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Pololu Blog (Page 92)
Welcome to the Pololu Blog, where we provide updates about what we and our customers are doing and thinking about. This blog used to be Pololu president Jan Malášek’s Engage Your Brain blog; you can view just those posts here.
Popular tags: community projects new products raspberry pi arduino more…
Interfacing a FrSky telemetry receiver with a Baby Orangutan.
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Forum user erik46 wrote up a document (523k pdf) showing how to read FrSky telemetry data and display it with a Baby Orangutan. The whole setup is small and light enough to clip on to an RC transmitter. For more information, see his forum post.
iPhone-controlled 3pi Robot.
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In this project, a WiFi module is connected to a 3pi robot, allowing it to be controlled by an iPhone. Here is a video of the robot in action:
Featured link: http://forum.pololu.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2816
Obstacle Avoider
This simple obstacle-avoiding robot by forum user TomatoWire is based on the Maestro and uses continuous-rotation servos and distance sensors. The robot is programmed using the Maestro’s internal scripting language, without the need for an additional microcontroller.
Featured link: http://forum.pololu.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2756
AIRbot
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AIRbot is a robot that can be controlled by a cellphone and can send images back to the cellphone. It uses a yellow RP5 tracked chassis, a transparent clear RP5 expansion plate, and a qik 2s9v1 dual serial motor controller along with the AIRcable S.D.K. and the AIRcable OptiEyes. The source code (both AIRcable and Nokia) and circuit diagrams are freely available.
Featured link: http://wiki.opensensors.org/airbot
Automatic Infrared Light Source Tracking HD Camcorder
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In this project, an HD camcorder sits on a pan/tilt mount controlled by a Micro Maestro 6-Channel USB Servo Controller. A Wiimote is used to track an IR light source. Here is a video taken from the mounted camcorder:
Featured link: http://helifreak.com/showthread.php?p=1868143#post1868143
Using the Pololu Pushbutton Power Switch
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This instructable shows how to power an Arduino through the Pololu Pushbutton Power Switch and use the self-shutoff feature.
Featured link: http://www.instructables.com/id/Using-the-Pololu-Pushbutton-Power-Switch/
Maestro Support for RoboRealm
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This module for RoboRealm provides an interface to the Pololu Maestro USB servo controllers, linking advanced video processing to RC servo motion control.
Featured link: http://www.roborealm.com/help/Pololu_Maestro.php
R2D2 dome position control
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This replica of the famous Star Wars droid R2D2, built by Glenn Pipe, uses a Jrk USB motor controller for position control. The video below shows how Glenn uses the Jrk Configuration Utility to control and analyze his system, and his blog post has more information.
Featured link: http://astromech.wordpress.com/2010/02/05/adding-position-control-to-r2s-dome/
Paparazzi Autopilot for Linux
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Patrick Hickey and Bradley Lord use a Pololu Micro Maestro for servo output and a Pololu 4 servo multiplexer to support manual control override in their model aircraft autopilot project.
Featured link: http://moreproductive.org/autopilot/
Active Magnetic Bearing: Tripod Floater v2.0
In this video, Meindert Norg from Norg Consulting demonstrates his active magnetic bearing, Tripod Floater. The closed-loop system uses three Pololu 18v15 high-power motor drivers as PWM amplifiers to power the magnetic coils that keep the module floating beneath the metal plate.
February, 2010 update: the Tripod Floater is now wireless:
Featured link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-f_H68Rl4g