RasPiRobot Rover Kit
| SKU: | 2127 |
Build your own Robot Rover for Raspberry Pi - just add Raspberry Pi and batteries.
The kit includes:
- RasPiRobot Board v3
- Raspberry Squid
- Raspberry Squid Button
- Range Finder
- Car Chassis
- 2 Gear Motors
- 2 Wheels
- Castor
- 2 Screwdrivers
- 6AA Battery Box (Batteries not included)
- All Necessary Screws And Nuts (plus some extra bits!)
- Booklet of instructions and projects
The kit uses the RRB3 library that you can download from GitHub.
You will find all the code for the example projects on GitHub.
The booklet of instructions includes the following activities:
- Blinking an LED on the RasPiRobot Board
- Using the RGB Squid LED including Cheerlights on Twitter
- Using a Squid Button
- Measuring distance with the ultrasonic rangefinder
- Detecting movement with the ultrasonic rangefinder
- Remote control rover
- Autonomous rover
Getting Started
The kit includes a full instruction booklet to show you how to make your roving robot, but the following video gives you an idea of what's involved in building the rover.
Resources
Because the Raspberry Pi is attached to the robot and not your keyboard and monitor, you will need to setup your Raspberry Pi so that you can connect to it remotely from another computer using SSH. The following guide will show you how to do that.
The kit uses the rrb3 library and if you take a look in the examples folder there, you will find other programs to explore with your rover.
Other Battery Options
7.4V LiPo racing packs have the advantage (over the supplied 6 x AA battery box) of being able to supply high currents without losing much voltage either through €˜internal resistance' of the batteries or resistance in the leads from the battery box to the RRB3. Theses LiPo racing packs tend to have good thick leads and very low internal resistance. The 9V is only necessary with AA batteries, because they have more voltage losses at high current and so when the motors start up, the voltage arriving at the RRB3 can drop below the 6V or so needed to stop the Raspberry Pi rebooting.
If you are not keen on single use AA batteries, then powering the Pi separately from a 5V LiPo phone battery backup means that the Pi won't reset itself even if the motors do cause the voltage supplied by the €˜motor' battery to drop below 6V. This also means that you could use rechargeable AA batteries in the AA battery box, or even use a 4 x AA battery box rather than the 6 x AA box suggested. You only need the 6 x AA battery box if also powering the Raspberry Pi from the batteries.
Troubleshooting
Problem: I can't install the raspirobotboard3 library
Make sure that your Raspberry Pi's internet connection is working ok. If you get an error running the €˜git' command, then it probably means you are using an old version of Raspbian that does not include €˜git'. The best thing to do is to download NOOBs and install the latest version of Raspbian from https://www.raspberrypi.org/help/noobs-setup/2/
Problem: The batteries do not power the Raspberry Pi
If the batteries do not power the Raspberry Pi, then please check the following:
* The batteries are new and fresh
* All the batteries are the correct way around
* The battery lead is connected with the correct polarity (red to +)
* The screw terminals for the battery are NOT gripping one of the battery leads insulation rather than the bare wire.