Rover Project Build Thread

Hey DiyDrones,

 

New here, thought I'd introduce myself by talking about the project I'm planning out right now.

 

Initially I had planned on building a quadcopter, but I decided first I'm going to build an Arduino powered 4wd autonomous rover.  I'll probably start with a Traxxas Summit RC car, though I'm still researching other options (and searching craigslist for good deals.)

 

I live on 40 acres of very mountainous terrain so the summit will probably be the best bet.  While the rover's primary goal will be surveillance, it make take on a variety of other roles such as providing a mobile wifi repeater, picking up screws and nails on the road with a magnet, transporting items around the property, verifying that irrigation systems are working, retrieving the mail (or better yet a beer), or just serving as a "follow-me boombox/flashlight" while I work.

 

While I've covered most of the areas which I regularly go on the property with WiFi already, the rover will be able to function with or without connectivity.  If it has exhausted it's mission queue it will go to the nearest known hotspot to check in.  Otherwise it will continue it's tasks unless it senses something deemed an emergency event in which case it will seek communications immediately.

 

Initially I'll be looking to include the following features:

  • Route-finding via GPS, physical and optical input (may use colored or ir-illuminated markers to designate the edges of the road)
  • WiFi router flashed to dd-wrt and hacked for serial communication with Arduino
  • Pan/Tilt IP camera attached to said router.
  • Control over car's built-in locking differential and high/low selectable gearbox
  • Control over car's built-in LED lighting
  • Ability to turn car off when not moving to improve battery life as well as put router to sleep when data transmission isn't needed

 

Once I get those issues working well I'll look into adding the following:

  • Thermal Sensor for human/animal/automobile detection
  • Robotic arm
  • Cellular or xbee backup link for when not in wifi range
  • Supplemental solar recharging
  • Pan/Tilt directional wifi antenna to sweep for signal
  • Garage near my front gate which can automatically swap in a fresh battery and start charging the low one (also serves as a way to let the rover through the fence but not the dogs)
  • Non-lethal armaments such as pepper spray or bb-gun
  • RFID reader so it can identify trusted persons/pets
  • Pan/Tilt mount for my pd-150 3-ccd dvcam along with LANC interface for Stop/Rec/Zoom/Focus functions
  • RGB led lighting

 

Comments appreciated!

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Tim - Arduino for Visual Studio on December 1, 2011 at 5:38am

Yes i have some 4x4's under conversation and i really like your ideas

Battery power might be the only big drawback. Can you design some solar recharge stations at the checkin points?

May I suggest you also add a water cannon to stop the burning sensation reported by recent pepper spray "victims" :)

Permalink Reply by headinthetrees on December 1, 2011 at 11:26am

The recharge station already has land power (and water if it needs a bath) so that's not an issue.  The solar on the vehicle would just be to trickle charge the battery when it was stationary.  I'm thinking of making some sort of roof rack system where I could mount a battery instead of the stock location to make automated swapping easier. 

 

I like the water cannon idea, but it'd probably be used more for dog repellant than aiding trespassers.  Hopefully I'm not coming across like a paranoid person, but we have had several trespassers on the property since I've been here.  Hopefully this can be a tool to avoid a more serious confrontation.

Permalink Reply by Tim - Arduino for Visual Studio on December 1, 2011 at 11:42am

sounds like you have the facilities to do some really exciting stuff

Permalink Reply by Bot Thoughts on June 25, 2012 at 9:59am

Sounds like a neat project with real utility!

Battery on roof = terrible CoG, just what you don't want for difficult terrain.

Hope to hear more updates...

Permalink Reply by wraith on September 27, 2012 at 2:55pm

flag the water cannon, get ur self a automated paint ball sentry gun and mount that to it

Permalink Reply by headinthetrees on December 4, 2011 at 1:29am

So I found a platform for my rover.  Unfortunately its not a summit, but it will do for now.  Its a HPI Wheely King that's already been lightly modified for crawling.

Next step on the build is to order the arduino, a crawler specific esc, a stronger servo for the steering, and a megapixel ip camera.

I found a cheap router which is dd-wrt compatible and can be soldered for a serial connection.  So next step once the parts show up is to get the arduino and the router talking.


AdminPermalink Reply by Thomas J Coyle III on December 4, 2011 at 10:31am

headinthetrees,

Given the amount of funds you have to spend, you might want to consider this: http://www.mymindsi.com/ or this one: http://www.pololu.com/catalog/product/1561

Regards,

TCIII

Permalink Reply by headinthetrees on December 4, 2011 at 4:03pm

Those are some cool products for sure.  But I already got the r/c crawler and I think it will do pretty well for what I need.  I'd rather spend the extra money on a nice megapixel ip cam and fabricate my own mounts for whatever electronics I decide to include.

Thanks for the link though, those are awesome.

Permalink Reply by wraith on September 27, 2012 at 3:11pm

hi thomas, hay this 6 wheeler, how hard is it to get up and running, is it plug and play, im looking for a platform that can carry a lot of weight that is easy to set as i have no idea how program


AdminPermalink Reply by Thomas J Coyle III on September 27, 2012 at 4:33pm

wraith,

My six wheel rover is home-made. I used six geared 12vdc motors from Lynxmotion and a Hammond aluminum box as a chassis. I have a Dimension Engineering Sabetooth 25amp motor controller taking R/C input from a Spektrum receiver. The whole setup is powered by two 3S 5000mahr LiPos connected in parallel. It can carry up to 10 pounds, but I doubt that I will ever need that much capacity.

If you want a Plug and Play kit with a lot of weight carry capacity try this outfit: http://www.superdroidrobots.com/shop/category.aspx?catid=51

As you can see, the Plug and Play rovers are not cheap. I have one of the Superdroid 4WD chassis that I put my own motors in and later added a third pair of wheels connected to a pair of Parallax wheel encoders and is controlled by a Parallax Propeller running software developed by Steve Norris.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

TCIII

Permalink Reply by wraith on September 28, 2012 at 2:30pm

hi, would u mind posting a photo of ur six wheeler, my project does need to carry a decent payload, me and couple of mates are going a bathurst 1000, and if been put in charge of building a chilli bin , so basically my rover needs to be able to carry a chillibin full of beers, im using a savage asd my test platform but thats completly wrong chassis for what need due the savage's abilty to pop wheelies on command at 60kph


AdminPermalink Reply by Thomas J Coyle III on September 28, 2012 at 4:10pm

Hi wraith,

Here are several pictures of my 4WD Superdroid rover before I added the third pair of wheels.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

TCIII

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