I took my inverted pendulum balancing robot, added a camera and wireless transmitter, and let everyone around the office take a spin. The event was not without mishap, but it’s a lot of fun to watch people interact with the robot, and not so much fun when they try to block it’s view, or just don’t get out of it’s way. Or they kick volleyballs at it. That’s just mean.

I added feedback from the motor encoders this week, which allows the robot to know that it is moving. Previously it only knew it was tilted, so it wanted to run away if it was only tilted slightly. I also wired up the batteries, which were salvaged from a less-than-optimal dell laptop battery. I’ve still got some work to do, but the velocity feedback is now countering it’s tendency to run away. The center of gravity is still really low (I’m waiting for mounts to get made to move the batteries up to the top), so it can still outrun itself really easily. Next on the list is to add control from the PC via the bluetooth module that is currently attached.

My birthday was a couple of weeks ago. I made the big 2-6. Yeah, kinda anti-climactic, I know. Anyway, Katie and my parents were kind enough to pitch in and buy me an airplane I’ve been wanting for awhile. I built it up last Friday, and then proceeded to go camping and snowshoeing in Sequoia NP for the remainder of the weekend, so I flew it first today. It ended up being a Santa-Ana winds weekend here anyway, so it was for the better. With some help from some much more knowledgeable co-workers, I got the plane and controller all set up and threw it off the hill for the first flight. The plane flies great, the pilot needs some practice. I’m very happy I got the model with the motor to save me when I make mistakes, otherwise I would have been doing a lot of hiking up and down the hill. The idea is that you fly in the rising air out in front of a hill looking into the wind. This way, the rising air provides lift and you can glide forever (usually without power required), as long as you’re skillful and the wind doesn’t die. Many people build ultra-light gliders for just this purpose without motors, but since I’m just starting out, a glider with a motor was a practical choice. Here are some pictures a friend took of the maiden voyage with a crummy 2MP camera from work.