This course if used by teams, mentors and students to structure the preparation for the Robotics Game of the FIRST LEGO League Robotics Competitions. One thing that is common each year at FLL is that experience matters a lot. Our goal with this course is to quickly bring new teams up to speed with experienced teams and to share some new tricks, patterns, constructions with the more experienced teams.
Robotics competitions with LEGO Mindstorms robots are very popular. One of the more popular types of robot constructions that are build for such competitions are the so-called "Box Robots". In this course we are gathering a series of videos on this box robots along with building instructions and recommendations of improvements.
After the first box robot course and its enormous success, we decided to build a second box robot. This time with fewer parts and with only three motors. The EV3 set comes with one medium motor and this robot will be easier for new teams. It is also lighter and more simple. Take the course and learn the ideas that we have in mind in simplifying a robot. Use this course with students and try to experiment to make the attachments and construction even simpler.
The course contains a number of sections with specific examples and tasks on how you could improve your FIRST LEGO League (FLL) robot game in order to achieve more points. It is designed mostly for after season teams that would like to prepare for next year, but could also work for teams that are currently working on their competition robots.
Next state in our state machine programming pattern is the "Turn Left" state and the corresponding behaviour.
We extract the Proportional Line Following algorithm into a new block with parameters. This allows us to experiment with the Threshold, Constant Speed and Relaxation Coefficient. You can now easily use the block in you other programs without having to implement it.
One of the very good things about box robots is that you could easily align with them both to the front, to the back or to the rear sides. This aligning is helpful for FIRST LEGO League, World Robotics Olympiad or other robotics competitions with LEGO Mindstorms EV3/NXT robots.
Continuing with the Proportional algorithm for following lines. Smooth and stable this is the first part of the PID.
In this video lesson I will show you how to follow a black line using just one sensor, but fast enough so that you could use it during any robotics competition without wasting any time.
It has been a long road with the last 8 BigDaddy competition robots video tutorials, but we finally arrived at the Differential Lock.
Looking at the field we must first think of a strategy of solving this line following problem. There are rules that the robot must follow and these rules should be programmed in the robot.
In this episode we continue from Episode 55 and we improve the durability and stability of the attachment for a LEGO Mindstorms EV3 robot. Many times attachments are not very stable which results in gaps between parts. The goal of the video is to give basic construction ideas.
Probably the robot I like the most from this series of five robots. See the video to understand why and what is interesting and special about this robot.
Next important state is Turn Right with our robot. This happens when we detect a line on the right.
Based on your feedback we have decided to show you the live process of building a complex LEGO Mindstorms Competition robot without having the whole robot ready yet. We would be making mistakes, showing them and taking up the challenges right in front of your eyes. The first construction would not be perfect but we would eventually arive at it.
In a competition environment like the FIRST LEGO League (FLL) or World Robotics Olympiad (WRO) the color sensor is more than useful. It makes positioning on the field quite easy and precise.
The second construction of the series along with a comparison with the first construction. The new robot requires more parts, but has a few more advantages.
We can Turn Right. We can Turn Left. How do we decide which way to go if there are lines both to the left and to the right. Check out the video.
We continue from part 3 where we finished part of the 'rear'. Power is transfered from a motor to the wheels but having about 16 gear wheels makes it more than complex for this LEGO Mindstorms EV3 Competition robot.
In Episode 58 we introduced you to a LEGO Mindstorms EV3 Modular robot. In this tutorial, we show you how we reached that construction. We start from a construction found on the Internet and take you through the process of examining and improving it, till we reach a more stable and reliable robot.
