RC car that you
can control using the LEGO remote than it is a robot. The instructions for
this chapter didn't turn out really well. It uses lots of flexible parts
that are really difficult to model. If anyone knows of a good way to
generate LDRAW files for bent ribbed hose please let me know.
The Three-in-One Bot - A differential drive platform you can modify for
creating different kinds of robotic vehicles.
LEGO Arial Tram - A design for those who like to suspend their RCX from a
string. Actually it's pretty safe. There is almost no way that the RCX can
fall off the cable and crash to the floor. However, I did run into some
slippage and derailing problems with the cable guide.
LEGO Safe - My 5 year old daughter thinks this one is cool. It is a safe
with a motorized door. You use touch sensors to enter the combination for
opening the safe. I modified mine so the combination is entered using a
spinning dial (which is monitored by a light sensor). I also reworked the
safe such that it is really hard to take apart unless you have access to the
interior.
ULK (Useful LEGO Knowledge) - Anyone familiar with Jonathan Knudsen's
O'Reilly book will recognize this robot as a modification of his "Minerva".
ULK is a mobile robot with an arm that can pick up small objects (like LEGO
bricks). For ULK, finding bricks to pick up is definately a hit or miss
proposition. It uses a light sensor to aid in task, but a brick has to be
almost directly in front of the robot for it to be seen and successfully
picked up.
Spinner Bot - If you enjoyed building the ULK you'll definately love Spinner
Bot. Function-wise these two are essentially the same. It is kind of an
interesting study in how two builders approach the same problem in different
ways. Spinner Bot is much more successful than ULK at finding and picking
up its targeted object.
RIS Turtle - This robot draws pictures. It has a motorized pen holder for
raising and lowering the pen. The same motor controls a shifter for the
robots transmission. The transmission ensures that the two drive wheels
always rotate at the same speed, but allows you to drive the wheels in the
same direction (for travelling straight), or in opposite directions (for
turning). The mechanics are truly a marvel, but this is one picky robot.
It takes a bit of adjustment to get everything working just right.
A big problem with the last book was that the contributors were not given
credit for their creations. The acknowledgments tell us who was involved,
but not what designs they created. That is corrected in this second book.
Now it is easy to find out that Dean Hystad (me) is the idiot who told you
to wire the motors backwards on the first robot. Or that Dean Hystad should
have spent more time testing ULK so he would know that the right axle starts
to bind up after the robot has been running a while. Other contributers,
who are much less fallable, are Luke Ma, Jeff Elliot, Rob Stehlik, Tonya
Witherspoon and CS Soh.
If you only buy one LEGO book this year, make sure it's the Ferrari brothers
book. If you can afford a second book I would suggest Dave Baum's book, or
maybe Jin Sato's. After that I would suggest Don Wilcher's Mindstorm
Interfacing book. But if you are going to buy at least 6 LEGO books this
year you shouldn't miss "10 COOL LEGO Mindstorms Robotics Invention System 2
Projects."
Dean Hystad
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: New Syngress RIS 2.0 Book!
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| (...) can be built in under an hour.>> Hi Dean, I agree with your opinion above. I almost didn't agree to write for the syngress 10 cool project books because I didn't like the idea of a step-by-step construction book. I like thinking up a problem (...) (22 years ago, 12-Nov-02, to lugnet.books, lugnet.robotics)
| | | Re: New Syngress RIS 2.0 Book!
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| (...) goes: (...) I didn't know that K'nex did this (or had forgotten), but I've always appreciated this in MLCad, which is where I got the idea. (...) My wife loves to build with LEGO, but only if she has step by step building instructions. I (...) (22 years ago, 12-Nov-02, to lugnet.books, lugnet.robotics)
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