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Idea: Drawing shapes with a robot and then getting them into the computer
ok, i haven't thought this one all the way through, but here is an idea that i
had a long time ago, i forgot about, and then it cropped up again today in my
head...
A robot with two angle sensors that is constantly datalogging them both and the
timestamp for each. One angle sensor records forward/backward movement, and
the other records side to side movement. The mechanics could be somewhat like
the Technic 8094 plotter, with racks, but no worm gears, because I want
hand-driven passive motion, not motor driven.
The idea is that you would grab the robot (or if it is stationary thing, like
the 8094, then just grab the "pen" part) and move it in a certain shape. Then
you upload the data into the computer. Then, with ROBOLAB Investigator Compute
Tools 5 (G Code), or something like Excel, you turn the raw data into
parametric (angle sensor1=x, angle sensor2=y) and plot it over time.
If I remember correctly, I think ROBOLAB does something to remedy the fact that
both sensors won't necessarily be taking data with the exact same timestamp.
This would be something that would need to be corrected in other environments
so that the time stamps are equal.
This is a different spin on the other fax machines, plotters, scanners, and
"robots that draw things with a pen" that exist out there. The difference here
is that you don't draw something first and then scan it in to get the
information in the computer - but just "draw" it. Has someone does this? Is
it even possible to get anywhere near accurate results?
I got this idea when working on writing up the Infrared FAX Machine (made from
two 8094 Technic kits) for my book back in June.
-ben
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: Robot Idea (been done before?)
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| That's a 'plotter' input device you're descibing - it used to be quite a popular input device for CAD (and I think still is at the high end of the market), but for general use, the mouse has replaced it. I remember building something similar for my (...) (24 years ago, 11-Jan-01, to lugnet.robotics.rcx, lugnet.robotics)
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