Swarm Robotics For The Masses
Cheap swarm robotics available in a kit? Check. Open source? Check. Easily hackable? Check.
We really like the fact that the wires hanging off the side of these robots is a recharging wire. The little robot could potentially makes its way to its very own charging station!
The robots have two skis soldered to the bottom of the PCB and two charging prongs on the top. As well as supporting the front of the robot, the skis are ground terminals for charging. They make contact with a foil pad in the charging bay. The angled charging prongs are designed to wedge under the aluminium rail in the bay, which is powered.
To read more about the making and designing of Formica robots, click here.
Now go forth and create your Formica swarm army! Pre order your Formica kit for about $48 here or click through for a quick peek at the tiny robots in action.
Wednesday, January 6th 2010 at 12:09 pm |
Looks very similar to that other open source robot swarm project covered a while back:
http://www.hizook.com/blog/2009/11/08/open-hardware-micro-robot-swarm-project
Yet another great candidate for some wireless power.
http://www.hizook.com/blog/2008/10/07/wirelessly-powering-swarm-robots